Center for Evolution & Medicine, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ 85281.
Department of Biology, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195.
CBE Life Sci Educ. 2019 Sep;18(3):ar35. doi: 10.1187/cbe.18-05-0083.
Gender gaps in exam scores or final grades are common in introductory college science and engineering classrooms, with women underperforming relative to men with the same admission test scores or college grade point averages. After failing to close a historically documented gender gap in a large introductory biology course using interventions targeted at training a growth mindset, we implemented interventions designed to reduce student test anxiety. We combined evidence-based exercises based on expressive writing and on reappraising physiological arousal. We also used a valid measure to quantify test anxiety at the start and end of the course. This instrument measures an individual's self-declared or perceived test anxiety-also called trait anxiety-but not the immediate or "state" anxiety experienced during an actual exam. Consistent with previous reports in the literature, we found that women in this population declared much higher test anxiety than men and that students who declared higher test anxiety had lower exam scores than students who declared lower test anxiety. Although the test anxiety interventions had no impact on the level of self-declared trait anxiety, they did significantly increase student exam performance. The treatment benefits occurred in both men and women. These data suggest that 1) a combination of interventions based on expressive writing and reappraising physiological arousal can be a relatively easy manner to boost exam performance in a large-enrollment science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) course and encourage emotion regulation; 2) women are more willing than men to declare that they are anxious about exams, but men and women may actually experience the same level of anxiety during the exam itself; and 3) women are underperforming in STEM courses for reasons other than gender-based differences in mindset or test anxiety.
在大学基础科学和工程课堂上，考试成绩或最终成绩的性别差距很常见，具有相同入学考试成绩或大学平均绩点的女性表现不如男性。在未能通过针对培养成长心态的干预措施来缩小大型基础生物学课程中历史上记录的性别差距之后，我们实施了旨在降低学生考试焦虑的干预措施。我们结合了基于表达性写作和重新评估生理唤醒的基于证据的练习。我们还使用了一种有效的测量方法，在课程开始和结束时量化考试焦虑。该工具衡量个体的自我宣称或感知的考试焦虑 - 也称为特质焦虑 - 但不衡量在实际考试期间经历的即时或“状态”焦虑。与文献中的先前报告一致，我们发现该人群中的女性宣布的考试焦虑程度明显高于男性，并且宣布考试焦虑程度较高的学生的考试成绩低于宣布考试焦虑程度较低的学生。尽管考试焦虑干预措施对自我宣称的特质焦虑水平没有影响，但它们确实显著提高了学生的考试成绩。治疗效果在男性和女性中都有出现。这些数据表明：1）基于表达性写作和重新评估生理唤醒的干预措施的组合可以是一种相对简单的方式，可以提高大型科学、技术、工程和数学（STEM）课程的考试成绩，并鼓励情绪调节；2）女性比男性更愿意宣布自己对考试感到焦虑，但男性和女性在考试期间可能实际上经历相同程度的焦虑；3）女性在 STEM 课程中表现不佳的原因并非基于思维或考试焦虑的性别差异。
