Time Of The Day When You Are At Your Best

Picture from Healthyplace.com

I have been out of school for decades and have not sat for any tests or exams in quite a while. But I do see new patients almost every day I am working in our clinics. I do take plenty of "tests" too, since every single patient I see will evaluate my treatment and decide if I made them better.

You must be wondering why I am writing about tests this week, Well, the Singapore primary school leaving exams (PSLE) just ended this past week.  Parents whose children just sat for the exams must heave a collective sigh of relief now that it's all over. 

The typical start times for the PSLE oral exams are at 0800 while written exams generally commence at 0815 hours. That's definitely an early start for those taking exams.

Unlike the students sitting for exams, we usually see new patients in our clinic whenever we can fit them in for an appointment. This may not necessarily be the best according to a group of researchers who analyzed the results of over 100,000 oral exams. They found a clear Gaussian distribution (also know as the Normal distribution or bell curve) in pass rates that peaked at noon. 

Passing rate by hour 

Between 11 am and 1 pm is the best time (pictured above). Any earlier or later the chances of passing significantly decreased. In fact the earlier or later in the day these students took a test, the less likely they were to pass.

The reason being our cognitive (or conscious intellectual ability) performance improves over the course of the morning and then declines in the afternoon. We also may have declining energy levels later in the afternoon. If your exam is scheduled later in the day, you may also stress about it and this usually leads to poorer performance.

According to the author's, the examiner's cognitive performance and fatigue level also matters. Both the examiner and student will be at their peak level of performance during the mid day hours.

This all means that whenever possible if you have to take a test or exam, an important meeting or a job interview, you should schedule it between 11 am and 1 pm. It can be the difference between passing and failing. 

Perhaps we should only see new patients in our clinics between 11 am and 1 pm then. 

Reference

Vicario CM, Nitsche MA, Lucifora C et al (2025). Timing Matters! Academic Assessment Changes Throughout The Day. Frontiers Psychol. 16:1605041. DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.1605041