Gender differences in willingness to compete and answering multiple-choice questions—The role of age
Gender differences in willingness to compete and answering multiple-choice questions—The role of age
Using a large and unique data set of a German wide voluntary mathematical school competition, we examine at which age gender differences in the willingness to compete arise. We use the data of more than 1, 3 million pupils, ages 8 to 18. We find that the share of girls participating in the competition starts to decrease in the early teenage years (12–13). Furthermore, girls answer fewer multiple-choice questions than boys at all age levels. This is interesting as previous findings have identified skipping in multiple-choice tests as one reason for men outperforming women inter alia in university entrance examinations.
Entering competition, Gender differences, Multiple-choice test, Skipping test items
86-89
Riener, Gerhard
8e8e27a6-4931-4e70-b223-688f3fd616c1
Wagner, Valentin
c650683b-2c3d-4772-95e4-b1177363a7f0
1 March 2018
Riener, Gerhard
8e8e27a6-4931-4e70-b223-688f3fd616c1
Wagner, Valentin
c650683b-2c3d-4772-95e4-b1177363a7f0
Riener, Gerhard and Wagner, Valentin
(2018)
Gender differences in willingness to compete and answering multiple-choice questions—The role of age.
Economics Letters, 164, .
(doi:10.1016/j.econlet.2018.01.012).
Abstract
Using a large and unique data set of a German wide voluntary mathematical school competition, we examine at which age gender differences in the willingness to compete arise. We use the data of more than 1, 3 million pupils, ages 8 to 18. We find that the share of girls participating in the competition starts to decrease in the early teenage years (12–13). Furthermore, girls answer fewer multiple-choice questions than boys at all age levels. This is interesting as previous findings have identified skipping in multiple-choice tests as one reason for men outperforming women inter alia in university entrance examinations.
This record has no associated files available for download.
More information
Published date: 1 March 2018
Additional Information:
Publisher Copyright:
© 2018 Elsevier B.V.
Keywords:
Entering competition, Gender differences, Multiple-choice test, Skipping test items
Identifiers
Local EPrints ID: 480845
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/480845
ISSN: 0165-1765
PURE UUID: 7f047308-dc24-4375-98e6-a43e0333fda4
Catalogue record
Date deposited: 10 Aug 2023 16:37
Last modified: 17 Mar 2024 04:18
Export record
Altmetrics
Contributors
Author:
Gerhard Riener
Author:
Valentin Wagner
Download statistics
Downloads from ePrints over the past year. Other digital versions may also be available to download e.g. from the publisher's website.
View more statistics