International Journal of Management, Knowledge and Learning, 9(1), 95–107
Skills, Gender, and Performance Matter
when Undergraduate Business
Students Choose Specialisation
within Business Courses
Leiv Opstad
Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Norway
Torbjørn Årethun
Western Norway University of Applied Sciences, Norway
The purpose of this article is to explore the heterogeneity among undergrad-
uate Norwegian business students. This is made visible by the students’
choice of subjects in their third year. The chosen methodology is the ordinary
least square (OLS) regression model. By using dummy variables depending
on the preferred discipline, we can analyse what impact the composition of
students will have on their performance in the compulsory courses during the
two first years. The students who are highest ranked by letter grades tend
to select further studies in finance and accounting subjects. One should be
aware of this in the design of study programmes.
Keywords: business students, major, performance, gender, quantitative
analysis, learning, knowledge
Introduction
There is a heterogeneous group of students at the Norwegian University
of Technology and Science (NTNU) Business School. They vary in prefer-
ences, personal characteristics, academic abilities, and attitudes towards
mathematics (Opstad, 2019). This has an impact on the undergraduate stu-
dents’ selection of a course major in the third year. There is an assortment
of students depending on preferred major. Students with good quantitative
skills want to specialise in financial subjects. Those who have anxiety to-
wards mathematics and minor success in this subject tend to specialise
in non-quantitative courses like marketing and management. The brightest
students study finance while students performing below average prefer, to
a larger extent, to study non-quantitative majors. We see the same pattern
at other business schools (Aggarwal et al., 2007).
Review of the Literature
According to prior research, there is a distinction in the quality of students
who are attracted to different majors in business studies (Bycio & Allen,
www.issbs.si/press/ISSN/2232-5697/9_95-107.pdf
96 Leiv Opstad and Torbjørn Årethun
2007). A lot of studies confirm differences in performance depending on
the chosen major. Black and Duhon (2003) reported that management stu-
dents underperform relative to other majors after controlling for GPA (Grade
Point Average) score, age, and gender. Using a regression model, Bielinska-
Kwapisz et al. (2012) found that students in marketing and management
had a disadvantage in performance compared to accounting and finance
majors. In the study of Bycio & Allen (2007), students completing the fi-
nance major performed significantly better than students with either mar-
keting or management majors. However, Bagamery et al. (2005) did not
notice any difference in student scores among the business majors.
Having talent in mathematics seems to be one of the main reasons
for selecting a major in finance or accounting. Students who feel that they
do not have control over their academic work are less motivated to select
demanding and laborious disciplines. Many students avoid majors that have
a reputation of requiring a lot of effort. The opportunity costs for achieving
success are too high (Davies et al., 2016). Roach et al. (2012) suggest that
job availability and job security might be more important than quantitative
abilities when students choose a business major discipline.
Aggarwal et al. (2007) found that the quality of students differs depend-
ing on their course major. They suggest that marketing attracts students
who are good in written and oral communication. Mathematical skills are
an important factor in the decision process for selection of a major field.
Those who do well in mathematics tend to prefer quantitative disciplines
like economics, finance, or accounting. Tarasi et al. (2013) pointed out
that students preferring a marketing major use quantitative tools less fre-
quently. Aggarwal et al. (2007) observed that marketing and management
attract students who score poorly in academic achievement compared to
other business majors. American data from a variety of colleges show that
students in marketing and management perform considerably weaker than
students in other majors. The results are stable over many years (1982–
2005) and stable over time. It is not clear why there is such a composition
of students. Do the students take in marketing and management due to
special interest in the field or because they consider this choice to be an
easier way to get a bachelor’s degree in business studies? Pappu (2004)
reported that many students choose marketing because it gives a wide
range of career possibilities and it is easy to combine with other business
majors (Siegall et al. 2007). Another reason for choosing marketing is that
students find the field interesting and exciting. Students who report being
poor with numbers like marketing and management (Schlee et al., 2007).
There might be a gender difference in business studies. Some stud-
ies report that men get higher scores than women (Black & Duhon, 2003;
Bagamery et al., 2005; Zeis et al., 2009). By examining multiple majors,
International Journal of Management, Knowledge and Learning
Skills, Gender, and Performance Matter 97
Table 1 Chosen Major The Third Year
Item GPA score* Females Males Total
N % N %
Finance 52.3 74 27.6 116 47.7 190
Accounting 51.6 45 16.8 37 15.2 82
Marketing 52.0 90 33.6 71 29.2 161
Management 51.7 59 22.0 19 7.9 78
Total 268 100.0 243 100.0 511
Notes *From high school.
