Cognitive Psychology in Education
By Emily Keller
We all think that we can multitask, but can we really multitask? Everyone says that that they are good at multitasking. However, our brains cannot focus on more than one task at a time. Today, I’m going to tell you why our brains cannot focus on more than one task at a time.
By Kennedy Savage
You’re driving down the road windows down and music blasting, while looking out the window you notice the sunset and people going about their day. All of a sudden your focus shifts and you notice a car swerving into your lane, unable to break fast enough you rear end the car causing a traffic incident. This split second failure to notice fully visible, yet often times unexpected objects is and example of inattentional blindness.
By Maya Estes
Do you ever feel like you are taking too much on? Responsibilities are piling up and you cannot for the life of you get on top of everything? You, my friend, are not the only one. At one point in time, everyone has been in your place; they have said ‘yes’ one too many times and now they have so many things on their plate that they are overwhelmed. It is not always saying yes though. Life is full of numerous distractions; it is amazing the world is still turning with the many ways you can avoid all of life’s responsibilities. There is never going to be a tried and true way of eliminating all these stressors, but there are some ways to help reduce them and focus on what is important.
By Sarah C. McSparin
You feel as though everything is piling up and you’ll never get it all done. Join the club! Your not alone; there are thousands of students and employees with a mountain of responsibilities that seem too overwhelming. Not to mention the countless distractions life throws at you, especially cell phones. You wish there was some formula for completing all the tasks your assigned. Unfortunately there is not but by gaining knowledge about your ability to pay attention you can learn some tips and tricks to help you focus your attention on the things you want while ignoring the things that are distracting.
By Dymond Hunley
What are you doing? In college studying for tests or maybe even finals. Let me Guess?! You’ve been cramming information for the last several hours. Let me guess again… You’re tired and ready to crash. Well let me be the one to tell you that you should not study for several hours constantly without taking a break. Time management is your best friend and procrastination is your worst enemy. When I started as a freshman that was one of my biggest flaws and sometimes still is.
By David Schultz
First days of college are exciting times, but college is an ever-changing world. However, there are two things that will always remain constant, stress and homework. Sadly, there is nothing you can do about the homework but there are things you can do to alleviate your stress. Each student suffers from some sort of stress and that stress strangles a student’s attention. Research has shown that ordinary chronic stress limits the flexibility of the student’s attention. Also stress temporarily reduces the connectivity of the attention regulating area of the prefrontal cortex. (1) Considering attention is one of the main processes that drive cognition, stress is going to be a huge issue for student’s grades. Attention is commonly referred to as a spotlight, and stress is shown to be like smoke, limiting the effectiveness of the spotlight. High stress could be like trying to use the spotlight during a soupy fog. But exams and tests are not the only issue that students face during stressful times. Being able to pay attention to the questions asked on exams are not the only effected area. But stress can affect the amount of information that a student can collect during lecture. It is common to see students bored by lectures or drifting off during reading assignments, we all have done it at least once. This is yet another why that attention is impaired by stress and there is data to support that. Research has shown that a person who is suffering from even acute stress can be imparted in attention allocation and distractibility during situations that involve information collection. (2) Stress can pull your ability to focus on the information in lecture and next thing you know you are in a daydream.
Continue reading “Attention!! Stress is Limiting Your Potential”
By Angela Watson
The modern debate of how much cell phones distract us from everyday responsibilities can be settled by cognitive psychology. Researchers found that the average person only studies for approximately six minutes before moving on to a new task, which was primarily linked to cell phone and media usage (1). The prefrontal cortex is designed to only focus on a single item, leaving us to “swap focus” between items at a rapid pace when we multitask (2).
By Kyle Oakes
Have you ever left class and wondered why you can barely remember a thing? I want you to try to remember what you were doing in that class. If you are like most college students, you probably snuck in a text message during the class, or maybe you clicked on that Facebook notification that popped up. Maybe you just dozed off. All of these could be affecting your grade drastically. In order to help your grade, you want to set those notifications, and ringer, on silent for the duration of the course, and stop dividing your attention to the wrong thing.
Continue reading “Stop, Drop and Roll Your Way Into a 4.0 GPA”
By Collin Aimone
Everyone has had the issue of being stressed and has experienced trouble when trying to focus. A lot of times this is seen in school as the regular pressures of a learning environment can weigh heavy on the student. The amount of stress a student may endure can sometimes go unnoticed, and this stress soon leads to trouble focusing which in return can lead to falling grades. It has most likely been presented to all of us before as a solution to our problems, meditating, but of course we would not take the time to sit in our rooms and cross our legs and find our happy place. However, studies have shown that meditation can induce a physiological state of momentary deep rest, which has shown proof of lowering stress levels and helping individuals focus better. Continue reading “Meditation for general focusing and stress relief”
By Randee Blickenstaff
From the moment you walk through the doors of high school, people are preaching to you about the impending storm that is college. Teachers preach to you for four long years about how everything that is taught within the walls of your sacred high school is to prepare you for the years of university life ahead. Well, maybe I missed the part where football games and homecoming are any sort of foreshadowing to college, but for the most part high school faculty hits the nail on the head. However, they seem to be missing one huge detail. COLLEGE IS A WHOLE NEW WORLD.
