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Effect of Relevant Costing Instruction on Students’ Short-Term Business Decision-Making Skills in Nigerian Polytechnics

Abstract

Relevant costing is an important component of management accounting because it provides information required for evaluating short-term business alternatives and making appropriate managerial decisions. However, students in Nigerian polytechnics may experience difficulties applying relevant costing principles when instruction focuses mainly on formulas, definitions, and routine calculations without sufficient opportunities to distinguish relevant and irrelevant costs within realistic decision-making situations. Relevant Costing Instruction provides a structured approach to teaching students how to identify costs and revenues that change between alternatives, exclude sunk and unavoidable costs, evaluate incremental financial effects, and apply relevant information to short-term business decisions. This approach may strengthen students' analytical reasoning, numerical accuracy, interpretation of accounting information, and ability to evaluate alternative courses of action. Against this background, this study investigates the effect of Relevant Costing Instruction on students' short-term business decision-making skills in Nigerian polytechnics. The study will be anchored on Experiential Learning Theory, Constructivist Learning Theory, and Cognitive Learning Theory. Experiential Learning Theory emphasizes learning through concrete experiences, reflection, conceptualization, and active experimentation, making practical decision-making activities relevant to the teaching of relevant costing. Constructivist Learning Theory emphasizes the active construction of knowledge through problem-solving, interaction, and connection of new information with prior knowledge. Cognitive Learning Theory focuses on how learners process, organize, retain, retrieve, and apply information when evaluating alternatives and making decisions. Collectively, these theoretical perspectives provide a suitable framework for explaining how Relevant Costing Instruction may influence students' short-term business decision-making skills. The study will adopt a quantitative quasi-experimental research design. The study population will comprise accounting education students enrolled in selected public polytechnics across Nigeria. A multistage sampling technique will be used to select geopolitical zones, states, polytechnics, departments, levels of study, classes, and eligible students. Relevant Costing Instruction will be assessed using indicators such as identification of relevant costs, classification of costs, distinction between relevant and irrelevant costs, identification of sunk costs, identification of opportunity costs, identification of avoidable costs, identification of unavoidable costs, incremental cost analysis, incremental revenue analysis, differential cost analysis, contribution analysis, comparison of alternatives, make-or-buy decisions, special-order decisions, product discontinuation decisions, product-mix decisions, capacity utilization decisions, replacement decisions, outsourcing decisions, shutdown decisions, acceptance or rejection of special orders, scarce-resource allocation, limiting-factor decisions, short-term pricing decisions, qualitative and quantitative decision factors, decision-making scenarios, business case studies, practical exercises, cost-analysis worksheets, guided problem-solving, decision trees, cost tables, numerical illustrations, real-world business examples, group discussions, individual exercises, lecturer demonstrations, guided practice, independent practice, immediate feedback, error analysis, reflection, repeated decision-making exercises, and opportunities to apply relevant costing principles to unfamiliar business situations. Students' short-term business decision-making skills will be assessed using indicators such as identification of business problems, identification of decision alternatives, collection of relevant accounting information, distinction between relevant and irrelevant information, recognition of sunk costs, identification of opportunity costs, calculation of incremental costs, calculation of incremental revenues, computation of differential costs, determination of contribution margins, comparison of alternative courses of action, evaluation of make-or-buy decisions, analysis of special-order decisions, product discontinuation decisions, product-mix decisions, outsourcing decisions, replacement decisions, shutdown decisions, scarce-resource allocation, limiting-factor decisions, short-term pricing decisions, interpretation of cost information, numerical accuracy, logical reasoning, financial analysis, evaluation of quantitative and qualitative factors, selection of appropriate alternatives, justification of business decisions, explanation of decision-making processes, identification of errors in cost analysis, correction of incorrect decisions, application of relevant costing principles to unfamiliar scenarios, and ability to make appropriate short-term business decisions based on available accounting information. Data will be collected using structured questionnaires, standardized relevant costing and decision-making tests, practical cost-analysis exercises, business case studies, scenario-based questions, decision-making tasks, observation checklists, competency-based assessment rubrics, and pre-test and post-test assessments. Descriptive statistics will be used to summarize students' demographic and academic characteristics, exposure to Relevant Costing Instruction, learning experiences, and levels of short-term business decision-making skills. Inferential statistical techniques, including paired and independent t-tests, analysis of covariance (ANCOVA), correlation analysis, and multiple regression analysis where appropriate, will be used to determine the effect of Relevant Costing Instruction on students' short-term