Working Paper: NBER ID: w18436
Authors: Ian Fillmore; Devin G. Pope
Abstract: In many education and work environments, economic agents must perform several mental tasks in a short period of time. As with physical fatigue, it is likely that cognitive fatigue can occur and affect performance if a series of mental tasks are scheduled close together. In this paper, we identify the impact of time between cognitive tasks on performance in a particular context: the taking of Advanced Placement (AP) exams by high-school students. We exploit the fact that AP exam dates change from year to year, so that students who take two subject exams in one year may have a different number of days between the exams than students who take the same two exams in a different year. We find strong evidence that a shorter amount of time between exams is associated with lower scores, particularly on the second exam. Our estimates suggest that students who take exams with 10 days of separation are 8% more likely to pass both exams than students who take the same two exams with only 1 day of separation.
Keywords: Cognitive Tasks; Exam Performance; Cognitive Fatigue
JEL Codes: D03; I20
Edges that are evidenced by causal inference methods are in orange, and the rest are in light blue.
| Cause | Effect |
|---|---|
| time between AP exams (C41) | performance on the second exam (D29) |
| time between AP exams (C41) | combined point total on the two exams (C12) |
| 10 days of separation (Y20) | passing both exams (C12) |
| time between exams (C41) | cognitive fatigue (D91) |
| demographic variations (J11) | performance benefits from increased time between exams (C41) |