How to Write Multiple Choice Questions

Multiple choice questions (MCQs) require learners to pick correct answers from a list of available possibilities. Potential answers are “set” beforehand instead of leaving room for the student to come up with or provide them. The two components of an MCQ are the stem, which defines the question or issue, and the alternatives or potential solutions, which include a key, which is the best response to the question, and a variety of distractors, which are reasonable but inaccurate responses. Learners respond to MCQs by selecting the option that they feel best completes or answers the stem. There are various guidelines you can follow to write exam questions multiple choice.

Tips on How to Write Good Multiple Choice Questions

Well-designed MCQs enable assessment for a broad range of topics while objectively evaluating learner ability. Accordingly, this article provides recommendations for how to write good multiple choice questions.

General strategies

• Compose questions throughout the semester. The creation of multiple-choice tests is difficult and time-consuming. Drafting several questions per week, possibly after a lecture while the information is still fresh in your memory, will make it simpler for you.
• Tell learners to choose the “best answer” instead of the “correct one” when answering questions. Acknowledging this prevents students from arguing that their response is correct while recognizing that the distractors may contain some truth.
• Employ familiar language. The question must utilize the same vocabulary as in the course. Avoid employing unfamiliar words if testing your understanding of a foreign language is among the questions. Students are inclined to disregard distractors containing unfamiliar terminology by terming them as false or incorrect.
• Steer clear of using verbal association hints from the key’s stem. Learners are more inclined to choose the correct answer if the key contains strikingly similar terms in the stem.
• Refrain from using trick questions. Students familiar with the subject matter should be able to determine the answers to the questions. This rule is broken by questions intended to lead students astray by deceptive wording or highlighting a minor aspect of the solution.
• Don’t use negative language. Learners sometimes overlook negative wording, which may lead to confusion. Consequently, students conversant with the subject frequently make errors on negatively phrased questions. It would help if you avoided including negatives in the choices or stems. On the other hand, tips for employing negatives include emphasizing the important words by underlining, bolding, or capitalizing them. For instance:

This building does NOT exist at the University of Waterloo.

1. Douglas Wright Engineering Building
2. I.L. Neilson Hall
3. Carl A. Pollock Hall
4. B.C. Matthews Hall

Designing stems

• Clearly state the whole issue in the stem. Consider if the learners could respond to the question without consulting the choices. This clarifies the question’s aim.
• Include all pertinent information in the stem. Don’t repeat material you can include in the stem in each choice. Students will find it simpler to respond promptly to the question because the options are simpler to read and comprehend.
• Remove irrelevant or extra details from the stem. Learners may get confused and waste time if you include irrelevant material in the stem. For example:

The University of Waterloo has been the subject of several books. These books cover various topics, including histories of specific departments, biographies of notable University figures, and photographic histories. A book by “Simon the Troll,” a well-known author, was one of them. What is this book’s title?

1. Images of Waterloo
2. Of Mud and Dreams
3. Water Under the Bridge
4. Dreaming in Technicolor

The majority of the stem isn’t required to answer the question. A more appropriate question is:

What is the name of the Waterloo-related novel by “Simon the Troll”?

1. Images of Waterloo
2. Of Mud and Dreams
3. Dreaming in Technicolor
4. *Water Under the Bridge

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Designing alternatives

• Reduce the number of choices. Each question should have three to five options since it is challenging to think of plausible distractors.
• Ensure that there is only one correct response. A question should not have two or more correct choices, but only one should be chosen as being “more” correct. The distractors ought to be incorrect responses to the stem’s question.
• Make the detractors compelling and believable. If the distractors are absurd, even learners with limited knowledge can quickly identify the correct answer. Keep the distractors’ lengths and language styles similar when testing people’s ability to recognize critical concepts. Great distractors should simulate typical student errors while evaluating conceptual knowledge. For instance:

Waterloo Counseling Services offers seminars on:

1. fire safety and prevention
2. *study skills
3. hockey refereeing
4. cooking skills

Learners probably wouldn’t pick choices a, c, or d, even if they are unsure of the answer. A better question would contain logical connections between the distractors and stem. For example:

The seminars that Waterloo Counseling Services offers cover:

1. psychotherapy research
2. *study skills
3. presentation skills
4. preparing for marriage

• Ensure grammatical consistency between the stem and choices. Among the best ways of checking the grammar of the stem and each of the alternatives is by reading them aloud.
• Arrange the options sensibly. Put the options in conceptual, chronological, or numerical order if feasible. It is simpler to read and answer a question with better structure. For example:

When did James Downey serve as Waterloo’s president?

1. 1990-1996
2. 1991-1997
3. 1992-1998
4. *1993-1999

• Refrain from using “all of the above.” Learners must choose “all of the above” as their response if “all of the above” is a choice and they are aware that the other alternatives are correct. The response cannot be “all of the above” if they know one is wrong. A student could read the first choice, decide it is the best one, and then be misled into selecting it without considering the other choices.
• Steer clear of employing “none of the above.” The “none of the above” response merely evaluates whether the learner knows the distractors are incorrect, not whether they recognize the correct answer.
• Avoid using terms like “none,” “all,” “never,” and “always.” Distractors including these terms are often baseless since most students are aware that few things can be said to be universally true or untrue.
• Don’t use overlapping alternatives. Ensure the choices are mutually exclusive when you write multiple choice questions. Never assume that the others must also be true since one distractor is true.
• Refrain from asking “Which of the below claims is correct?” questions. The question is vague, and there are often a variety of options. True/False questions are a better format for presenting these questions.