Choice Factors When Vietnamese High School Students Consider Universities: A Mixed Method Approach

Abstract

Higher education around the world and especially in Vietnam is becoming increasingly competitive. Universities apply marketing strategies to student recruitment and get to know their students and prospective students more closely, just as businesses learn about consumer attitudes and behavior. Therefore, studying students’ behavior of choosing a university is necessary, but most research about this topic has been conducted by a single approach. In order to examine the choice factors such as characteristics of institutions and information sources students consider when selecting universities, this research applies a mixed method approach, including both quantitative and qualitative data. Data were collected from questionnaire surveys with 670 responses from final-year high school students, and from 20 interviews with freshmen university students. Findings indicate the rankings of characteristics of institutions and information sources and the qualitative analysis explained how students consider them during their decision-making process. The research results provide important findings to help universities understand more about the factors that students are interested in and search for during the decision-making process.

1. Introduction

As the higher education market is more competitive, universities are currently investing more in student recruitment activities [1]. For example, in Vietnam, open days and live-stream information sessions are two new marketing practices that have just been applied in recent years. Additionally, understanding the nature of the university selection process of students, as consumers, is also important in developing a successful strategy.

Higher education is a special service, and the consumer decision is also complicated. People take part in distinct types of decision-making behavior, which require the effort and time of consumers in making their own decision. From a marketing perspective, higher education is regarded as a credence service in which the consumers might be unable to evaluate the service quality prior to and post consumption [2,3]. In fact, higher education bases itself on credibility, through which prospective students make a unique decision and do not have the ability to assess their higher education courses prior to placement [4].

The Vietnamese government’s Ministry of Education and Training has launched a number of educationally beneficial programs, such as one to encourage public and private investment in the establishment of new educational institutions [5]. High school students in Vietnam have a lot of options for continuing their education after high school, including attending a public or private university or a university that is part of a foreign affiliate program for training. As a matter of fact, some colleges have shut down several majors and programs owing to poor recruiting, which may be a result of the unequal increase in higher education alternatives and prospective students. Some non-public colleges and universities just cannot compete with their public counterparts for student enrollment [6]. In order to recruit sufficient numbers of students to maintain operations and make strategic decisions for their longer-term growth, universities in Vietnam must have a firm grasp of the factors that shape the decisions of university applicants in their specific setting [5].

As higher education is a unique service and important for any individual, the selection of university can be a hard decision for students. They consider various aspects to evaluate the suitability of universities to themselves. Choice factors were analyzed in previous studies, but these analyses were conducted by a single approach. While a quantitative analysis might be good at providing a general ranking based on the scores of all available factors, a qualitative approach is necessary to explain the insights on how a prospective student thinks and why a choice factor is important to them. In order to understand the choice factors prospective that students consider when selecting universities and overcome the limitations caused by single-approach research, this work employed a mixed method approach. By applying the mixed method approach, the objective of this research is to investigate the topic from a triangulation perspective. The choice factors are examined in two areas: information sources and characteristics of institutions.

2. Literature Review

2.1. University Choice and the Decision-Making Process

The intention to pursue higher education begins when a consumer recognizes the aspiration to chase higher education and wants to achieve a higher educational degree; then, they will seek for associated information and assess their potential decisions during the evaluation stage [7]. Considered as rational consumers in terms of chasing higher education and in university selection [8], they concentrate on choice factors to support their decision-making and evaluate potential universities [9]. Furthermore, by asking friends and searching for information from various types of communication, e.g., advertising or promotional events, university websites, and reports [3], consumers can gain detailed information regarding every aspect of universities [10], so they can feel more confident about making a decision. In the various types of communication sources, the information that prospective students require might be different [11], and prospective students may ask distinct questions to multiple outlets. However, the consumer can, at any point, enter or exit. An individual engaging in routine response or restricted decision-making may not employ the whole procedure, while each step may typically be implemented by a person who wants to tackle a problem at an in-depth level. For instance, the consumers (students) will carry out active research and do their utmost to arrange the alternative ‘brands’ available. In the beginning, a ‘consideration package’ including ‘alternatives from which choice is made’ by [12] is developed, and then, a variety of decision rules can be implemented so the consumer can pick a choice from the alternatives [12].

There were a large number of studies built to conceptualize the decision-making process and its associated variables [1,13,14,15,16]. Chapman (1981) created a search which targets external influences in combination with student-related characteristics. Moogan and colleagues’ works have investigated the influences and behavior of students through different process stages [1,16]. Vrontis et al. [7] contributed a comprehensive framework to emphasize all the factors, including student and personal characteristics, influencers, high school and college characteristics, environments, and college actions. Those works provided an integrated root for the decision-making process of promising students.

