# Quiz feedback students read: when to show the answer

**When should a quiz show the right answer, the explanation and the score?** Quiz feedback should show the right answer with a two-sentence explanation as soon as nothing more rides on the quiz: after each question in practice, at hand-in for a weekly check, and once the last student has sat a test. Show the score apart or later, because in several studies a grade weakened the comment beside it.

Published 2026-10-10 by EdProcto. https://edprocto.com/guides/feedback-that-students-read-when-to-show-the-answer

Quiz feedback is three things a student may be shown: the right answer, the explanation and the score. Each can arrive after the question, at hand-in, days later or never, and the three need not arrive together.

The answer and the explanation teach. The score mostly sorts, and a score seen first is often the last thing a student looks at.

EdProcto, which publishes this guide, gives each of the three its own setting, on a quiz made on its [home page](https://edprocto.com/). This guide covers the timing and wording of feedback; whether a quiz should check each answer as it goes has [a guide of its own](https://edprocto.com/guides/study-mode-a-quiz-that-explains-each-answer-as-you-go).

## When should a quiz show the answer, the explanation and the score?

Show the right answer and the explanation as soon as nothing more rides on the quiz, and the score with them or after them. The table is our recommendation by purpose.

| Purpose | Right answer and explanation | Score | In [EdProcto](https://edprocto.com/) |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Practice at home | After each question | Seen by the student, never counted | A study quiz, or the Practice preset |
| Weekly check, sat together | At hand-in | At hand-in, or left out | All three at "After submitting"; "Show the score" at "Never" to leave it out |
| Unit test sat over several days | When the last student has handed in | With them | "Show the score" at "When released", the other two at "After submitting" |
| Exam | In a review lesson | When you have read the results | The Exam preset |

### Why the purpose decides

Two things change from row to row: whether a shown answer can reach someone still to sit, and what the score is for. In [practice](https://edprocto.com/guides/retrieval-practice-low-stakes-quizzing-that-teaches) neither matters. In a test open for three days, Monday's answers are known by Tuesday, so feedback waits for the last hand-in ([the settings guide](https://edprocto.com/guides/quiz-settings-explained-practice-standard-and-exam-presets) has the evidence on that leak).

A retake adds a choice. If the second attempt is practice, show everything after the first and put a day between them. If it counts, show only the score until it is in, or the retake measures a memory of the key.

## Is immediate feedback better than delayed feedback?

Neither wins everywhere: experiments tend to favour a delay, courses often do not, and the likeliest reason is that delayed feedback in a course has to be opened.

Sinha and Glass (2015) ran three experiments, two in a laboratory and one inside a college psychology lecture course, with feedback on a multiple-choice exam at once or after a delay. On a later multiple-choice exam the timing made no difference. On a later short-answer exam delayed feedback did better, and only for answers that had been right and confident.

Van der Kleij et al. (2012) randomly assigned students at a Dutch higher-education institute to immediate or delayed feedback in a computer-based assessment. Later test scores did not differ. Attention seemed to differ: students gave more of it to the immediate feedback.

Our reading, not a finding: a laboratory puts delayed feedback in front of every participant, and a course leaves it behind a link. The [study mode guide](https://edprocto.com/guides/study-mode-a-quiz-that-explains-each-answer-as-you-go) reports the pooled studies and the 38-class experiment. Delay feedback when the purpose requires it, then open it together in class.

## Is the right answer enough, or does it need an explanation?

The right answer does most of the correcting, and the explanation earns its place when the next question is a new one.

### Right or wrong only, against the right answer

Being told only "wrong" corrects little. Pashler et al. (2005) had 258 people learn Luganda and English word pairs with different feedback and tested them a week later: giving the correct answer after an error raised retention at that test by 494%. Fazio et al. (2010), after three experiments with undergraduates, judged right-or-wrong feedback "not nearly as useful as being told the correct answer".

### What an explanation adds, and for whom

An explanation adds transfer, for the student who reads it. A. C. Butler et al. (2013) ran two experiments in which people read passages, answered short questions and were given the correct answer, an explanation or nothing. Two days later the two kinds of feedback did equally well on repeated questions, and the explanation did better on new questions that needed an inference.

