Personal, Home And Social Factors As Determinants Of Female Students’ Enrolment And Completion In University Education In Southwestern Nigeria, 2001-2010

ABSTRACT

Female students‘ enrolment and completion in university education in Nigeria was low between

2001-2010. These have been attributed to some personal, home and social factors which have

inhibited many females from being enrolled and completing university education in some

courses. Previous studies examined the link between these factors and low female enrolment and

completion at the primary and secondary school levels without focusing on Science Education,

Engineering, Agriculture, Law, Mathematics and Statistics at university level. This study,

therefore, examined personal (age, role model with mentorship and feminine inclination), home

(mothers‘ education, fathers‘ education, parent‘s socio-economic status and parental support)

and social (school environment, socio cultural value, government and non-governmental

involvement) factors as determinants of female students‘ enrolment and completion in these

universities courses from 2001-2010.

The study adopted a causal modelling design with two hypothesised models. Six governmentowned

universities (one per state) from the south-west were selected. They comprised three

states (Adekunle Ajasin, Ekiti State and Olabisi Onabanjo Universities) and three federal

(University of Ibadan, Obafemi Awolowo University and University of Lagos). Stratified and

purposive sampling techniques were used to select 622 female final and penultimate year

students from five courses (Mechanical engineering (37), Civil law (207), Mathematics and

Statistics (38), Science Education (164) and Agriculture (176). Role model and mentorship

(r=0.75), feminine inclination (r=0.89), parents socio-economic status (r=0.87), parental

involvement (r=0.83), school environment (r=0.79), traditional and cultural value (r=0.76) and

government and non-governmental involvement (r=0.83) inventories were used to collect data.

Key informant interview was also used. Data were subjected to multiple regression, path

analysis at 0.05 level of significance and content analysis.

The 10 factors had significant joint contributions to female enrolment and completion in

university education (F(9,612) =26.46; R2=0.28) and (F(9,612)=15.44; R2=0.20), accounting for

28.0% and 20.2% of their variances respectively. Role model with mentorship (β=.29), school

environment (β=.29), had relative contributions to enrolment while parental support (β=.23) age

(β=19) and socio-cultural value (β=19) had relative contributions to completion. There was no

significant difference between the hypothesised and the reproduced models. The percentage of

direct and indirect effects were 55.6% and 44.3% on enrolment while on completion were 67.3%

and 38.7% respectively. There were 62 pathways, where eight and 54 exert direct and indirect

causative effects on enrolment, and 103 pathways where seven and 96 exert direct and indirect

effects on completion. Content analysis revealed that there was attrition despite low enrolment of

female students across the courses examined.

Role model with mentorship and school environment factors had casual effects on enrolment

pattern while parental support, age and socio-cultural values were key determinants of

completion of university education among female students in Nigeria. These factors should be

taken cognizance of in order to improve female enrolment and completion of courses at the

university level.