2.2. Choice Factors When Selecting a University

It is noteworthy that the coverage of the term choice factors might be considered differently depending on the scope of the discussion. As the present study is conducted from the marketing perspective, the factors in this paper are related to the decision on which university to apply to, not the decision of why to pursue higher education. Choice factors can be classified as the criteria prospective students can access to estimate the existing options [17]. Customers would weigh up product aspects, including quality, cost, function, and design when making a decision to purchase a product or service. Prospective students may consider the ranking of the university, tuition fee, or distance from home when choosing a university. In order to diminish risks and ambiguities associated with the decision, prospective students do their utmost to strive for more information involving these factors during these stages [18]. In the review of Hemsley-Brown and Oplatka [19], choice factors are classified into different aspects such as institutional characteristics, student characteristics (e.g., [20]) and information sources.

Across research, the lists of choice factors are diversified. There are three commonly listed variables in this field of research: course, location and reputation [4,21]. Soutar and Turner [22] concluded that ‘course suitability’, ‘academic credibility’, ‘job opportunities’, and ‘teaching standard’ were the top four determinants of university preferences in Western Australia. The factors of ‘geographic proximity’, ’academic credibility’ and ‘academic reputation’ were examined by Simões and Soares [3], and the additional factors of ‘expected employability’ and ‘program availability’ were also noted. Veloutsou, Lewis, and Paton [18] analyzed the need and relevance of information on 36 choice factors, and the top information needed was linked to ‘content of particular courses’, ‘prestige of the university’ and ‘prestige of the department’. In the sense of Scotland, the exploratory analysis by Briggs [23] revealed the top ten variables, of which the top three factors were ‘academic prestige’, ‘distance from home’ and ‘place’. The choice factor analysis findings that are proved in the previous study are dependent on the research context.

Regarding the Vietnamese context, there is a lack of research about choice factors, and the results also indicate inconsistent findings. Future job prospects, teaching quality, staff expertise, and course content were important choice factors across all market segments [1]. According to Dao and Thorpe [5], ‘facilities and resources’, ‘programme’ and ‘price’ were most relevant for students when choosing a university. Reasons for the differences might be because of the variety of choice factors analyzed in such studies. Therefore, a further analysis applying a mixed method approach is important for the Vietnamese higher education sector.

Universities need to comprehend the information sources prospective students use during the decision-making process in order to establish successful methods for student recruitment [18]. Consumers relate, alongside internal sources (memory), to external sources of knowledge for the retrieval of information [24]. As the option of higher education is a high-risk and complicated decision over an extended time [25], during the consideration process, prospective students seek information from a wide variety of information sources [11]. Thereby, in support of understanding the information search of prospective students, information sources and university-related factors have been certainly investigated together [5,26].

From a comprehensive review of prior research in this area, the present study adapts the framework of Hemsley-Brown and Oplatka [19] for the list of characteristics of institutions. As the present study includes a segmentation analysis, the student characteristics are not included within this study. Most research in this area [11,23,26,27] does not include the demographics or student profiles in the study, which provide the potential to deep dive. The information sources category in the framework by Bonnema and Van der Waldt [11] is used for the information sources analysis of this study.

2.2.1. Characteristics of Institutions

The research emphasizes the seeking behavior of consumers (prospective students); as a result, this paper follows the first view to define choice factors as universities’ features and education experience. This section thus continues the first view to define choice factors as all characteristics of universities and education experience, as these classes of factors are relatively arbitrary, such that prospects seek their knowledge from external sources. However, the literature indicates a fair degree of fragmentation around characteristics of institutions [19]. The following analysis of the characteristics of institutions illustrated five most common dimensions of characteristics of institutions, based on the review paper of Hemsley-Brown and Oplatka [19] and major works (i.e., [18,27]).

• Reputation: The reliability of the institution and the outcomes of previous acts or historical performance in terms of educational aspects. The reputation of a university can be classified into seven main components. In terms of intangible points, they include the ‘quality of the university’ or of ‘particular degrees’, ‘academic standing or ranking’, ‘image’, and ‘types of universities’. With tangibility, they consisted of ‘campus physical/visual appearance and safety’, and ‘facilities’.
• Quality of Teaching: In what way the course is conveyed and how the students absorb the learning in terms of availability, range and content. This dimension includes ‘course programme’, ‘course content’—rated by the evaluation of academic and practical components of the course. Academic components include ‘quality and reputation of academic staff’. Practical components include ‘lecturer aptitude’—the professional and teaching style of lecturers. Furthermore, the ‘class size’ is also added and tested in order to complete this field.
• Entry Qualification: The entrance requirements and admission process of the university, including the institutions’ management profile and capital-related aspects. Four factors are examined—‘entrance standards’, ‘quick response to application’, ‘affordability’, and ‘cost and price’—for a seat at university.
• Career Prospect: Employability during and post-university. The components of this dimension are wide ranging and greatly depend on student self-perspective and affairs. Regarding the student experience elements, they are ‘experiential benefits’, ‘lifestyle benefits’, and ‘social benefits’. Then, in terms of future student-self growth, ‘post-degree employability’, ‘research success’, ‘employment prospects’, and ‘immigration opportunities’ are gathered and investigated in order to support this field.
• Student Life: Non-academic indicators on the subjects of student experience. Campus utilities, laboratories, security, library facilities, classrooms, and lodging are mentioned in university amenities. On campus and in the surrounding environment, ‘psychosocial life’ belongs to social interactions and cultural atmosphere. Aspects of student life refer to the more personal aspects of an institution and how these impact the day-to-day experience of attending one. They include considerations such as whether the student will find accommodation at the institution, whether there is easy transport to the institution and whether the campus is a safe place.

