Prior research used cognitive psychological theories to predict that examiners might begin marking a question using particular cognitive strategies but later in the marking session they might use different cognitive strategies. Specifically, it was predicted that when examiners are familiar with the question paper, mark scheme and candidates' responses they:

• use less 'evaluating' and 'scrutinising'
• more 'matching'

This research tests these predictions. All Principal Examiners (n=5), Team Leaders (n=5) and Assistant Examiners (n=59) who marked in the winter 2005 session were sent a questionnaire. The questionnaire asked about different occasions in the marking session. It was found that sometimes examiners' marking strategies changed as the examiners marked more scripts. When there were considerable changes in cognitive strategies these were mostly in the predicted direction.