Gender Differences in Willingness to Guess Revisited: Heterogeneity in a High Stakes Professional Setting

Multiple choice question tests are often the gateway to important professional outcomes. We study gender differences in willingness to guess among highly skilled and trained candidates in a high stakes multiple choice question test, before and after a reduction in the number of alternative answers to each question, lowering the penalty for incorrect answers to the critical value, i.e, the one yielding zero expected value upon uniform beliefs. We find heterogeneous gender differences, replicate the previous finding that women answer fewer questions than men, and conclude that reducing the number of alternative answers levels the field for men and women among those candidates who answer most of the questions.