Factors Affecting Academic Performance Among Senior Secondary School Students in Nigeria

Background and Purpose: Understanding the factors that influences/affects academic performance is a major area of interest worldwide. Many studies have been conducted to determine the factors that influences academic performance across the world. Some factors that has been studied in relations to academic performance are school environment/climate, parent educational background, socio economic status, learning styles among other factors. The purpose of this study was to look at studies between January 2000 to December 2015 and examine the factors that were significant in influencing/affecting academic performance in senior secondary school students in Nigeria.

Methods: A systematic search from Scopus, PsycINFO (ProQuest), CINAHL (EBSCO), and Academic Search Complete (EBSCO) was conducted for all types of articles involving factors that influences academic performance in senior secondary school students in Nigeria. A total of 18 articles met the criteria.

Results: of the 18 studies, 8 studies showed that school environment/climate has significant impact on academic performance. Despite the limitations of not all the studies using the same research design, having diverse sample sizes, being concentrated in one region of Nigeria out of four possible regions, and not using the same test and measurement scales, knowing the factors that are significant in affecting/influencing academic performance is helpful in helping to inform future studies.

Conclusions and Implications: Based on the systematic review conducted, school environment/climate which entails various variables such as class size, classroom environment, teacher’s attitude, qualification, teaching style, as well as instructional and learning materials and instructional supervision has been found to be significant in affecting the academic performance of senior secondary school students in Nigeria. Another factor that this review uncovered was the impact of food intake such as skipping or eating breakfast on academic performance. This review found these factors to be significant and they have implications to consider for social work practice and research. Some implications for social work practice include advocacy towards improving school environment/climate. Advocacy is a core principle of social work practice and school social workers can help advocate for better school environment/climate in other to ensure students are provided with the utmost resources and support necessary to succeed in school. It is also essential to study the effects of these factors that affects academic performance not just at one point in time but also over a long period which can provide better insight for researchers to understand various interventions that can be applied to reduce the effect of these factors.