2.2.2. Information Sources

In prior studies, there are various source styles that have been investigated. Lists and types of sources of information are basically reliant on the context of research, which is categorized into personal and impersonal [28] or direct, media and social [11]. The study by Hemsley-Brown and Oplatka [19] also includes the impact of parenting and peers as two key sources of information. The categories that prospective students depend on during their decision-making process are valuable for marketers to consider. All information sources are loaded into two components: marketing-controlled sources and WOM sources [1]:

Marketing-controlled Sources: Managed by marketers and are mostly one-way information. These are both sources stemming directly from the institution and print, electronic and outdoor media sources, which are ‘websites’, ‘brochures’, ‘career exhibition and assessments’, ‘open day’, and ‘advertisement on many channels’ (billboards, TV, radio, magazines, newspapers).

WOM Sources: Students tend to rely on the advice or suggestions of the people they believe to have expertise or at least more experience than them. The information or recommendations from ‘close friends’, ‘past or current students of the institution’, ‘school counsellors/guidance teacher’, ‘parent and guardians’, and ‘family members (other than parents and guardians)’ are critically granted and followed.

3. Methods

To answer the research objectives, we conducted a mixed method study that included both quantitative and qualitative approaches. The survey and interview data collection methods were conducted separately to examine the information sources and characteristics of institutions that prospective students consider when selecting universities from two different methodological perspectives.

3.1. Quantitative Approach

Survey by questionnaire was applied to collect data for this quantitative approach. The main parts of the questionnaire were asking about the choice factors of selecting universities in terms of information sources (16 items) and characteristics of institutions (35 items). Regarding the information sources, students were questioned with “During your decision-making process of higher education, please rate how important each of following information resources to you”. For the characteristics of institutions, the question was “During your higher education decision-making process (which university to attend), how would you rate the importance each of the following factors?”. Considering all the items mentioned in these sections, the scale was from 1 to 7, with 1 equal to “not important at all” and 7 equal to “extremely important”. The questionnaire content was translated into Vietnamese using a back-translation method. An expert in the field analyzed and assessed the translation versions’ accuracy and usability (in Vietnamese and English). Four high school students were also administered the questionnaire as part of a pilot study to determine its validity and applicability. A research description was included on the questionnaire’s front page to explain the project’s objectives, the advantages for participants, how to complete the questionnaire without difficulty, and the benefits that would result from participating.

Employing the convenience sampling method, survey questionnaires were distributed to final-year students in four high schools. To limit the geographical bias, they were large high schools from Ho Chi Minh city (two schools), Tien Giang province and Dong Nai province. A total of 800 responses were collected, with 670 responses used for data processing. The sample included 293 male respondents (44%) and 366 female respondents (55%). This was followed by 348 responses (52%) from those who had at least one brother or sister currently enrolling and studying or graduating from universities.

3.2. Qualitative Approach

The researcher conducted 20 in-depth interviews with 20 freshman university students from Vietnam’s universities. To invite participants for the interviews, an open sampling method was utilized since it did not prematurely shut off the sample, and the students were volunteers among the survey respondents. Members of the research team conducted in-depth interviews utilizing a semi-structured interview style with open-ended questions to enable participants to share their experiences. Participants were asked to describe and remember any information sources and characteristics of institutions that influenced their decision to select a university. They were asked to elaborate on how they evaluate these choice factors. There were two major interview questions that were asked during the interview to obtain a separate, clear testimony on the results: “What sources of information did you search for information about your current university?”; “During your consideration, which characteristics of university influenced your decision most?”.

All interviews were conducted in the Vietnamese language. Each interview lasted about 40 min, was digitally recorded, and was verbatim transcribed by a professional. Two researchers reviewed the transcripts to verify that the transcriptions were accurate and achieve a deeper understanding of the experience of the candidates, in order to construct a dense, rich explanation of the study via a small observed group [29].

4. The Analysis on Information Sources

4.1. Quantitative Results and Qualitative Discussion

4.1.1. Marketing-Controlled Sources

The preference of information sources is reported in

Table 1. The importance and ranking of Information Sources.

