Examination of the Predictive Effects of Parents Attitude, Socio-Economic Status and Home Facilities on Secondary School Learning Outcomes in South-West Nigeria

Abstract

The challenges facing secondary school level of education in Nigeria seem to have negatively affected student learning outcomes. Literature reveal that about 70.0% of candidates presented for Senior Secondary School (SSS) Certificate Examinations between 2001 and 2010 failed in five subjects including English language and mathematics. Most studies previously conducted on home affecting secondary school student learning outcomes only investigated socio-economic status without considering their combined influence with the parent attitude towards their children education. This study, therefore, examined the predictive influence of parents’ socio-economic status, parent’s attitude towards their children education and home facilities on secondary school student learning outcomes in Oyo State, Nigeria. The study adopted the correlational survey design. Multistage sampling technique was adopted for the study.  Stratified sampling technique was used to select 4,670 SSS II students from 348 public secondary schools that have presented students for SSS examination between 2001 and 2010. Home Factors Questionnaire (HFQ) (r = 0.79) was used for data collection. Data were analysed using descriptive statistics and multiple regressions at 0.05 level  of significance. Two components of home education matrix as indicated by the students: parents’ socio-economic status (β = 0.165 t = 9.21) and parents’ attitude toward children’s education (β = 0.459, t = 24.911) contributed significantly to student learning outcomes, while home equipment did not. A significant difference was found between the learning outcome of students from the three socio-economic background (F (3, 2656) = 100.347, P < 0.05). It was discovered in this analysis that learning outcome of students from low socio-economic background (m = 18.46, sd = 9.10) seems to be lower than the learning outcome of students from medium socio-economic background (m = 23.51, sd = 9.03) and students from high socio-economic background (m = 19.70, sd = 8.06). Learning outcome of students from high and medium socio-economic backgrounds were not significantly different from each other. Parents should demonstrate positive attitude towards their children’s education.

Keywords: Parent attitude, Parent socio-economic status, Home facilities, Learning outcomes