The effects of test difficulty on undergraduates' state anxiety and perception of test difficulty

The finding of a previous study that student perception of difficulty level may be just as important as the actual difficulty levels was reinterpreted. A specially developed Educational Psychology Recognition Test and Test Perception Inventory assessed task difficulty and perception of exam difficulty, respectively, in 30 American undergraduates. A modified version of the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory assessed state anxiety. Results indicated, that 1) test difficulty did not significantly affect state anxiety but did significantly affect perception of exam difficulty, 2) students administered the high-difficulty test exhibited a perception of higher exam difficulty than those taking the medium- and low-difficulty tests, and 3) there was no significant difference for the perception of exam difficulty between students taking the medium- and low-difficulty tests.