Why do students attend lectures?: Exploring justifications for attendance among undergraduate students from a British university in Asia

A substantial amount of time and resources are invested in the improvement of teaching and learning methods within Higher Education institutions today. These efforts could be undermined by problems of low student attendance however – an issue which has attracted increased attention in 21^st century education literature. Moreover, previous studies have found that lecture attendance is a key factor in improving student academic performance. Thus, the main aim of this paper was to gain insight into Undergraduate student perceptions on their lecture attendance. This included identifying student’s perceptions on reasons for both lecture attendance and absenteeism, using data obtained from 162 undergraduate Business students from a British university in Southeast Asia. A purposive sample was selected from three diverse economics modules – classified according to year of study. Ethical guidelines for social research were adopted in this study. The main reasons cited by students as motivations to attend lectures included: acquiring knowledge, gaining exam guidance and collection of lecture notes. On the other hand, students stated that they will not attend lecture if the classes are held during weekend and if they needed time to complete their coursework. Contradict to previous studies, availability of online lecture materials and environmental conditions are not valid reasons for not attending lectures. In the second stage analysis, this study also investigated the association between key reasons for attending and not attending lectures and student characteristics, using Chi-Square test. The findings suggest that female students perceived that attending class would lead to good grades above male students. Interestingly, more male students highlighted that they would be less likely to attend classes if a lecture slot competed with a coursework deadline. It is worth noting that student perceptions on reasons for attending and not attending lectures are not statistically different across year of study. The policy implications for universities with a similar profile are also discussed.