business decision-making skills. Where a quasi-experimental design is adopted, students' decision-making scores before and after exposure to Relevant Costing Instruction may be compared with those of a control group receiving conventional management accounting instruction to determine changes associated with the intervention. Diagnostic tests will also be conducted to assess the reliability, validity, and robustness of the findings. The study is expected to find that Relevant Costing Instruction has a significant positive effect on students' short-term business decision-making skills in Nigerian polytechnics. Students exposed to structured and practically oriented relevant costing instruction are expected to demonstrate stronger abilities to identify relevant information, evaluate alternatives, perform incremental cost analysis, and make appropriate short-term business decisions than students receiving conventional instruction. Cost-classification activities may help students distinguish costs that are relevant to a particular decision from those that should be excluded. Sunk-cost exercises may help students understand why historical costs should not influence future choices, while opportunity-cost activities may demonstrate the financial implications of choosing one alternative over another. Incremental-cost and incremental-revenue exercises may strengthen students' ability to evaluate the financial consequences of alternative decisions. Make-or-buy scenarios may enable students to compare avoidable production costs with external purchase costs and identify relevant qualitative considerations. Special-order exercises may help students determine whether additional orders should be accepted based on incremental revenues and relevant costs. Product-discontinuation cases may strengthen students' ability to distinguish avoidable costs from costs that would continue after discontinuation. Product-mix and scarce-resource problems may help students allocate limited resources to alternatives that provide the most beneficial contribution. Outsourcing and replacement decisions may provide opportunities to evaluate relevant financial information alongside qualitative considerations. Shutdown decisions may help students understand the distinction between avoidable and unavoidable costs. Short-term pricing cases may encourage students to apply relevant cost information when evaluating pricing alternatives. Business case studies may enable students to apply relevant costing principles to realistic managerial situations rather than isolated numerical exercises. Decision trees and cost tables may help students organize information and compare alternatives systematically. Group discussions may expose students to different approaches to cost analysis and decision-making, while individual exercises may strengthen personal accountability. Immediate feedback may enable students to identify errors in classifying costs or evaluating alternatives. Repeated practice may improve students' ability to apply relevant costing principles to unfamiliar situations. Reflection activities may encourage students to explain why particular information was relevant or irrelevant to a decision. However, weak prior knowledge of cost accounting, difficulty distinguishing relevant from irrelevant information, poorly designed business scenarios, limited practical resources, inadequate instructional time, large class sizes, insufficient lecturer guidance, excessive emphasis on numerical calculations, and failure to consider qualitative factors may reduce the effectiveness of Relevant Costing Instruction. The study therefore expects structured, practical, decision-focused, and contextually relevant Relevant Costing Instruction to contribute significantly to improved short-term business decision-making skills among accounting education students in Nigerian polytechnics. The study is expected to contribute to the literature on Relevant Costing Instruction, short-term business decision-making skills, management accounting education, Experiential Learning Theory, Constructivist Learning Theory, Cognitive Learning Theory, relevant cost analysis, incremental analysis, managerial decision-making, cost accounting instruction, accounting education, practical accounting education, learner-centred instruction, accounting pedagogy, analytical reasoning, and polytechnic education in Nigeria. The findings will provide useful information to the National Board for Technical Education, polytechnics, accounting education departments, accounting educators, curriculum developers, professional accounting bodies, and policymakers regarding strategies for improving students' decision-making skills in management accounting. The study will also provide evidence-based recommendations for integrating Relevant Costing Instruction into management accounting programmes, developing realistic short-term business decision-making cases, using practical cost-analysis exercises to distinguish relevant and irrelevant costs, incorporating make-or-buy and special-order scenarios, using product-mix and scarce-resource activities to strengthen analytical skills, incorporating qualitative factors into relevant costing decisions, providing immediate feedback on cost-analysis errors, training accounting educators in practical relevant costing instruction, developing competency-based assessments of short-term business decision-making skills, and aligning accounting education with the analytical, numerical, financial, and managerial competencies required in contemporary business practice in Nigeria.

Keywords: Relevant Costing Instruction, short-term business decision-making skills, management accounting, accounting education students, relevant cost analysis, incremental analysis, managerial decision-making, Experiential Learning Theory, Constructivist Learning Theory, Cognitive Learning Theory, cost accounting instruction, practical accounting education, analytical reasoning, Nigerian polytechnics, Nigeria.