Rank	Factors	Mean	Std. Dev
1	Advice from school counsellors/guidance teachers (W)	5.551	1.2880
2	Open days at institutions (MC)	5.516	1.4286
3	Careers assessments (MC)	5.467	1.4335
4	Websites of institutions (MC)	5.422	1.3578
5	Advice from past/current students of institutions (W)	5.348	1.4258
6	Career exhibitions (MC)	5.334	1.4778
7	Advice from parents and guardians (W)	5.230	1.4355
8	Free publications distributed at schools (MC)	5.219	1.4736
9	Advice from family members (other than parents and guardians (W)	4.616	1.6459
10	Advertisements in newspapers (MC)	4.558	1.5374
11	Advertisements on television (MC)	4.427	1.5628
12	Information brochures from institutions (MC)	4.336	1.5199
13	Advertisements on billboards (MC)	4.234	1.5291
14	Advice from a close friend (W)	4.207	1.7265
15	Advertisements in magazines (MC)	4.124	1.5982
16	Advertisements on radio (MC)	3.604	1.6303

W: Word-of-mouth (WOM) sources, MC: Marketing-controlled sources.

. Although the analysis highlights that the most important information source is the WOM source ‘advice from school counsellors/guidance teachers’ (ranked 1), the marketing-controlled sources such as ‘open-day events’, ‘career assessment’, and ‘websites of institutions’ ranked high in the analysis (ranked 2–4). In the past, marketing activities in Vietnamese universities were not well-designed as most universities were public with a lack of competition in the market. Nowadays, the landscape has changed, with more choice options for prospective students. Promotional activities such as ‘open days’ or ‘career assessment’ are now popular and are a good chance for prospective students to know about the institutions. The qualitative findings support the quantitative results as all interviewees confirmed that they rely on the university’s information through marketing-controlled sources, including ‘website of institution’ and ‘open days’. They agreed that the opportunity to visit the campus is one of the most influential information sources, especially in the evaluation and final stage of the decision-making process. The ‘open days’ are the major information source through which prospective students can access other information sources and evaluate the factors in relation to the universities.

[Open days] “When I joined the open day, I read the brochure and listened to advice from lecturers here. So, I gain trust form it”

[Open days] “After that, I visited and listened to consultants in their open days. Finally, I chose University F.”

[Website of institutions] “I searched for information on the website of the University C including social networking. Then I found out about admission and the activities that University C. had organized for students”.

On the other hand, the advertising-related factors include advertising on ‘radio’, ‘television’, ‘newspapers’, ‘magazines’, and ‘billboards’ as well as ‘university brochures and leaflets’ are not very influential information sources (ranked 10 to 16). These traditional advertisements seem to be less important in Vietnam, which is consistent with the work of Ivy [30].

4.1.2. WOM Sources

According to the quantitative results, the WOM source ‘advice from school counsellors/guidance teachers’ is the most important information source. Interviewees also frequently mentioned this information source, especially in the evaluation stage. This source satisfies multiple characteristics of a powerful WOM source such as source expertise, trustworthiness and tie strength with the students [31,32,33,34]. ‘Advice from the past/current students’ is also an impactful information source (ranked 5).

‘Advice from parents and guardians’ is surprisingly not very influential (ranked 7). This might conflict with the impact of Confucian tradition in Vietnamese culture and families, where parents have power over the future of their children. Actually, during the interviews, four students agreed that their parents are a key contributing factor to her final decision. Parents might be considered as the decision-makers but not a perceived information source when students completed the questionnaire. Together with the students, parents are also the potential consumers of the universities, and they are also looking for information:

[Advice from parents and guardians] “And the final factor is my mother’s encouragement. As she tried to help me seek information about University C. as much as possible, which is a great motivation for me to apply to University C.”.

4.2. Demographic Analysis

The information preferences, which are analyzed across demographic segments such as gender, income, and generation, are listed in

Table 2. The information sources ranking across segments (Gender, Income, and First or Non-first generation).

Sources	Gender		Income		Generation
	Male	Female	Low to Mid	Mid to High	First	Non-First
Advice from school counsellors/guidance teachers (W)	2	1	2	1	1	1
Open days at institutions (MC)	1	4	1	3	2	2
Careers assessments (MC)	3	3	3	4	3	3
Websites of institutions (MC)	5	2	6	2	4	4
Advice from past or current students of institutions (W)	4	6	4	6	5	6
Career exhibitions (MC)	7	5	5	5	6	5
Advice from parents and guardians (W)	6	8	8	7	7	8
Free publications distributed at schools (MC)	8	7	7	8	8	7
Advice from family members (other than parents and guardians) (W)	9	10	9	9	9	9
Advertisements in newspapers (MC)	10	9	10	10	10	10

W: Word-of-mouth (WOM) sources, MC: Marketing-controlled sources. Income (VND): low to mid (5 million or below and 5 to 10 million), mid to high (10 to 20 million and 20 million or above).

. Descriptive results indicate mostly no difference between the first child and non-first child in the family in reference to the information sources. Regarding gender, results show that male and female students consider ‘open days’ and ‘website of institutions’ differently. Male students might be more interested in the experience events while female students can collect information from the websites. The segment of mid-to-high income also considers ‘websites of institutions’ as a truthful information source more than the low-to-mid income segment. These findings are relevant to universities as these are the marketing-controlled sources managed by the universities.

