FACTORS RESPONSIBLE FOR POOR FEMALE ENROLMENT FOR POSTGRADUATE STUDIES IN NIGERIAN UNIVERSITIES

Abstract

Despite the recent advances made by women in various domain of public life, the numbers of women who seek for postgraduate programme in Nigerian Universities are on the decrease. Though many started the programme but were unable to complete them due to some cultural, religious, economic and manmade factors. This paper is examining factors affecting female participation in postgraduate studies. The study adopted the descriptive survey research method using questionnaire. The study population is from eight faculties out of thirteen faculties in the University of Ibadan. The University of Ibadan is chosen because of her dynamic policy of becoming a postgraduate institution. Stratified random sampling technique was used to select 480 female postgraduate students purposively. This was to ensure easy accessibility of sample and true representation in the university. Descriptive statistics of mean, simple percentage and standard deviation was used to analyze the data collected. The finding revealed that economic factors such as spouses’ poor encouragement constitutes barrier to female participation in postgraduate studies with a mean score of 2.32 which represents 95.2%. Other factors that affected female participation in postgraduate studies include; material resources, cultural/social factors and students’ attitudes/knowledge on research work. The paper concludes by stating that females in Nigeria should wake from their slumber and become active towards becoming highly educated citizens’ as well champion critical development in building female capacities in all fields of life. Recommendations were made based on the finding of the study.