THE PRESSURE PARADOX
Does Stress Fuel or Fracture Exam Performance?
Fun Project By Varick Hasim, Ravi Harun, Rayyan Khalid
Our demo video, if you're curious about how we made this project:
THE PRESSURE PARADOX
Does Stress Fuel or Fracture Exam Performance?
Ever felt your mind go blank during an exam, even though you studied?
That’s not just bad luck—it might be stress silently sabotaging your score.
Well, is that true? We don’t know!
Let’s find out together.
We have exam stress data of 10 students and their corresponding exam scores.
Which one of them is the most similar to you based on your stress levels? How well would you do?
THE PRESSURE PARADOX
What type of exam do you wanna take?
Midterm 1 is the exam with the lowest stakes.
Midterm 2 is the exam with moderate stakes, depending on how you did for Midterm 1.
(If you do well on Midterm 1, you can relax for the rest of the semester until your final. However, if you do poorly, Midterm 2 is more important than ever now.)
Final is the exam with the highest stakes.
How Nervous Do You Think You Will Be?
Lower heart rates indicate lower stress levels, while higher heart rates indicate higher stress levels.
The average heart rate of a healthy adult is around 90 beats per minute (bpm).
Adjust the slider to set your average heart rate for the exam.
The average room temperature is around 25°C.
Adjust the slider to set your average room temperature for the exam.
Based on our calculations, this is the student who was the most similar to your average room temperature and average heart rate.
The charts below show the heart rate and temperature data of this student.
The heart rate chart shows the heart rate data over time, while the temperature chart shows the temperature data over time.
The black dotted line indicates the class' average heart rate and room temperature for the exam.
Tap your right arrow to see how nervous this student was in the exam!
So, what have we learned?
Based on the data, we can see that stress levels vary among students during exams.
Some students perform better under pressure, while others struggle.
In general, students tend to spike in heart rate towards the end of every exam.
Whether it is a midterm or a final,
the experience of writing at the speed of light to answer all remaining questions is a familiar experience for any student!
Students who do the test in colder rooms tend to perform worse than students who do the test in warmer rooms.
This is likely because students who are too cold tend to be more nervous and students who are too hot tend to be more relaxed.
The data also shows that students with lower heart rates do not necessarily to perform better on exams, and vice versa.
What's important to note
is that students who stay calmer (constant cycles of heart rate and temperature) tend to do better than students who panic (spiking heart rate and temperature levels).
Remember, it is important to stay calm, but it is always the most important to study for your exam! No amount of unnervousness will save you if you do not know the material!
Still curious about how nervous other students were and how they performed?
The charts below show the heart rate and temperature data of all students during the exam.
Compare student(s) and the class average!
Select the exam you want to see: