Impact of Socio-Cultural Factors on Senior Secondary School Students’ Academic Achievement in Physics

This study examined the impact of socio-cultural factors on the achievement in physics. Descriptive survey research designs were adopted. The sample for the study consisted of one hundred and seventy-one students who were selected from three intact co-educational senior secondary school physics classes. Two research questions raised for investigation alongside one corresponding null hypothesis were answered and tested respectively. Two Instruments: Physics Achievement Test (PAT) and Student Socio-cultural factors on Achievement Questionnaire (SSAQ) were used to collect data for the study. The Physics Achievement Test had a reliability coefficient of the achievement test was 0.87 using spilt-half method while that of the questionnaire was 0.91 using the Cronbach alpha method. using the Mean, Standard deviation, bar graph and Analysis of variance (ANOVA) statistical tools. The data collected were analysed using the Mean, Standard deviation, bar graph and Analysis of variance (ANOVA) statistical tools. Findings in this study revealed that of all the socio-cultural factors considered in this study which include sex, student attitude, parental educational background and peer group, parental educational background had the highest impact on students achievement. Also, the study revealed that there was significant impact between socio-cultural factors and students’ achievement in physics; F (5,123) = 2.676, p