Multiple choice exams are ubiquitous, but advice on test-taking strategies varies and is not always well informed by research. This study evaluated the question of whether students benefit or are harmed when they change their initial answers on multiple choice questions in the context of physiology and biology courses. Previously marked…

We investigated how item formats influence test takers' response tendencies under uncertainty. Adult participants solved content-equivalent math items in three formats: multiple-selection multiple-choice, grid with forced-choice (true-false) options, and grid with non-forced-choice options. Participants showed a greater tendency to commit (rather…

This article investigates how 86 first-semester African-American college freshmen perceive their time management, study, and test-preparation habits. The research questions sought if the freshman students reported study, note taking, and test preparation habits were different from what we would expect if no preferences existed. Participants…

Grading is often a faculty member's least favorite chore, especially in engineering where open-ended problems prevail. For this reason, multiple-choice test items could be a popular alternative for assessing learning and understanding. In addition, most Learning Management Systems allow the instructor to create multiple-choice questions to be…

Assessment specialists expend a great deal of energy to promote valid inferences from test scores gathered in low-stakes testing contexts. Given the indirect effect of perceived test importance on test performance via examinee effort, assessment practitioners have manipulated test instructions with the goal of increasing perceived test importance.…

Examinees who attempt the same test multiple times are often referred to as "repeaters." Previous studies suggested that repeaters should be excluded from the total sample before equating because repeater groups are distinguishable from non-repeater groups. In addition, repeaters might memorize anchor items, causing item drift under a…

Use of high-stakes exams in a course has been associated with gender, racial, and socioeconomic inequities. We investigated whether offering students the opportunity to retake an exam makes high-stakes exams more equitable. Following the control value theory of achievement emotions, we hypothesized that exam retakes would increase students'…

This study investigated how students used information provided in given energy questions while answering these questions. Participant students were taking at least one college-level introductory science course and were asked to respond to two-tiered format (multiple-choice question and short written response question) energy questions addressing…

Drug abstinence studies indicate that escalating reinforcement schedules maintain abstinence for longer periods than fixed reinforcement schedules. The current study evaluated whether escalating reinforcement schedules would maintain more quiz taking than fixed reinforcement schedules. During baseline and for the control group, bonus points were…

This study is aimed at exploring how different formulations of the same mathematical item may influence students' answers, and whether or not boys and girls are equally affected by differences in presentation. An experimental design was employed: the same stem-items (i.e., items with the same mathematical content and question intent) were…

The basic purpose of the present study was to assess the root causes and provoking factors of cheating during an examination and to propose possible solutions to take corrective actions in public secondary schools in Gedeo zone, Southern Nations Nationalities and Peoples Region, Ethiopia. Because of the homogeneity of schools, five schools were…

Shadow education or private supplementary tutoring has become an international phenomenon as increasing numbers of students seek help beyond traditional schooling for academic achievement. The positive relationship between students' academic achievement and participation in shadow education has been previously reported. However, the manner in…

Educators, especially test creators, are concerned with the construct validity of their tests. Blame has generally been attached to test-wiseness strategies as one source of error in measurement. There is little evidence of any relation between test-taking strategies in general and test validity; thus, it is not known how strategies can affect…

This study investigated the effects of two different planning time conditions (i.e., operational [20 s] and extended length [90 s]) for the lecture listening-into-speaking tasks of the "TOEFL iBT"® test for candidates at different proficiency levels. Seventy international students based in universities and language schools in the United…

This study aimed at assessing the cognitive determinants of the BSIT students during the second semester of the academic year 2019-2020. A total of three hundred ninety-four (394) respondents participated in this study to understand the relationship of the cognitive determinants to their academic performance in a major programming course. Results…