How does a 48-hour test-taking window affect performance? Results from a testing centre

This note examines the effect that different self-selected test-taking strategies have on a student's performance in an introductory economics course. Due to the policies of a centralized testing centre, students are allowed to choose when in a 48-hour period they take each exam as well as how long they work on the exam. The results suggest that the relationship between completion time and exam score follows an inverted U-shape while the relationship between relative order and exam score follows a U-shape. In other words, students who turn in their exams in a relatively short or a relatively long time tend to perform worse while students who choose to take their exams relatively early or relatively late tend to perform better.