Research questions were devised from the literature and covered the following
nine areas: difficulty in understanding language; weak communication
skills; weak educational background; grading procedures; involvement
in other activities; wrong course selection, lack of seriousness in studies,
family problems and personal problems. A total of 242 responses were collected
(out of 250) from probation students, with an effective response rate
of 96.8 per cent. Standard demographic measures were included in order
to characterize the sample. Briefly, the male–female ratio is around 4 to 1
(male = 80 per cent versus female = 20 per cent) and all were undergraduate
students at the average age of 20.