published in: Journal of Economic Psychology, 2016, 53, 37-53
We investigate whether and how time pressure affects performance. We conducted a field experiment in which students from an Italian University are proposed to choose between two exam schemes: a standard scheme without time pressure and an alternative scheme consisting of two written intermediate tests, one of which to be taken under time pressure. Both exam schemes consist of a verbal and a numerical part, each carrying half of the total marks. Students deciding to sustain the alternative exam are randomly assigned to a "time pressure" and a "no time pressure" group. Students performing under time pressure at the first test perform in absence of time pressure at the second test and vice versa.
We find that being exposed to time pressure exerts a negative and statistically significant impact on students' performance both at the verbal and at the numerical task. The effect is driven by a strong negative impact on females' performance, while there is no statistically significant effect on males. Gender differences in handling time pressure are relevant only when dealing with the verbal task. Using data on students' expectations, we also find that the effect produced by time pressure on performance was correctly perceived by students. Female students expect a lower grade when working under time pressure, while males do not.
We use cookies to provide you with an optimal website experience. This includes cookies that are necessary for the operation of the site as well as cookies that are only used for anonymous statistical purposes, for comfort settings or to display personalized content. You can decide for yourself which categories you want to allow. Please note that based on your settings, you may not be able to use all of the site's functions.
Cookie settings
These necessary cookies are required to activate the core functionality of the website. An opt-out from these technologies is not available.
In order to further improve our offer and our website, we collect anonymous data for statistics and analyses. With the help of these cookies we can, for example, determine the number of visitors and the effect of certain pages on our website and optimize our content.