Fred Awaah
6 Publications in AERD
Author Publications
Export PDFEffects of cyberbullying on the academic life of Ghanaian tertiary students
By Fred Awaah
Purpose: This study aims to examine the effects of cyberbullying on the academic lives of Ghanaian university students. It also establishes whether cyberbullying victims, perpetrators, victim-perpetrators and bystanders differed in their thoughts on the effects of cyberbullying on students’ academic lives. Design/methodology/approach: This study is anchored on Bandura’s theory of triadic reciprocal determinism and Abraham Maslow’s theory of needs. This study uses a cross-sectional survey design and quantitative approach to collect the data from 1,374 students from three public universities. The authors use descriptive statistics and ANOVA techniques to analyse the data. Findings: The results show that the effects of cyberbullying on academic life are difficulty concentrating on studies, difficulty studying in groups and difficulty assessing important academic information online. There is also a statistically significant difference among cyberbullying victims, perpetrators, victim-perpetrators and bystanders in their thoughts on the effects of cyberbullying on students’ academic lives. Originality/value: This research contributes to the literature on cyberbullying in the Ghanaian tertiary education environment. Even though the impact of cyberbullying on academics in Ghanaian universities may seem minimal, it is still imperative that it be checked, as it is significant enough to disrupt effective academic work. Thus, this study adds to the existing literature on cyberbullying from a developing country perspective. © 2023, Emerald Publishing Limited.
The culturo-techno-contextual approach and students' understanding of computer science education in a developing economy
By Mariyam Abdulhadi
Purpose: The lecture method has been compared with teaching methods such as flip learning, cooperative learning and simulations to establish which holds the key to students' understanding of concepts. What is bereft in the education literature is its comparative efficiency with the culturo-techno contextual approach (CTCA) in the teaching of computer science education. Design/methodology/approach: This study adopted the quasi-experimental design to determine the efficacy of the CTCA in breaking difficulties related to the study of spreadsheets as a difficult concept in the Nigerian computer science education curriculum. Junior high school students studying computer science education participated in the study. The control group had 30 students, with 35 students in the experimental group. The experimental group was taught using CTCA, while the control group used the lecture method. The spread sheet achievement test, which had 40 items on spreadsheet, was used to collect data. Findings: The results showed that the experimental group significantly outperformed the control group [F (1,60) = 41.89; p < 0.05]. The findings showed the potential of CTCA in improving students' performance in spreadsheets in the computer science education curriculum. Originality/value: The originality of this study is hinged on its ground-breaking test of the CTCA to the study of the spreadsheet. The findings of this study indicate its efficacy in improving students' understanding of spreadsheet and computer science education. © 2023, Mariyam Abdulhadi, Fred Awaah, Deborah Agbanimu, Emmanuel Okyere Ekwam and Emmanuella Sefiamor Heloo.
Does students' understanding of corporate governance in Ghanaian higher education relate to teacher knowledge and teaching methods?