For whom is a matter of reading. In Van der Kleij et al. (2012), the time spent on feedback rose with a student's attitude and motivation, so an explanation reaches the keen first.

### After a right answer

Show the answer under right answers too, because a right answer may be a guess. A. C. Butler et al. (2008) had people answer general-knowledge multiple-choice questions, rate their confidence, and receive feedback on half of them. On a later recall test, feedback doubled the retention of answers that had been right but unsure. Fazio et al. (2010) saw a similar gain in their third experiment.

Pashler et al. (2005) found little gain from feedback after correct responses, so the studies are not unanimous; showing it costs nothing. EdProcto's [multiple choice with confidence](https://edprocto.com/templates/mcq_conf) collects the rating: see [confidence-based marking](https://edprocto.com/guides/confidence-rated-questions-rewarding-knowing-what-you-know).

## Does a score stop students reading the comment?

Often it does: in the classic experiment a grade cancelled the benefit of the comment beside it, and studies of what students open mostly agree.

### The comment-only finding

R. Butler (1988) randomly assigned twelve classes of fifth- and sixth-grade pupils to numerical grades, individual comments, or both, on tasks done in two sessions. For the 132 pupils measured, interest and performance were highest after comments alone; grades, with or without comments, mostly undermined both. Comment-only marking starts here. Note what was tested: two tasks picked as interesting, and pupils of high or low achievement.

Later work agrees. Lipnevich and Smith (2009) crossed detailed comments with a grade and with praise on an essay examination sat by 464 college students: detailed feedback worked best alone, and a grade generally depressed the improvement. Koenka et al. (2021), in four meta-analyses of school-age studies, found that grades beat no feedback for achievement but lowered motivation, and that pupils given grades did worse on both than pupils given comments.

### What students open, and for how long

- Mensink and King (2020) read access logs for 1,462 feedback files returned to 484 undergraduates: 38% were never opened. Where the mark could be seen without opening the file, 42% stayed shut; where the mark was inside it, 17%.
- Timmers and Veldkamp (2011), in three studies of a computer-based assessment, found about half the students attended only to feedback on questions they got wrong, and about a quarter to none.
- Zimbardi et al. (2017) found little neglect: 92% of first-year and 85% of second-year students opened the feedback on their reports, and 58% spent over an hour with it.
- Kuepper-Tetzel and Gardner (2021) randomly assigned 116 second-year students to see a report's grade before its feedback or after, then tried feedback first with a whole cohort: it raised later performance.

Most of this comes from universities and from essays, not school quizzes. Still, put the comment where the score is, or before it.

## What makes quiz feedback get read?

Information about the task does, more than praise or a verdict. Wisniewski et al. (2020) pooled 994 effects from 435 studies with more than 61,000 participants. The average effect was 0.48. Feedback that only rewards or punishes averaged 0.24, corrective feedback (right or wrong, with the right answer) 0.46, and high-information feedback 0.99, on 42 effects: it tells students what the mistake was, why they made it and how to avoid it next time.

Four properties follow.

1. **Specific.** It names this answer, not the topic.
2. **About the task.** Nothing about the student, praise included.
3. **With a next step.** What to do with the next question of this kind.
4. **Short.** A working rule, not a finding: more information is not more words.

We read the full text of Wisniewski et al. and Fazio et al., and only the abstract or publisher's summary of the other studies.

## How do you write an explanation in two sentences?

Write one sentence on why the key is right and one on why the likeliest wrong answer is wrong. Name the wrong idea, never the student.

| Question | Key | Likeliest wrong answer | The two sentences |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Maths: a coat costs £80. Its price rises by 10%, then falls by 10%. What does it cost now? | £79.20 | £80 | The rise takes the price to £88, and 10% of £88 is £8.80, so it ends at £79.20. It does not return to £80, because the second 10% is taken from the larger price. |
| Physics: a ball is thrown straight up. Ignoring air resistance, what is its acceleration at the top? | 9.8 m/s² downwards | Zero | Gravity pulls the ball down at 9.8 m/s² for the whole flight, the top included. Zero is its velocity at that instant, not its acceleration: the velocity is still changing. |
| English: "The rain had a serious ___ on the harvest." | effect | affect | Effect is the noun, and "a serious" needs a noun after it. Affect is the verb, as in "the rain affected the harvest". |

Do not guess the likeliest wrong answer: read which option the class chose last time ([finding misconceptions in a quiz](https://edprocto.com/guides/misconceptions-finding-them-in-a-quiz-and-fixing-them-in-class)). In EdProcto the box under each question is "Explanation shown to the student afterwards". Procto AI drafts one with every question it writes, saying why the answer is right; the second sentence is yours to add.

