Evidence map›Paper›PMID 41003358›Full record

ArticleJournal of imaging2025

Unsupervised Optical Mark Recognition on Answer Sheets for Massive Printed Multiple-Choice Tests.

Yahir Hernández-Mier, Marco Aurelio Nuño-Maganda, Said Polanco-Martagón, Guadalupe Acosta-Villarreal, Rubén Posada-Gómez

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Journal of imaging, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
0citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

0 citing papers in PubMed.

No citing paper in PubMed yet.

4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

5 authors.

Yahir Hernández-MierIntelligent Systems Department, Polytechnic University of Victoria, Ciudad Victoria 87138, Mexico.ORCID 0000-0003-1044-2710
Marco Aurelio Nuño-MagandaIntelligent Systems Department, Polytechnic University of Victoria, Ciudad Victoria 87138, Mexico.ORCID 0000-0003-0102-8227
Said Polanco-MartagónIntelligent Systems Department, Polytechnic University of Victoria, Ciudad Victoria 87138, Mexico.ORCID 0000-0001-8473-0534
Guadalupe Acosta-VillarrealResearch Department, Universidad Tecnologica del Mar de Tamaulipas Bicentenario (UTMarT), La Pesca 87678, Mexico.ORCID 0000-0001-8137-4239
Rubén Posada-GómezDivision of Postgraduate and Research Studies, Instituto Tecnológico de Orizaba, Tecnológico Nacional de México, Orizaba 92670, Mexico.ORCID 0000-0001-9325-7988

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

The large-scale evaluation of multiple-choice tests is a challenging task from the perspective of image processing. A typical instrument is a multiple-choice question test that employs an answer sheet with circles or squares. Once students have finished the test, the answer sheets are digitized and sent to a processing center for scoring. Operators compute each exam score manually, but this task requires considerable time. While it is true that mature algorithms exist for detecting circles under controlled conditions, they may fail in real-life applications, even when using controlled conditions for image acquisition of the answer sheets. This paper proposes a desktop application for optical mark recognition (OMR) on the scanned multiple-choice question (MCQ) test answer sheets. First, we compiled a set of answer sheet images corresponding to 6029 exams (totaling 564,040 four-option answers) applied in 2024 in Tamaulipas, Mexico. Subsequently, we developed an image-processing module that extracts answers from the answer sheets and an interface for operators to perform analysis by selecting the folder containing the exams and generating results in a tabulated format. We evaluated the image-processing module, achieving a percentage of 96.15% of exams graded without error and 99.95% of 4-option answers classified correctly. We obtained these percentages by comparing the answers generated through our system with those generated by human operators, who took an average of 2 min to produce the answers for a single answer sheet, while the automated version took an average of 1.04 s.

Indexed as

automatic exam-grading systemcomputer visionimage processing

Identifiers

PMID41003358
PMCPMC12470569

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
LicenceCC BY
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.