Abstract
<title>Abstract</title> <p>The validity of test scores may be threatened by guessing behavior in educational exams, especially quick guessing and solution activity. The psychological causes of this behavior are still poorly understood, despite the fact that a large portion of research has concentrated on detection techniques. The purpose of this study is to evaluate a causal model that incorporates cognitive load, self-efficacy, and test-taking motivation as predictors of quick guessing and solution behavior in Indonesian high school students. 297 students' data were gathered online using a quantitative method utilizing Structural Equation Modeling (SEM). The analysis revealed that cognitive load is a positive and significant predictor of rapid guessing behavior (β = 1.051, p = 0.008), accounting for 80.1% of the variance in the model. Conversely, motivation and self-efficacy did not show a significant influence on either rapid guessing or solution behavior. The low proportion of variance explained for solution behavior (R² = 14.2%) suggests that other factors, such as prior knowledge and metacognitive skills, may play a more dominant role. Heavy thinking load has been shown to be a major trigger that drives students to guess, a reaction whose power can even override their internal motivation. In practice, designing assessments that take cognitive load into account is fundamental to anticipating students' desire to guess during exams.</p>