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Online Academic Exams: Does Multiplicity of Exam Versions Mitigate Cheating?

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  • Marc Vorsatz
  • Flip Klijn

Abstract

We study academic integrity in a final exam of a game theory course with 463 undergraduate students at a major Spanish university. The exam is an unproctored online multiple-choice exam without backtracking. A key characteristic is that for each (type of) problem, groups of students receive different versions. Moreover, each problem version is assigned to one subgroup during one stage of the exam and to another subgroup during an immediately consecutive later stage. Thus, we can exploit grade points and timestamps to study students' academic integrity. We observe a significant decrease in completion time at each later stage; however, surprisingly, there is no corresponding impact on average grade points. The precise number of different versions does not seem to have an effect on either variable. Our findings thus suggest that employing a limited number of distinct problem versions (as few as two) can diminish cheating effectiveness in online exams.

Suggested Citation

  • Marc Vorsatz & Flip Klijn, 2024. "Online Academic Exams: Does Multiplicity of Exam Versions Mitigate Cheating?," Working Papers 1430, Barcelona School of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:bge:wpaper:1430
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Hill, Andrew J. & LoPalo, Melissa, 2024. "The effects of online vs in-class testing in moderate-stakes college environments," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 98(C).
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    7. Jake Anders, 2020. "How should universities select students?," CEPEO Briefing Note Series 8, UCL Centre for Education Policy and Equalising Opportunities, revised Nov 2020.
    8. Vazquez, Jose J. & Chiang, Eric P. & Sarmiento-Barbieri, Ignacio, 2021. "Can we stay one step ahead of cheaters? A field experiment in proctoring online open book exams," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 90(C).
    9. Klijn, Flip & Mdaghri Alaoui, Mehdi & Vorsatz, Marc, 2022. "Academic integrity in on-line exams: Evidence from a randomized field experiment," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 93(C).
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    JEL classification:

    • A22 - General Economics and Teaching - - Economic Education and Teaching of Economics - - - Undergraduate
    • C93 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Field Experiments
    • D9 - Microeconomics - - Micro-Based Behavioral Economics
    • I21 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Analysis of Education
    • I23 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Higher Education; Research Institutions

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