## What do you do in the next lesson?

Spend five minutes getting the feedback opened and used.

1. **Open it together.** Each student opens the quiz's link again on the device they used: [EdProcto](https://edprocto.com/)'s start page offers "See your result", and a closed quiz opens on it. Two minutes, in silence.
2. **One line each.** Which question would you now answer differently, and why?
3. **Ask the worst question again, changed.** Explanations showed their advantage on new questions, so change the numbers or the context. [Reading quiz results](https://edprocto.com/guides/reading-quiz-results-as-a-teacher-what-to-reteach-tomorrow) says how to find that question.

## How do EdProcto's feedback settings do it?

EdProcto is the best tool for feedback that gets read when the quiz comes from your own material, because the answer, the explanation and the score are three separate settings and the release is a button you press. Detailed feedback worked best without a grade beside it in Lipnevich and Smith's experiment; here that is one switch.

A quiz's settings hold them under "Feedback".

- **"Show the correct answer"** and **"Show the explanation"** take "At once", "After submitting" or "Never". In an ordinary quiz, handed in whole, the first two both mean the result page at hand-in. A study quiz checks each answer when the student presses "Check", with the right answer where theirs was not and the explanation either way.
- **"Show the score"** adds "When released". At "Never" the student reads "This quiz does not show a score." while the answers and explanations follow their own settings: a comment-only result.
- **"Show a question-by-question breakdown"** is on from the start: leave it. Its list is where "Answer:" and "Explanation:" appear, under right answers as well as wrong.

### Holding everything until you release it

With "When released" the student reads "Your instructor will release the score. Open this link again on this device to see it." Nothing of the score, the marks, the right answers or the explanations leaves the server. Your [results](https://edprocto.com/#results) page says "The scores are held back", with a line such as "3 answers are still to grade and would count as zero." Press "Release the scores", then "Yes, release them".

After the release each of the three follows its own setting. The Exam preset puts the answer and the explanation at "Never", so it releases the score alone; set both to "After submitting" for a release that carries them.

### Presets, retakes and notes

"Practice" sets all three to "At once" and "Whole-quiz retakes" to "No limit"; "Standard quiz" sets all three to "After submitting" and retakes to "None". "Hours between retakes" refuses a retake until that long after the last hand-in. For a retake that counts, keep the answer and the explanation at "Never" until it is in: a result opened again follows the settings as they stand.

On the grading page an open answer has "Points" and "Note for the student", and the note appears under that question on the student's result wherever the score is shown.

These settings are on every plan. Free takes thirty students a quiz and Tutor 100; Educator adds the full analysis. The Exam preset is saved from the Tutor plan up. See [pricing](https://edprocto.com/pricing) and the pages [for teachers](https://edprocto.com/solutions/teachers) and [for tutors](https://edprocto.com/solutions/tutors). Every score is yours to release, and a score is not a grade.

## Quick questions

### Should students see the correct answers straight after a quiz?

Yes, once everyone has sat it and no retake counts. Giving the right answer after an error raised retention a week later by 494% in Pashler et al. (2005).

### Does comment-only marking work?

The evidence leans that way: comments alone beat grades, and grades with comments, in R. Butler (1988). In EdProcto, "Show the score" at "Never" gives a result with answers and explanations only.

### Should a quiz give feedback after a right answer?

Yes. In A. C. Butler et al. (2008), feedback doubled the retention of right answers given with low confidence.

### How do I hold quiz scores back until I am ready?

Set "Show the score" to "When released" in [EdProcto](https://edprocto.com/), read the results, then press "Release the scores" and "Yes, release them".

