Because they can be marked quickly and easily and can cover a wide range of course content, objective tests are particularly appropriate for informal self-assessment to give students ongoing feedback about their progress. They can be used in this way throughout an undergraduate course. For formal assessment, however, their contribution to final marks is likely to decline as students progress through their degree programmes and the range of abilities being examined becomes more comprehensive and demanding. CAA software can provide immediate supportive feedback for each question, tailored to the answer given, making this particularly suitable for informal self-assessment. Superior graphical and visualisation exercises can also be included with the use of multimedia files such as graphics, sound and video clips.
Most software offers a facility for reporting results and analysing student responses.
An increasing number of systems are web based. This may be presented immediately after the question, at the end of the test or not at all. Feedback may also be provided on the basis of overall test performance. For MCQs students might be discouraged from guessing by the imposition of a penalty for incorrect answers, although it is generally considered that negative marking simply alters the baseline of results. In any case, the rewards of 'blind' guessing diminish rapidly as the number of questions increases.