Table 3. The information sources ranking across favorite degree types.

Sources	Business and Economics	Engineering	Law, Social Sciences
Advice from school counsellors/guidance teachers (W)	1	3	2
Open days at institutions (MC)	2	1	5
Careers assessments (MC)	4	2	3
Websites of institutions (MC)	3	5	1
Advice from past or current students of institutions (W)	7	7	7
Career exhibitions (MC)	5	6	4
Advice from parents and guardians (MC)	6	8	8
Free publications distributed at schools (MC)	8	4	6
Advice from family members (other than parents and guardians) (W)	9	10	10
Advertisements in newspapers (MC)	10	9	9

W: Word-of-mouth (WOM) sources, MC: Marketing-controlled sources.

shows there are some differences across favorite degree types in information preferences, especially also on ‘open days’ and ‘websites of institutions’. For ‘open days’, social science students are less interested in this event, while engineering students rank this information source as the most important. In contrast, the information from institutional websites is very important for social science students. It can be explained that the demonstrations and facility visits during the open days are very exciting to future engineers, while it is harder to showcase the social sciences in such a type of event.

5. The Analysis on Characteristics of Institutions

5.1. Quantitative Results and Qualitative Discussion

The mean scores and ranks of institutional characteristics are shown in

Table 4. The importance and ranking of choice factors in terms of institution-related characteristics.

Rank	Factors	Mean	Std. Dev
1	Employment prospect (CP)	6.515	0.9591
2	Quality of teaching staff (QT)	6.407	0.8814
3	The aptitude of lecturers (QT)	6.397	0.8938
4	Post-degree employability (CP)	6.390	0.9942
5	Actual course content (QT)	6.187	1.0558
6	Experiential benefits of going to the university (CP, SL)	6.155	1.0699
7	Cost and price (EQ)	6.119	1.2578
8	The parent’ affordability to cover higher fees (EQ)	6.107	1.2940
9	Lifestyle benefits (CP, SL)	6.100	1.0275
10	The requirement for the university entry (EQ)	5.970	1.1308
11	Facilities at the university (R, SL)	5.930	1.0698
12	Actual course programme (QT)	5.913	1.2305
13	Cost of living at school (SL)	5.855	1.3036
14	Social benefits (CP, SL)	5.791	1.2473
15	Degree reputation (R)	5.778	1.1675
16	Administrative efficiency (SL)	5.757	1.2234
17	Psychosocial life (SL)	5.663	1.3167
18	Location of the university (SL)	5.657	1.3242
19	Part-time employment prospects (CP)	5.618	1.3637
20	Quick response to application (EQ)	5.607	1.2645
21	Travel to institution (SL)	5.581	1.4274
22	Financial aid from school (SL)	5.546	1.5212
23	University reputation (R)	5.531	1.2353
24	Fear of debt for studying at school (SL)	5.516	1.5872
25	Class size (QT)	5.504	1.3323
26	Campus experience (SL)	5.487	1.2476
27	Types of universities (private/public) (R)	5.481	1.4667
28	Research success (R)	5.472	1.3219
29	Scholarship (SL, EQ)	5.364	1.5029
30	University public image (R)	5.294	1.3129
31	Campus physical/visual appearance and safety (SL, R)	5.187	1.3809
32	Academic standing or ranking (R)	5.182	1.3755
33	Immigration opportunities (CP, SL)	4.864	1.6979
34	Proximity to home (SL)	4.522	1.8691
35	Live with parents when attending university (SL)	4.409	1.9035

R: Reputation, QT: Quality of teaching, EQ: Entry qualification, CP: Career prospect, SL: Student life.

. First, the top nine factors, which have mean values above 6, are ‘employment prospect’, ‘quality of teaching staff’, ‘the aptitude of lecturers’, ‘post-degree employability’, ‘actual course content’, ‘experiential benefits’, cost and price’, ‘affordability’, and ‘lifestyle benefits’. Among those high-ranking characteristics, four of the nine factors belong to Career prospects (ranked 1, 4, 6, and 9) and three factors belong to Quality of teaching (ranked 2, 3 and 5). This indicates that the students are of a deeper understanding of higher education and focus more on educational quality and future career rather than following feudal beliefs and the recognition of being enrolled in superior universities. In fact, there is no existence of a Reputation dimension or its related factors among the top factors, which conflicts with previous studies in Western countries [18,26]. It shows that ‘university reputation’, ‘degree reputation’, ‘academic standing and ranking’, ‘campus appearance and safety’, ‘university types’, ‘image’, and ‘facilities’ are not highly rated among students. Although the result is inconsistent with major surveys in Western contexts, the top five factors and the low position of the Reputation factors are mostly the same as in the segment analysis by [1]. Integrating this with the qualitative results, the following analyses will discuss the characteristics of institutions in detail.

