Undergraduates who self-identify as a consumer of their education achieve lower academic grades than those who do not (Bunce Baird & Jones 2016). The current study tested the hypothesis that this is because paying fees creates a customer – service-provider relationship between students and universities which fosters passive or surface approaches to learning. 679 undergraduates studying in England UK completed an online questionnaire to assess their consumer orientation level of course complaints approaches to learning and level of academic performance. The analysis replicated previous findings and supported the hypotheses finding that poorer academic performance was associated with identifying more strongly as a consumer making more course complaints and engaging more in surface approaches to learning. Furthermore the relationships between identifying as a consumer and complaining with academic performance were mediated by level of surface approach to learning. Implications for positioning students as consumers and charging increasingly higher tuition fees are discussed.
