Shifting College Majors in Response to Advanced Placement Exam Scores / Christopher Avery, Oded Gurantz, Michael Hurwitz, Jonathan Smith.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Avery, Christopher.

Contributor:

National Bureau of Economic Research.

Gurantz, Oded.

Hurwitz, Michael.

Smith, Jonathan.

Series:

Working Paper Series (National Bureau of Economic Research) no. w22841.

NBER working paper series no. w22841

Language:

English

Physical Description:

1 online resource: illustrations (black and white);

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, Mass. National Bureau of Economic Research 2016.

Summary:

Mapping continuous raw scores from millions of Advanced Placement examinations onto the 1 to 5 integer scoring scale, we apply a regression discontinuity design to understand how students' choice of college major is impacted by receiving a higher integer score despite similar exam performance to students who earned a lower integer score. Attaining higher scores increases the probability that a student will major in that exam subject by approximately 5 percent (0.64 percentage points), with some individual exams demonstrating increases in major choice by as much as 30 percent. These direct impacts of a higher score explain approximately 11 percent of the unconditional 64 percent (5.7 percentage points) gap in the probability of majoring in the same subject as the AP exam when attaining a 5 versus a 4. We estimate that a substantial portion of the overall effect is driven by behavioral responses to the positive signal of receiving a higher score.

Notes:

Print version record

November 2016.