5.1.1. Reputation

Reputation is an important aspect frequently concluded in prior study. When asked about the selection factors, many students mentioned the reputation of a university and the reputation of a degree. According to their responses, the reputation of a university determines the degree’s reputation. This might be because of the structure of higher education in Vietnam, where most universities are single-disciplinary institutions (i.e., University of Economics, University of Technology, etc.) and each university has its featured majors [1].

[University reputation] “To be honest, when it came to HCM City, I tended to find universities that belong to Vietnam National University because it is prestigious, safe, and professional”.

[Course reputation] “This university is famous for those interested in chasing higher education, especially for journalism”.

The answers related to the academic standing or ranking of a university are rarely mentioned. According to Hobsons [35], this finding corresponds with previous surveys conducted in foreign educational markets, which reveals that academic standing/ ranking is less of a concern for prospective students. There might be two reasons for this. First, the university ranking is not applicable for comparing universities featuring different majors. Second, this is understandable in developing countries such as Vietnam in which the universities have uncompetitive positions in global ranking systems.

Most of the interviewees have prior perceptions about the reputation of a university in their plan; as a result, they do not have to strengthen this knowledge in their search stage. Only three of them consider the reputation aspects as a crucial factor affecting their final decision when choosing a university. This might justify the quantitative result of the low ranking of the Reputation dimension. As the reputation of a university is formed a long time prior to the decision-making process for selecting a university, students tend to consider other factors during the evaluation stages.

5.1.2. Career Prospect

Interviewees agreed that career prospects are important to them. Career prospects in this study also consist of internships, part-time jobs, and industry engagements. At the stage of selecting universities, the perceptions of prospective students about the career prospects are mostly influenced by social feedback such as current students, alumni and employers.

[Employment prospect] “The second factor is the job opportunities after I graduate. After I graduate here, I will definitely have a stable job”.

[Employment prospect] “It is not uncommon that the employment prospect of University C. students is high. I consulted the information about job opportunities, most employers tend to favor University C. students, especially in my major”.

[Employment prospect] “When I asked my acquaintance in more detail about University F., she told me that University F. students were welcomed in many companies after graduation. Moreover, the employment prospects after graduation are good”.

In some cases, prospective students think that the career possibilities after graduation depend on the reputation of their degree; as a result, the more prestigious a university degree is, the more likely it is to have job opportunities.

[Employment prospect] “However, my friends and my acquaintances convinced me that I could earn a lot of money after graduation if I learnt Information Technology. Therefore, I chose the Information Technology department of University A”.

5.1.3. Quality of Teaching

Both qualitative and quantitative responses consider the quality of teaching as one of the most important factors when prospective students select a university, in line with other major works (e.g., [27]). This dimension includes the quality of courses and the quality of instructors. According to interviewees, taking courses that are highly practical allows them to absorb experience and knowledge from excellent instructors, and being inspired by them is a steppingstone to their success in the future. Universities should enhance the promotion of the quality of teaching in their marketing messages [18].

Interviewees are concerned about the academic reputation or degree requirement from lecturers at universities. They want to learn from the lecturers that are experts in their field, have well-known publications, or used to study abroad. With those concerns, they can find their answers about the qualification of lecturers mainly through media sources.

[Quality of staff] “I read on the University C. website about the quality of lecturers here and also heard from other parents. They said that the entrance standard for the lecturers is a master’s degree that is trained abroad. To be honest, I am interested in lecturers who have studied overseas before because the textbooks of developed countries are more open and professional”.

The quality of teaching not only requires a well-developed curriculum and professional teaching, but lecturers are also expected to build conditions that inspire students to enhance willingness and studying responsibility.

[Lecturer aptitude] “When I visited University C., I was really impressed by the lecturer who guided my group. The way he counseled as well as the way he introduced University C. and the general knowledge made me motivated to want to study at University C. immediately. Thanks to him, I knew what works the engineer would have to do. It was only in a short time that he gave me a great motivation so I think that during the time I was in college, when I was in contact with such people, I would succeed when I graduate”.

It can easily be seen that this is a factor that frequently appears when students search for information about any university. Course programs show students which careers match their goals as well as their interests, the pathway they will take, and its practicality. The level of difficulty of the courses, including pass rates, was also involved when prospects discussed the virtual communities within their relationships.

[Course programs] “Besides, I also cared about the course programs here. I mean the credits I have to study to accomplish the course and graduate”.

[Course programs] “The most important factor that I had to cope with was the course programs. I wanted to learn in a university that provided the best course programs related to my major. For instance, I want to study journalism, but in the South this is the only university that provides this course”.

In Vietnam, the teaching language is also a related factor, and the training of subjects entirely in English is an outstanding strength. With the rising number of English-taught high schools, using English as the teaching language can attract prospective students who want to learn in an international environment to improve their language ability, and this is a determining factor when they consider alternatives.

[Course programs] “I was impressed by the total English-taught program of University C. As my English competence was weak, I wanted to study in an environment that could help me to improve my English skills, so I could do my favorite job in the future”.