Bielinska-Kwapisz et al. (2012) found that males outperform females in all
business majors (finance, accounting, management and marketing) with the
highest gap in accounting. On the other hand, Bycio & Allen (2007) did not
find any differences related to sex.
Numerous studies have shown that the GPA (Grade Point Average) score
from upper secondary school is an indicator of performance in business
studies (Bycio & Allen, 2007; Rook & Tanyel, 2009; Bielinska-Kwapisz et
al., 2012; Ketcham et al., 2018). There is a significant positive correlation
between GPA scores and success in business studies across all subjects
and majors.
Sample and Research Methodology
The data used in this study were collected from business students in the
NTNU Business School, Norway, within the 4-year period 2013 to 2016. The
students in the undergraduate bachelor’s programme have almost identical
course portfolios in the first two years, but in the third year, they can select
among different majors. In this study, we focus on four different majors:
management, marketing, accounting, and finance. The average number of
students completing the bachelor’s degree is around 200 per year. The stu-
dents can choose courses across majors. Around 40 per cent of the stu-
dents overlap between the major courses in marketing and management.
The proportion of crossovers is much lower for accounting and finance. In
order to avoid double counting, we decided to exclude those students and
those with unknown gender. A significantly greater share of males compared
to females chooses the finance major, while female students have higher
preferences for attending a major in management (Table 1).
Table 2 shows that there are differences in performance in compulsory
courses during the first and second year, depending on the student major
course of study. The finance major students have the highest score. The
accounting students are second to the finance class, and both classes
have higher letter grades than marketing and management students.
By using a linear regression model, we will analyse how the composition
Volume 9, Issue 1, 2020
98 Leiv Opstad and Torbjørn Årethun
Table 2 Performance Depending on Chosen Major
Item (1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7)
(a) 3.01 2.92 3.15 2.10 2.22 3.38 3.76
(b) 3.12 3.00 3.25 2.31 2.54 3.46 3.70
(c) 3.24 3.18 3.31 2.28 2.77 3.52 3.81
(d) 2.94 3.00 2.90 2.53 3.07 2.82 3.08
(e) 2.96 2.98 2.96 2.71 2.82 2.75 3.26
(f) 3.02 3.12 2.95 2.44 2.35 3.16 3.38
Notes Column headings are as follows: (1) all, (2) female, (3) male, (4) management, (5)
marketing, (6) accounting, (7) finance. row headings are as follows: (a) business mathe-
matics and business statistics, (b) quantitative courses in economics and business studies
(business economics, microeconomics and macroeconomics), (c) accounting (financial ac-
counting and managerial accounting), (d) introduction to marketing, (e) management (organi-
zational management and organizational psychology), (f) business law.
of students in different majors depending on their success in compulsory
courses. The applied model is:
yi =α0 +α1x1 +α2x2 +α3x3 +α4x4 +α5x5 + ε, (1)
where yi are Grades in the compulsory course i (0: F, 1: E, 2: D, 3: C, 4: B,
5: A), α0 is constant, x1 is gender (0: F, 1: M), x2 is Grade Point Average
(GPA) from upper secondary school, x3 is dummy variable for having chosen
finance course (0: not chosen, 1: chosen), x4 is dummy variable for having
chosen accounting (0: not chosen, 1: chosen), x5 is dummy variable for
having chosen management course (0: not chosen, 1: chosen), and ε is
stochastic error.
The literature shows that the GPA score and gender affect student per-
formance in business courses. Hence, they are included as independent
variables. To avoid multicollinearity, no dummy variables for marketing ma-
jor are included in the regression model and this group will belong to the
reference category, which also includes some students who have taken
other courses the third year.
The focus of this study is to see how students preferring different ma-
jors perform compared to the reference group. If the value of the dummy
variable is positive, the curve will shift upwards from (0) to (1). Those stu-
dents will perform better than the reference group. On the other hand, if
the coefficient (αi) for the dummy variable is negative, the curve will shift
downwards from (0) to (2). This means that the students belonging to this
major underperform relative to the reference group.
