Assessing university students’ achievements by means of standard score (Z score) and its effect on the learning climate

• Students who are informed of their scholastic standing become more competitive.
• Status awareness promotes personal achievement more than group cooperation.
• This also occurs with those in socially oriented fields as sociology and education.

Scholastic achievements are reported in sequential scores. The hypothesis examined was that incorporating a standard score in the achievement record would resolve these problems, increase interpersonal competition and decrease cooperative learning among students.182 students in Economics, Education and Social Work, who their achievements were evaluated on a scale of 0–100, completed a questionnaire of learning climate and personal learning style. Afterwards they were told of plans to include a standard score in their grade record with an explanation of its implications regarding student ranking. The participants then completed the same questionnaire a second time.When the standard score was included in the evaluation, the climate became significantly more competitive in all three majors.