Most students used cheat sheets as an occasional backup or continuous aid rather than a one-time reference¶

Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study (2 entries) · associational r1 · q3
Currency · newest study 2026 · not yet checked against its sources · not reviewed by a person

Subclaims¶

q3 i? Around 64% (midterm) and 50% (final) reported occasional use; less than 20% rarely or never used the sheet. → Helen Weixu Chen 2026 q3 i? Continuous reference while working through the exam was the most common usage strategy, reported by 73% of participants. → Helen Weixu Chen 2026 (2)

Evidence¶

Helen Weixu Chen 2026¶

Helen Weixu Chen, Victoria Sakhnini, and Lesley Istead. (2026). Make or Take: How Students Navigate Self-Created and Instructor-Provided Cheat Sheets. ACM Trans. Comput. Educ. https://doi.org/10.1145/3834566

q3 · i? · associational · r1

Survey responses on consultation frequency across both exams; occasional use predominated, indicating the sheet served "more as a backup reference than as a central tool" for most participants.

"the majority of participants said they "occasionally" used it, with around 64% for the midterm and 50% for the final exam."

Helen Weixu Chen 2026 (2)¶

Helen Weixu Chen, Victoria Sakhnini, and Lesley Istead. (2026). Make or Take: How Students Navigate Self-Created and Instructor-Provided Cheat Sheets. ACM Trans. Comput. Educ. https://doi.org/10.1145/3834566

q3 · i? · associational · r1

Self-reported usage strategies for the final exam; continuous referral (73%) far exceeded skimming at the start (23%) or referral only for uncertain questions (13%).

"The most popular strategy for using the cheat sheet was to "refer to the cheat sheet continuously as I worked through the exam, " reported by 73% of participants."

Discussion¶

Related Claims¶

• Cheat sheet type was not significantly associated with exam performance on either exam, though a moderate non-significant trend favoured self-created sheets on the final — the general claim this finding bears on, with the studies behind it
• Most participants reported that cheat sheets boosted their confidence and efficiency during exams — related
• Self-created cheat sheet users reported significantly longer midterm preparation time than instructor-provided users, but the difference was not significant for the final exam — related