Abstract

The objective of the study was to determine how well recent senior high school graduates understand basic consumer financial concepts and to ascertain those financial topics for which a significant proportion of students admit to not having knowledge. The sample for this research consisted of first-year degree students with a business major at the University of Cape Coast. There were 343 out of 613 business-major first-year students enrolled in the school of business that were tested on 20 multiple-choice questions dealing with basic knowledge of financial issues, which should be understood in order to function in everyday life. Of these, 190 were male and 152 were female. The highest test score was 75% and was achieved by 1 student only and the lowest was 5% and was achieved by 7 students. The average score was 35.87% for all students and the median score was 35%. Unlike most previous studies, students were offered the opportunity to respond “don’t know” to each question. On 15 of the 20 questions, more students selected the incorrect answers than those selecting “don’t know” answer.

Key words: Knowledge, personal finance, freshmen business students, Ghana.