Online education continues to grow, bringing opportunities and challenges for students and instructors. One challenge is the perception that academic integrity associated with online tests is compromised due to undetected cheating that yields artificially higher grades. To address these concerns, proctoring software has been developed to address and prevent academic dishonesty. The purpose of this study was to compare online test results from proctored versus unproctored online tests. Test performance of 147 students enrolled in multiple sections of an online course were compared using linear mixed effects models with nearly half the students having no proctoring and the remainder required to use online proctoring software. Students scored, on average, 17 points lower [95% CI: 14, 20] and used significantly less time in online tests that used proctoring software versus unproctored tests. Significant grade disparity and different time usage occurred on different exams, both across and within sections of the same course where some students used test proctoring software and others did not. Implications and suggestions for incorporating strategic interventions to address integrity, addressing disparate test scores, and validating student knowledge in online classes are discussed.

Traditional and online university courses share expectations for quality content and rigor. Student and faculty concerns about compromised academic integrity and actual instances of academic dishonesty in assessments, especially with online testing, are increasingly troublesome. Recent research suggests that in the absence of proctoring, the time taken to complete an exam increases significantly and online test results are inflated. This study uses a randomized design in seven sections of an online course to examine test scores from 97 students and time taken to complete online tests with and without proctoring software, controlling for exam difficulty, course design, instructor effects, and student majors. Results from fixed effects estimated from a fitted statistical model showed a significant advantage in quiz performance (7-9 points on a 100 point quiz) when students were not proctored, with all other variables statistically accounted for. Larger grade disparities and longer testing times were observed on the most difficult quizzes, and with factors that reflected the perception of high stakes of the quiz grades. Overall, use of proctoring software resulted in lower quiz scores, shorter quiz taking times, and less variation in quiz performance across exams, implying greater compliance with academic integrity compared with when quizzes were taken without proctoring software.