Akeem Tunde ADELEKAN

Abimbola Fikayo OLANIRAN

Abstract

Responsible citizenship is the cornerstone of democratic governance, peaceful co-existence, and sustainable national development. In Nigeria, the interplay between security education (SE) and social knowledge (SK) as twin curricular pillars for cultivating responsible citizenship has received growing scholarly attention at the national level, yet context-specific empirical investigations remain sparse, particularly in South-Western local government areas such as Ondo West. This study revisited the relationship between security education and social knowledge and their joint influence on responsible citizenship among secondary school students in Ondo West Local Government Area (LGA), Ondo State. A descriptive survey research design was employed. The target population comprised all senior secondary school II (SS2) students in public secondary schools in Ondo West LGA. Using stratified random sampling and the Krejcie and Morgan (1970) sample size table, a sample of 310 respondents was drawn from six selected public secondary schools. Data were collected using the Security Education, Social Knowledge, and Responsible Citizenship Questionnaire (SESKRCQ), a researcher-developed, 45-item instrument validated by three experts (Cronbach’s α = 0.88). Descriptive statistics (means, standard deviations), Pearson Product-Moment Correlation Coefficient (PPMCC), and multiple regression analysis were used to analyse data at the 0.05 level of significance. Findings revealed that: the level of security education knowledge among students in Ondo West LGA was moderate (grand mean = 2.71); social knowledge significantly and positively influenced responsible citizenship behaviour (r = .56, p < .001); security education significantly and positively influenced responsible citizenship (r = .49, p < .001); and security education and social knowledge jointly predicted responsible citizenship (β₁ = .31, β₂ = .38, R² = .42, F(2, 307) = 110.7, p = .000). Gender did not significantly moderate the relationship between SE, SK, and responsible citizenship (p > .05). The study concluded that responsible citizenship is not a spontaneous civic outcome but a cultivated educational achievement that depends on the quality, relevance, and contextual integration of security education and social knowledge instruction The study recommended the revitalisation and contextual adaptation of security education delivery, integration of social knowledge into practical civic engagement activities, and the establishment of school-community security-citizenship partnerships in Ondo West LGA.

   

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Published: 2026

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