Test anxiety and online testing: A study

Test anxiety is known to negatively affect test performance. Having students write about their testing worries before taking a test was recently shown to improve test performance by reducing test anxiety. We conducted a controlled study to replicate this result in the context of students using online Computer Science tutors unsupervised and on their own time. Instead of using open-ended expressive writing exercise, we used a multiple-choice questionnaire that addressed student anxiety. During the study, we collected data from two tutors on advanced programming concepts over three semesters. We did ANOVA analysis of the number of problems solved, score per problem and time spent per problem with treatment as the between-subjects factor. The test group solved significantly more problems and scored more points per problem than the control group on one of the two tutors, but not the other. We discuss a possible explanation for the result and the significance of addressing test anxiety for broadening participation in Computer Science.