Each year, selective colleges promote their application totals, along with the virtues of their applicants.

The study, involving 90 college students, is published in the Journal of Environmental Psychology.

Colleges everywhere want more minority students, more out-of-state students and more students from overseas.

Some colleges, such as the University of Phoenix online run on a different credit system.

About 80 colleges and a handful of high schools have administered the test so far.