5.1.4. Entry Qualification

In Vietnam, the national examination is required for students to obtain a high school degree and it is used for university admissions. Most universities will recruit students based on this entrance result. A number of interviewees had to change their choice because their examination scores were not enough to gain admission to their favorite universities.

[Entrance requirement] “I originally planned to go to another university. Because my entry score was not enough to be accepted. Unfortunately for me this year’s benchmarks were up 2 points with the comparison to the previous year”.

Many of them showed their concerns about entry scores before applying to a university as well as evaluating between alternatives. It is necessary for them to prepare an academic background that is adequate to their choice.

[Entrance requirement] “I first paid attention to information about the entry score of previous years. From that I could compare my own learning competence to see if I could pass or not and if it deviated much or not”.

Tuition fees and related costs are obviously concerns during the decision-making process of prospective students. There is a strong relationship between university selection and the financial condition of the student’s family [36]. However, financial issues are not rated too importantly if the prospective students could afford it, and many of them accept paying more for higher quality teaching, programme and facilities of the school. No interviewees had to give up their aspirations because of the high tuition fees.

[Cost and price] “The last important thing is the tuition fee. I didn’t want to ask for too much tuition from my parents but I wanted to be able to work part-time to cover my tuition fee with the purpose of relieving financial burden for my parents”.

[Cost and price] “I didn’t care about the tuition fees of a university. In my opinion, the total English-taught course of University C. is the most crucial thing to me. Actually, it is hard to find a university that has a high-quality English-taught course in Vietnam with acceptable tuition fees”.

5.1.5. Student Life

The last dimension of institution-related characteristics, student life, is a collection of experiences, many of which have a significant impact on student satisfaction [37]. The responses from the interviews predominantly center on psychosocial life, impression of club activities, dynamism and style of current students at the university.

Although the student life is not a significant dimension in the early stages of the decision-making process, many interviewees said that these are the determining factors for making the final decision between the shortlisted candidates. Prospective students said that they want to spend their student life in an appropriate culture. Further, after communicating with the current students at a university, prospective students might be more attracted by the dynamism and want to be a part of that community.

[Psychosocial life] “My last concern was the activities of clubs here. I wanted to know if current students were active and energetic or not. It is very important to me. I don’t like the boring studying environment”.

Many interviewees considered psychosocial life as an important factor during their evaluation and decision stage. During the interview process, there were interesting aspects of student life mentioned by candidates, such as “the regulation”, “students’ uniform”, and “university culture” besides facilities and club activities. This reflects that prospective students are quite concerned with the cultural values as well as the experience they would have during their 4 years of university.

[Psychosocial life] “I used to consult reviews from current students of University H. They said that the programs of this university are weighty and their regulations are tough. For example, they require students to wear uniforms on a specific day in a week. However, University C. does not have any strict regulations and students can wear whatever they want when they go to school”.

University facilities and the operation of those facilities play a pivotal role in fulfilling their aims by delivering a high-quality infrastructure for students and staff, which is considered as a foundation for a university [38]. In addition, university facilities are critical considerations affecting the decision-making process of prospective students when choosing a university [39] because effective facilities have a major influence on the learning progress.

[Facilities] “Besides, University F. has an international studying environment. For example, University F. does not have lecture hall dais, which creates a sense of closeness for lecturers and students. Facilities of University F. are very good. In general, University F. offers great conditions for students”.

[Facilities] “My priority is the facilities of a university. When I first came to University C., I was impressed by the material facilities here such as classrooms, library, and the playground for students. When visiting University C., I had a look at students here. I mean their styles, and their behaviors”.

5.2. Demographic Analysis

The importance of institutional characteristics, which is analyzed across demographic segments such as gender, income, and generation, are listed in

Table 5. The ranking of institution-related factors across segments (Gender, Income, and First or Non-first generation).

Choice Factors	Gender		Income		Generation
	Male	Female	Low to Mid	Mid to High	First	Non-First
Employment prospect (CP)	1	1	1	1	1	1
Quality of teaching staff (QT)	2	3	4	2	2	4
The aptitude of lecturers (QT)	3	4	3	3	3	3
Post-degree employability (CP)	4	2	2	4	4	2
Actual course content (QT)	5	5	8	5	6	5
Experiential benefits of going to the university (CP, SL)	6	6	7	7	7	6
Cost and price (EQ)	7	9	9	6	9	7
The parent’ affordability to cover higher fees (EQ)	8	8	5	10	8	9
Lifestyle benefits (CP, SL)	9	7	6	9	5	8
The requirement for the university entry (EQ)	10	10	14	8	11	10

R: Reputation, QT: Quality of teaching, EQ: Entry qualification, CP: Career prospect, SL: Student life., Income (VND): low to mid (5 million or below and 5 to 10 million), mid to high (10 to 20 million and 20 million or above).

. Across gender, income, and generation, the first-ranking institutional factor remains the same, implying that ‘employment prospect’ plays the most essential role in the student decision-making process for choosing higher education. Descriptive results mostly indicate no difference between the gender and generation comparisons.

