How Exam Cheat Sheets Shape Student Success

Instructor-authorized exam cheat sheets have recently become commonplace within UNC’s introductory biology courses, but it is unclear how cheat sheets impact students’ exam scores, if at all. To investigate, we asked how students’ direct interactions with their cheat sheets prior to and during an exam, and their corresponding perceptions, are related to exam performance. Within an introductory biology course, students created unique cheat sheets to reference during exams. Students completed online surveys after Exam 1 (N = 270) and Exam 2 (N = 211), providing information on their behaviors and perceptions relating to their cheat sheet and exam. Exam scores were negatively correlated to behaviors involving cheat sheet interaction, including the amount of time spent creating cheat sheets and cheat sheet referencing frequency during the exam. Students’ perceptions of excessive reliance on their cheat sheets were also negatively correlated to exam scores. Alternately, a significant positive correlation was observed between the perception that cheat sheets increased students’ confidence on exams and their exam scores. These results suggest that cheat sheets do not serve as a replacement for effective studying and learning, as relying on them is associated with relatively low exam scores. Instead, cheat sheets appear to assist students the most when improving the mindset with which they take the exam. Therefore, cheat sheets likely serve as an effective pedagogical tool when students use them sparingly, reaping the benefits in mentality without falling into a false sense of security. Current work includes expanding this study to encompass biology electives and students with more experience in college-level biology courses.