The Effects of Question Difficulty Order During a Test on Metacognitive Judgments

• In Event: Metacognition and Motivation in Learning and Instruction

Abstract

Building from prior work that has shown that the question order of a test affects learners’ evaluations of their test performance, we conducted two experiments to examine the generalizability of this effect. Using a between-subjects design, Experiment 1 had participants from a diverse population take a test with either an easy-hard or a hard-easy question order. After the test, they made a post-test judgment of their performance. Experiment 2 used the same procedure but explored U-shaped question orders (e.g., easy-hard-easy). Results showed that the question order influenced participants’ post-test judgments with each order producing different patterns of bias—the easy-hard order led to relative optimism and the hard-easy-hard led to relative pessimism. The implications of these results are discussed.

Authors

• Wei-Chieh Fang, Washington University in St. Louis

• Cristina D. Zepeda, Vanderbilt University

• Andrew C. Butler, Washington University in St. Louis