The comparison between high-income and low-income segments indicates some noteworthy results. Regarding the top factors, the higher income segment tends to focus more on the influence of ‘quality of teaching staff’ and ‘actual course content’, while the low-to-mid income segment is significantly affected by ‘post-degree employability’. In relation to other factors, the lower-income segment tends to care more about the ‘fee’, ‘cost and price’ factors, while the higher-income segment is significantly affected by the ‘requirement for the university entry’. It is understandable that students from the low-income segments have to consider more financial factors.

Lastly, the comparison among the degree-type segments shows a lack of differences. There are only a few gaps, such as that students studying engineering might care less about ‘actual course content’ and ‘entrance requirement’ (

Table 6. The ranking of institution-related factors across student’ choice of degree types.

Choice Factors	Business and Economics	Engineering	Law, Social Sciences
Employment prospect (CP)	1	1	1
Quality of teaching staff (QT)	2	4	3
The aptitude of lecturers (QT)	3	2	2
Post-degree employability (CP)	4	3	4
Actual course content (QT)	5	7	5
Experiential benefits of going to the university (CP, SL)	6	5	6
Cost and price (EQ)	7	6	7
The parent’ affordability to cover higher fees (EQ)	8	8	9
Lifestyle benefits (CP, SL)	9	12	11
The requirement for the university entry (EQ)	10	9	8

R: Reputation, QT: Quality of teaching, EQ: Entry qualification, CP: Career prospect, SL: Student life.

).

6. Conclusions

6.1. Discussions

The mixed method approach in this research offers insights into the university selection process for prospective undergraduate students. The quantitative data showed the importance ranks of consideration factors and sources of information during the decision-making process. The qualitative data further explain the results by adding more answers from the interviewees.

Prospective students refer to many information sources available to help with the university selection process, including a mix of both marketing-controlled and word-of-mouth sources. Findings highlight the word-of-mouth source of school counsellors/guidance teachers and the marketing-controlled course of open days. Interestingly, both of them are quite new in the marketing strategies of Vietnamese universities. Counselors and guidance instructors at students’ schools are frequently cited as personal advice when students are dealing with challenging or unforeseen circumstances [28]. Open days have only recently been popularly organized, while the roles of school counsellors/guidance teachers have been not very focused. Among the marketing-controlled sources, universities should invest more to organize open days. This is an opportunity for prospective students to approach the availability of services in the institutions so that they can decide whether to enter an institution. In addition, this finding is consistent with previous research, which found that high school students heavily considered career assessment data when deciding which college to attend [11,40]. On the other hand, Vietnamese students do not place a high value on brochures and advertising in newspapers, radio, television, magazines, and billboards, which is a frequent marketing technique for Vietnamese colleges [1]. Additionally, the less-important role of parents and families have also been clarified by the qualitative data. It is different to the previous research of Choi and Nieminen, Eldegwy et al. and Nguyen [41,42,43].

Regarding the characteristics of institutions, our results are consistent with prior studies in terms of the importance of career prospects and teaching quality. This result is consistent with the hypothesis of Hemsley-Brown and Oplatka, and T. D. Le et al. [1,19]. However, reputation is no longer ranked as the top choice factor, as is seem in the results of Moogan et al. [44]. This might reflect the structure of Vietnamese higher education where most universities are single-disciplinary institutions (i.e., University of Banking, University of Technology, etc.) so each university has its featured majors [1]. Students these days show a deeper understanding of higher education and have changed their perception: a university having a superior reputation does not mean they can fully provide what the students seek (prospective students focus more on afterward practical outcomes—after graduation). The movement into Generation Z, who are more open-minded, free to approach many modern perspectives, and have self-control when searching for information, provides students with the autonomy to choose the right universities for their ability and their expectation rather than following the traditional thinking: the more superior the reputation of a university, the more successful outcomes the students receive.

6.2. Practical Implications

Educators may find this work helpful as it guides high school students through the university selection process. While high school teachers have a crucial influence on students’ university choices, educators should utilize the results of this research to assess their present efforts to help high school students when exploring further education. In particular, while helping students with their university consideration, it would be helpful to assess students’ university choices based on their expectations as well as their financial and academic requirements in order to assist them in identifying a university that fits their criteria. Furthermore, guidance teachers should consciously offer events related to higher education, such as information fairs and campus tours or open days at institutions.

Admission administrators, marketers, and others engaged in student recruitment in higher education may utilize these data to learn more about student preferences and create customized marketing campaigns that meet the preferences of this specific group of students. Developing a purposeful marketing and recruiting strategy based on student data has the potential to reach and attract a higher number of new students for the university. These strategies may include efforts aimed at expanding chances for family members and high school teachers to participate in the recruiting process, as well as strengthening communication with potential students. It is critical to assess communication in order to guarantee customization, as well as an emphasis on enticing students to visit campus and providing information about academic programs, college location, and student engagement possibilities. Finally, universities should work to raise awareness of their social media channels and urge potential students to interact with them on these accounts.