Findings
For all courses, there is a significant positive link between GPA score and
performance. There is a clear positive connection between gender and
International Journal of Management, Knowledge and Learning
Skills, Gender, and Performance Matter 99
(1)
Reference group (0)
(2)
α0 < a0
α0 > a0
a0
0
Pe
rf
or
m
an
ce
(L
et
te
r
G
ra
de
)
GPA
Figure 1 The Link between GPA and Performance Depending on the Dummy Variables
Table 3 Dependent Variable: Performance in Mathematics and Statistics
Item Business
math
Business
statistics
(1) (2) (1) (2)
Constant 0.16 –0.425
Gender 0.088
(0.167)
0.528 –0.107
(0.172)
–0.63
GPA 0.049
(0.025)
1.98
**
0.055
(0.026)
2.12
***
Finance 0.993
(0.194)
5.10
***
1.369
(0.199)
6.88
***
Accounting 0.683
(0.246)
2.78
***
1.236
(0.251)
4.92
***
Management –0.441
(0.260)
–1.70
*
–0.373
(0.271)
–1.38
R2
N
0.139
328
0.199
328
Notes Column headings are as follows: (1) coefficient, (2) t-value. Standard error difference
in parenthesis; *, ** and *** denote significance at the 10%, 5% and 1% level, respectively;
VIF (variance inflation factors) values are between 1.0 and 2.0.
macroeconomics, while this effect is negative for introductory courses in
marketing and business law. Except for marketing and organisational man-
agement, the dummy variable for finance major has a positive impact on
performance. The same tendency applies for accounting majors as well.
There is, however, no significant positive impact from an accounting major
on the performance in marketing. Unlike the finance major, the accounting
major has a positive influence on organisational management, but not on
organisational psychology. For all other courses, there is a positive correla-
tion. The picture is the opposite for a management major. Consistently sig-
nificant negative effects are present. The exception is in the following three
Volume 9, Issue 1, 2020
100 Leiv Opstad and Torbjørn Årethun
Table 4 Dependent Variable: Performance in Quantitative Courses in Economics and
Business Studies
Item Business
economics
Micro-
economics
Macro-
economics
(1) (2) (1) (2) (1) (2)
Constant –0.908 0.879 –0.586
Gender 0.096
(0.158)
0.61 –0.163
(0.130)
–1.26 0.213
(0.119)
1.79
*
GPA 0.068
(0.023)
2.92
***
0.038
(0.019)
1.95
*
0.067
(0.018)
3.80
***
Finance 0.490
(0.184)
2.66
***
0.0967
(0.150)
6.43
***
0.74
(0.139)
5.32
***
Accounting 0.733
(0.233)
3.14
***
0.852
(0.192)
4.45
***
0.663
(0.176)
3.76
***
Management –0.781
(0.244)
–3.19
***
–0.266
(0.203)
–1.31 –0.687
(0.180)
–3.81
***
R2
N
0.121
338
0.175
328
0.245
322
Notes Column headings are as follows: (1) coefficient, (2) t-value. Standard error difference
in parenthesis; *, ** and *** denote significance at the 10%, 5% and 1% level, respectively;
VIF (variance inflation factors) values are between 1.0 and 2.0.
Table 5 Dependent Variable: Performance in Accounting
Item Managerial
accounting
Financial
accounting
(1) (2) (1) (2)
Constant 0.350 –1.403
Gender 0.44
(0.166)
0.26 –0.130
(0.171)
–0.76
GPA 0.05
(0.025)
2.10
**
0.083
(0.025)
3.37
***
Finance 0.662
(0.195)
3.39
***
0.693
(0.200)
3.46
***
Accounting 0.669
(0.245)
2.73
***
0.750
(0.250)
3.00
***
Management –0.897
(0.259)
–3.46
***
–0.698
(0.272)
–2.57
**
R2
N
0.132
318
0.139
284
Notes Column headings are as follows: (1) coefficient, (2) t-value. Standard error difference
in parenthesis; *, ** and *** denote significance at the 10%, 5% and 1% level, respectively;
VIF (variance inflation factors) values are between 1.0 and 2.0.
subjects: microeconomics, business statistics, and organisational psychol-
ogy. Notice that this result appears when we compare with students in the
International Journal of Management, Knowledge and Learning
Skills, Gender, and Performance Matter 101
Table 6 Dependent Variable: Performance in Non-Quantitative Courses
Item Introduction to
marketing
Organisational
management
Organisational
psychology
Business
law
(1) (2) (1) (2) (1) (2) (1) (2)
Constant 0.756 –0.533 0.582 –3.011
Gender –0.172
(0.103)
–1.67
*
–0.184
(0.127)
–1.45 –0.115
(0.128)
–0.90 –0.501
(0.199)
–2.57
**
GPA 0.045
(0.015)
2.92
***
0.072
(0.019)
3.84
***
0.040
(0.019)
2.13
**
0.116
(0.032)
3.68
***
Finance 0.119
(0.120)
0.99 0.144
(0.147)
0.98 0.577
(0.148)
3.91
***
0.646
(0.234)
2.76
***
Accounting –0.212
(0.152)
–1.40 –0.697
(0.192)
–3.63
***
0.211
(0.193)
1.09 0.669
(0.282)
2.37
**
Manag. –0.523
(0.159)
–3.28
***
–0.532
(0.195)
–2.72
***
–0.011
(0.200)
–0.05 –0.840
(0.373)
–2.25
**
R2
N
0.078
338
0.123
328
0.065
336
0.290
120
Notes Column headings are as follows: (1) coefficient, (2) t-value. Standard error difference
in parenthesis; *, ** and *** denote significance at the 10%, 5% and 1% level, respectively;
VIF (variance inflation factors) values are between 1.0 and 2.0.
