Investigating factors influencing class attendance and performance of first-year economics students
Abstract
The academic success of first-year Economics students has been examined in many South
African studies in Economic Education. These studies controlled for differences in demographic
characteristics, last school examination (Matric) subjects and results, as well as lecture and tutorial
attendance when investigating differences in students’ performance. While there is an abundance
of international studies investigating the main reasons for attendance or non-attendance, these
studies are rare in the South African context, especially in the field of Economics. Hence, this
study fills the existing local research gap by investigating factors influencing lecture attendance as
well as their possible impact on the performance of first-year Microeconomics students at the
University of the Western Cape.