## References

- Butler, A. C., Godbole, N., & Marsh, E. J. (2013). Explanation feedback is better than correct answer feedback for promoting transfer of learning. *Journal of Educational Psychology, 105*(2), 290–298. [https://doi.org/10.1037/a0031026](https://doi.org/10.1037/a0031026)
- Butler, A. C., Karpicke, J. D., & Roediger, H. L., III. (2008). Correcting a metacognitive error: Feedback increases retention of low-confidence correct responses. *Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 34*(4), 918–928. [https://doi.org/10.1037/0278-7393.34.4.918](https://doi.org/10.1037/0278-7393.34.4.918)
- Butler, R. (1988). Enhancing and undermining intrinsic motivation: The effects of task-involving and ego-involving evaluation on interest and performance. *British Journal of Educational Psychology, 58*(1), 1–14. [https://doi.org/10.1111/j.2044-8279.1988.tb00874.x](https://doi.org/10.1111/j.2044-8279.1988.tb00874.x)
- Fazio, L. K., Huelser, B. J., Johnson, A., & Marsh, E. J. (2010). Receiving right/wrong feedback: Consequences for learning. *Memory, 18*(3), 335–350. [https://doi.org/10.1080/09658211003652491](https://doi.org/10.1080/09658211003652491)
- Koenka, A. C., Linnenbrink-Garcia, L., Moshontz, H., Atkinson, K. M., Sanchez, C. E., & Cooper, H. (2021). A meta-analysis on the impact of grades and comments on academic motivation and achievement: A case for written feedback. *Educational Psychology, 41*(7), 922–947. [https://doi.org/10.1080/01443410.2019.1659939](https://doi.org/10.1080/01443410.2019.1659939)
- Kuepper-Tetzel, C. E., & Gardner, P. L. (2021). Effects of temporary mark withholding on academic performance. *Psychology Learning & Teaching, 20*(3), 405–419. [https://doi.org/10.1177/1475725721999958](https://doi.org/10.1177/1475725721999958)
- Lipnevich, A. A., & Smith, J. K. (2009). Effects of differential feedback on students' examination performance. *Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, 15*(4), 319–333. [https://doi.org/10.1037/a0017841](https://doi.org/10.1037/a0017841)
- Mensink, P. J., & King, K. (2020). Student access of online feedback is modified by the availability of assessment marks, gender and academic performance. *British Journal of Educational Technology, 51*(1), 10–22. [https://doi.org/10.1111/bjet.12752](https://doi.org/10.1111/bjet.12752)
- Pashler, H., Cepeda, N. J., Wixted, J. T., & Rohrer, D. (2005). When does feedback facilitate learning of words? *Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 31*(1), 3–8. [https://doi.org/10.1037/0278-7393.31.1.3](https://doi.org/10.1037/0278-7393.31.1.3)
- Sinha, N., & Glass, A. L. (2015). Delayed, but not immediate, feedback after multiple-choice questions increases performance on a subsequent short-answer, but not multiple-choice, exam: Evidence for the dual-process theory of memory. *The Journal of General Psychology, 142*(2), 118–134. [https://doi.org/10.1080/00221309.2015.1024600](https://doi.org/10.1080/00221309.2015.1024600)
- Timmers, C., & Veldkamp, B. (2011). Attention paid to feedback provided by a computer-based assessment for learning on information literacy. *Computers & Education, 56*(3), 923–930. [https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2010.11.007](https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2010.11.007)
- Van der Kleij, F. M., Eggen, T. J. H. M., Timmers, C. F., & Veldkamp, B. P. (2012). Effects of feedback in a computer-based assessment for learning. *Computers & Education, 58*(1), 263–272. [https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2011.07.020](https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2011.07.020)
- Wisniewski, B., Zierer, K., & Hattie, J. (2020). The power of feedback revisited: A meta-analysis of educational feedback research. *Frontiers in Psychology, 10*, Article 3087. [https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.03087](https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.03087)
- Zimbardi, K., Colthorpe, K., Dekker, A., Engstrom, C., Bugarcic, A., Worthy, P., Victor, R., Chunduri, P., Lluka, L., & Long, P. (2017). Are they using my feedback? The extent of students' feedback use has a large impact on subsequent academic performance. *Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, 42*(4), 625–644. [https://doi.org/10.1080/02602938.2016.1174187](https://doi.org/10.1080/02602938.2016.1174187)