By Solomon Yeboah
There is empirical evidence on the factors influencing students' understanding of various subjects in higher educational institutions. However, there is a deficit in studies about the link between teacher knowledge and teaching methods on students' understanding of corporate governance course. Thus, this study investigates whether students' understanding of corporate governance in Ghanaian universities is related to teacher knowledge and teaching methods. This study adopts quantitative approach and cross-sectional design to collect from 1,050 sampled students from three public universities in Ghana. We use descriptive statistics and Pearson correlation techniques to analyse the data. The results show that there is a significant positive correlation between teacher knowledge and students' understanding of corporate governance. Furthermore, teaching methods have significant positive correlation with students' understanding of corporate governance. This study has provided a conceptual framework that indicates how teacher knowledge and teaching methods may relate to students' understanding of corporate governance in higher education from the perspective of a developing country. Additionally, this study shows that to promote students' comprehension of corporate governance, there must an understanding of how teacher knowledge and teaching methods can overlap to address the challenges confronting governance education in developing countries. © 2024 The Author(s). European Journal of Education published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
Exploratory study of the efficacy of the Culturo-Techno-Contextual Approach (CTCA) in student’s understanding of biology
By Fred Awaah
Past studies have established cell division as a difficult topic in the Nigerian senior school system. While the lecture method has been used over time to overcome the challenges relative to students’ understanding of cell division, a deficit in the literature is whether or not cultural teaching methodologies would help students’ understanding of the concept. This study aims at testing the potency of the Culturo- Techno- Contextual Approach (CTCA) in enhancing students’ understanding of cell division. The study is anchored on Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory, Nkrumah’s ethnophilosophy, and Heidegger’s techno-philosophy. The quasi-experimental study had 26 students from the Feranmi Comprehensive High School (control group), with 21 students from the Royal Priesthood Secondary School (experimental group). The results showed that the experimental group (Mean = 33.29 and SD = 2.37) significantly outperformed the control group (Mean = 23.19 and SD = 4.92) in cell division [F (1, 44) = 137.19; p<.05]. © 2023 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.
Perception of cyberbullying among students: the study of a developing country
By Andrew Tetteh
Purpose: This study aims to investigate students’ perceptions regarding the causes and effects of cyberbullying among university students. The study also establishes whether or not there would be statistically significant differences among cyberbullying victims, perpetrators, victim-perpetrators and bystanders in their thoughts on the causes and effects of cyberbullying on students’ social lives from a developing country perspective. Design/methodology/approach: This study uses quantitative approach and cross-sectional survey design to collect primary data from 1,374 undergraduate students sampled from selected public universities in Ghana. Descriptive statistics and analysis of variance analyses were carried out using statistical package for the social sciences. Findings: The study reports popularity among friends, extortion, retaliation, stress, trauma and low self-esteem as causes of cyberbullying. Also, cyberbullying resulted in difficulty trusting people, low self-esteem and increased stress. The study also found statistically significant differences among cyberbullying victims, perpetrators, victim-perpetrators and bystanders in their thoughts on the causes and effects of cyberbullying on students’ social lives. Practical implications: The study’s findings imply that cyberbullying has some fairly significant negative effects on students’ lives in Ghana and must be taken more seriously. Conditions must be created to ensure that perpetrators and victims are given the support needed to curb this menace. Detailed remediating measures are provided in the study. Originality/value: This paper contributes to the existing literature by studying cyberbullying perceptions among students from a relatively bully-tolerant culture. © 2022, Emerald Publishing Limited.
Students' career interests and entrepreneurship education in a developing country
By Fred Awaah
Purpose: Students' career choices and programmes of study are perceived to influence student understanding of many courses. Yet, research attention is limited on entrepreneurship education that is a panacea for unemployment. Thus, this paper aims to assess the influence of students' career interests on students' comprehension of the entrepreneurship curriculum from a developing economy perspective. Design/methodology/approach: The study adopts a mixed-method approach and explanatory sequential design is used to collect the data from 575 student studying entrepreneurship course in Ghana. Findings: The results show that there is no statistically significant relationship between students' career interests and students' comprehension levels in concepts taught in the entrepreneurship curriculum but a statistically significant relationship between students' programme of study and students' comprehension levels in concepts taught in the entrepreneurship curriculum in Ghanaian universities. Practical implications: The findings imply that the entrepreneurship course should be taught practically. This can be accomplished by creating a virtual enterprise modelled after a successful enterprise. This will help students understand the concepts being taught. Second, students who study different programmes should be taught using different methods. Lastly, students who study non-business-related programmes should be taught using methods that emphasise the basic ideas to aid students' understanding. Originality/value: This study has made significant contribution by successful adopting the Piaget's cognitive constructivism to the learning of entrepreneurship from a developing country perspective and establish that no statistical relationship exist between students' career interests and students' comprehension levels in entrepreneurship education. © 2022, Emerald Publishing Limited.
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