Test Anxiety, Self-Efficacy & Prior Experience

Studies show that both test anxiety (TA) and self-efficacy (SE) have an impact on academic performance [4] and that different students experience TA at different levels. For example, TA has consistently been shown to be higher and SE to be lower for women than men [3]. In our study, we explore how TA and SE are experienced by CS1 students in a computer-based testing environment and how this changes by demographic group. We build on our prior work [1], focusing on groups of students based on their prior programming experience (PE) and whether or not they are first in their family (FIF) to attend a post-secondary institution. We measure self-reported TA and SE at five points and relate these to grades. We find that while novices report higher TA, lower SE, and lower grades than their peers, TA is only correlated with grade for experienced students.