reference group, i.e., mainly students choosing courses in the marketing
discipline. If we look at financial accounting, students who have chosen
further studies in this field (accounting) or in finance achieve grades that
are about 0.75 points better (three quarters of a letter grade) on average,
while those belonging to management will underperform with grades that
are about 0.7 lower when compared to the reference group. Furthermore,
with a significance level below 1 per cent, there is a strong link between
performance in business statistics and mathematics and in selection of
further studies within finance or accounting.
Discussion
The substantial variety of student preferences is reflected in the choice of
courses and majors in their third year. The composition of students differs
depending of the field selected in the third year reflecting different prefer-
ences, skills and interests.
GPA from upper secondary school has an impact on achievement in
all business courses. The link is positive and significant for all presented
courses. Besides mathematical skills, GPA is the most important factor to
determine study success (Opstad, 2018). However, there are some vari-
ations in the unstandardised coefficient for GPA. For instance, this value
is distinctly higher for business law than for other courses. This could be
related to the fact that business law is a non-quantitative course that re-
Volume 9, Issue 1, 2020
102 Leiv Opstad and Torbjørn Årethun
quires significant analytical skills and good writing ability. High GPA scores
show academic capacity and the students get rewarded in disciplines like
business law. Pitts et al. (2005) confirm this finding.
For the majority of the courses, there is no significant gender impact.
However, there are some exceptions. In macroeconomics, males perform
better the females, but the opposite is true for management and busi-
ness law. Some studies confirm this tendency. The female students struggle
more with quantitative courses relative to male students, but they do better
in non-quantitative subjects. This might indicate a gender gap in favour of
men (Naqvi & Naqvi, 2017). Daymont and Blau (2008) however, reported
higher scores for female students than their male peers. Based on such
findings, the results in this research make sense. However, prior studies do
not give a clear answer for the gender effect. Many studies have not found
any significant gender gap in law studies (Sigfried, 1980; Terry et al., 2015;
Fordyce et al., 2017).
This study shows that the undergraduate business students at the NTNU
Business School are not a homogenous group. This is clearly evident by
looking at the coefficients of the dummy variables. If there were no diver-
sities in the composition of students choosing different pathways through
their major studies, the coefficients of the dummy variables would not vary
when we compare the preferred fields with the reference group.
Our study shows that there is a substantial difference in quantitative
skills depending on the selected major. This is in line with findings of Newell
et al. (1996) and Tularam (2013). Those who have decided to specialise in
finance subjects perform about one letter grade better in business statis-
tics and business mathematics. The reason is probably that subjects in
finance are quantitative oriented, and business statistics are definitely an
important tool in this field. The magnitude of this impact is modest, but still
substantial and significant for quantitative business courses. Compared to
students choosing the marketing field (reference group), the dummy coeffi-
cient for finance major appears to be significantly positive for organisational
psychology and business law as well (with a coefficient around 0.6). On av-
erage, the finance group students outperform the reference group by more
than half of a letter grade.
The same tendency is also seen among the students who prefer to spe-
cialise in accounting. The students who select to study this discipline out-
perform the reference group in quantitative courses. There is a strong pos-
itive link, but the coefficients are marginally smaller than for the finance
students. For the non-quantitative courses, the results are more mixed. A
significant influence occurs for two courses, and notice that it is with an
opposite sign. In organizational management, the link is negative.
The picture is quite the opposite among students who choose manage-
International Journal of Management, Knowledge and Learning
Skills, Gender, and Performance Matter 103
ment compared to those taking further studies in finance and accounting.
When considering that the reference group consists mainly of students who
prefer marketing, it means that students who have chosen to specialise
in marketing outperform those who take added courses in management.
Among the students who prefer management there is a strong negative link
for almost all courses.
