Determining the Most Critical Pedagogical Approach for Principle of Economics (ECO120) Through Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) Analysis in Higher Education

This study aims to identify the most critical pedagogical approach for teaching the Principles of Economics (ECO120) in higher education by applying the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) method. With the growing complexity of economic concepts and the need for effective instructional strategies, it is essential to evaluate various teaching methods to enhance student understanding and engagement. Five prominent pedagogical approaches—constructivist, collaborative, inquiry-based, integrative, and reflective—are analysed to determine their relative importance in an ECO120 classroom. AHP, a structured decision-making tool, is employed to compare these approaches by using pairwise comparison, a systematic process in which each element is compared with every other element in terms of relative importance, typically using a scale ranging from 1 to 9. This method is used to quantify subjective judgments and convert them into a numerical form that can be analysed mathematically. The findings reveal that the collaborative approach ranks as the most critical, followed by the constructivist approach, which emphasizes active knowledge construction. Inquiry-based, integrative, and reflective approaches occupy the third, fourth, and fifth positions, respectively. These results suggest that a student-centred, interaction-driven pedagogy is most effective for fostering comprehension in introductory economics courses. The study provides actionable recommendations for educators to optimize their teaching strategies, thereby improving the overall quality of economics education in higher learning institutions.