For organisational psychology, the effect is also negative, but not sig-
nificant. Notice also that for the other management course (organisational
management) there is a substantial negative relationship. The conclusion is
that students with the weakest achievements in compulsory courses tend
to select further studies in management.
Our finding is consistent with some previous studies. This is the same
pattern as Aggarwal et al. (2007) had noticed. The quality of the students
is different depending on their chosen field. Management majors get the
lowest score (representing the line below the reference group). The best
students prefer specialisations in accounting and finance (indicated by the
line (1) in the figure).
The difference between the student mean letter grade in the compulsory
courses for those who have chosen finance major and management major is
substantial. Based on the values on the dummy coefficients, the calculated
difference is more than one letter grade for most of the business courses.
This means that there is a large variation in student academic skills among
the different majors. The data in this survey does not provide a complete an-
swer to these findings. We know from other studies that mathematic skills
and attitudes can be an explanatory factor. Students with practical math-
ematics from upper secondary school demonstrate a substantially poorer
performance in quantitative courses (Opstad, 2018). Those students tend
to prefer non-quantitative majors. Our investigation confirms this result, be-
cause the difference in success between students choosing finance and
management major, respectively, is significantly less in courses where the
student performance does not depend on mathematical skills (for instance
in the introductory course in marketing).
Other research papers show that there is a close link between the stu-
dent success in the introductory course and their later performance in
desired course within the same field (Bernardi & Bean, 2002; Opstad &
Årethun, 2020). This positive selection may be due to preferences, inter-
est, skills and success.
Limitation and Contribution
The present dataset is from one business school only. In the regression
model, there are few independent variables besides the dummy variables.
This creates some limitations and can explain the low R-square values.
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104 Leiv Opstad and Torbjørn Årethun
Adding additional independent variables to our analyses would probably in-
crease the R-square values, and it could have led to a slightly different
result regarding the effects of gender and GPA on performance.
The causal effect is not obvious. Our regression model has explored how
characteristics among the students choosing different pathways in the third
year have influenced the performance in compulsory courses. The compo-
sition of students within various disciplines differs. However, an obvious
interpretation of the results is that performance in compulsory courses is
a key factor to explain student selection in the third year. Students who are
being successful in the two first years tend to prefer specialisations in fi-
nance and accounting. They may have the most promising and prosperous
careers in business ahead of them. Therefore, those with the best letter
grades tend to choose this lane. Among those who achieve poorer grades,
further studies in management are more tempting.
Using data from a Norwegian business school, this research confirms
that there are differences in performance among students depending on
their chosen major. This information is useful for ensuring a diverse study
programme that may be adapted to the individual student interests. There
is a discussion about requiring theoretical mathematics as a criterion for
enrolment into business schools. The result will be another selection of
students and will probably improve the student performance. On the other
hand, this will likely lead to fewer students choosing non-quantitative ma-
jors. One should consider both these effects when determining the level of
math skills as entry ticket to business studies.
A different composition of the students may have an impact on the grad-
ing practice. If the instructor is not aware of this or if he or she ignores it,
the result will be different grading practice depending on student choice of
major. It will then become harder to achieve good grades in subjects with
many skilled undergraduates (Opstad, 2020).
Conclusion and Further Research
The results of this study confirm the findings from other business schools.
By dividing the students according to their choice of discipline, significant
differences are revealed among the student performance and their reasons
for choice of course portfolio. There is a substantial heterogeneity among
undergraduate business students. The evidence or indicator is student se-
lection of specialisation in the third year. Undergraduates who choose fur-
ther studies in finance or accounting tend to have higher average grades in
the compulsory courses, while the opposite is the case for those who take
extra courses in management. There might be some gender effects as well.
Female students favour some non-quantitative courses.
There is a need for further research to explore why there is such a con-
International Journal of Management, Knowledge and Learning
Skills, Gender, and Performance Matter 105
siderable difference among the undergraduates’ choice of pathways in the
third year. Why do various disciplines attract different kinds of students?
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Dr Leiv Opstad is Professor of Economics at Norwegian University of Science
and Technology Business School. Opstad has experience from the Ministry
of Finance. He has written economics textbooks and his research fields are
International Journal of Management, Knowledge and Learning
Skills, Gender, and Performance Matter 107
education and public economics. The finding appears in different journals.
leiv.opstad@ntnu.no
Dr Torbjørn Årethun is Professor of Economics at Department of Busi-
ness Administration, Western Norway University of Applied Sciences. His
research interest is wide, including regional economy, innovation, sustain-
ability and education. This has ended up in numerous published articles.
torbjorn.arethun@hvl.no
Volume 9, Issue 1, 2020