Tag: psychology

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Taking breaks while studying? Who knew studying could be this easy

By Kloe Norris

Introduction 

When people first get to college, most kids do not know how to study. Some kids come into college homeschooled, some did not go to a public school while others went to a school where they did not have to study for hard tests/exams. Incoming freshmen wanting to go to college are blindsided when it comes to how much studying really affects how well someone does in college. Coming to college has made me realize how much studying you have to do. Knowing how to study the right way is something that has helped tremendously while being in college. College is a scary thing but knowing how to study the right way and pass your classes will make college so much easier in the future. 

The Spacing Effect and how it works

Just hearing the word Spacing effect when it comes to studying may scare some students off and they will probably look past it like it is nothing, but it is very important. The Spacing Effect, when it comes to studying, is one of the earliest discoveries in human learning (1). It is proven that if a student spaces out their studying and processes what they are learning, they will remember and learn the information and memorize it better (1). For example, if you have a big exam coming up, it is better for you to take breaks throughout the time you are studying to help understand the information more. 

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Survival of the Studious

By Makayla Rosenbery

Survival value (also known as adaptive value and connection to survival processing) is understanding memory and how memory is used to survive which leads to survival processing that encodes items into our memory(1)! Survival value leads to enhanced memory by relating words to situations that others have not experienced (the apocalypse!!!) This works because when we relate words to our survival, we are linking to something meaningful that will stick in our minds(2). In cognitive psychology, survival value refers to the adaptive benefit of certain cognitive processes or behaviors that assist one’s survival. 

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Conquer Your Mind: Understanding Interference in Learning 

By Haley Cutting

Introduction 

Trying to learn new information while having to remember old information is hard, especially the thought of coming in as a first-year college student. The thought of trying to learn multiple classes and courses at once at a high level can be stressful, especially coming out of high school. The class schedule in college is confusing within itself. Trying to figure out how you will study for your psychology of learning exam on Monday and your cognitive psychology exam, also on Monday. When you go in to take your cognitive psychology exam, you completely forget everything you studied from earlier chapters, but can only remember everything from recent chapters. This is what is called retroactive interference (RI). This process occurs when learning a new task that then impairs the previously learned task (1). As you continue throughout the exam, you remember stuff from chapters from the start of the year. As you start remembering those earlier chapters, you cannot seem to remember anything from the chapters you just learned! This is what is called proactive interference (PI). This process occurs when the old task you learned impairs the ability to learn or remember the new task (1). There are some ways to stop these interferences from occurring for you little newcomers. To stop these from happening you need to fully understand which interference is which and what they fully mean. Here is a little acronym trick for you, Proactive = Old, Retroactive = New (“P.O.R.N”).  

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One at a Time: The Hidden Power of Singular Focus

By Gabrielle Penberthy

Running Away Balloon Meme | MULTITASKING: LISTENING TO MUSIC WHILE STUDYING; YOU; MULTITASKING: LISTENING TO MUSIC WHILE STUDYING; ME: YOU WON'T BE ABLE TO STUDY EFFICIENTLY; YOU | image tagged in memes,running away balloon | made w/ Imgflip meme maker

While studying, everyone has experienced the need to snap back others, listen to music, and browse Instagram. We laugh when we communicate with others, we groove to music, and we stay connected when we browse Instagram. We run the risk of drifting from our study goals when we engage in these activities while studying. It is all fun and games until we get a bad grade on that important test or the homework assignment that is half of the final grade. I understand how difficult it might be to resist temptation when your phone is so close. I find myself picking up my phone to put on music or snap others back. But when I do this, I find that I start singing along to the music, which diverts my attention from my studies. Why is this a task so hard to complete? Divided attention, or multitasking, is the term used to describe this. When this occurs, I typically end up with a low grade or find it difficult to respond to an important quiz question. This causes an excessive amount of worry and self-doubt.  

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Using Elaboration as a Cognitive Approach for Helpful Studying

By Emma Sandlin

It is quite difficult to start college. There are several issues that must be resolved, the most important of which being how to comprehend and absorb the content in the best possible way. One of the many worries that accompany beginning college is learning how to use elaboration when studying new material. According to cognitive psychologists, elaboration is a very useful technique for enhancing learning and memory retention (1). Elaboration is the process of bringing new information to life by connecting it to what has already been learned or by creating meaningful connections. Students can improve their comprehension and retain more information by using the elaborative encoding method. Study skills mastery is essential to achieving academic brilliance. Elaboration is shown to be an effective tactic for boosting understanding, fortifying memory retention, and encouraging in-depth learning (1). Elaboration makes study sessions more lively by enticing students to actively interact with the content, draw connections, and develop ideas (2). Students that integrate elaborative processing into their study regimens open the door to an abundance of knowledge that is just waiting to be discovered and comprend (3).

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Studying Blows!! Try Chunking it!

By Macey Whisker

As a college student, you will be doing a LOT of studying! Twelve to sixteen credit hours a semester is an intense workload, so let’s make it a bit lighter. Throw your previous study tools out the window, this is not high school anymore! If you are anything like me, your parents or guardians probably had you remember their phone number so you could contact them from anywhere, anytime, if there was an emergency. Some parents added a little tune or jingle to the memorization process to make it easier to recall, and some assigned the chunked numbers a specific value or meaning, which is what chunking is (1)! Splitting up a specific group or list of information into chunks then assigning those chunks a title or value makes the details not just easier to remember, but able to be retained for longer periods of time!

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Studying is a Waste of Time: There’s a Better Way to Get the Grade You Want

By Brody Forsythe

The transformation of becoming a college freshman from a high school senior is a different transition for everyone. Depending on the individual’s experience, goals and interests, it can either be a seamless transition or one with many holes and lots of exposed seams. When it comes to academics, it can be an extremely difficult transition if one is trying to incorporate old study habits that were previously effective in high school. There are numerous students out there that will tell you about their humbling experience with their very first college exam, and I can include myself in that category. I can remember studying for my first chemistry exam thinking about how easy it was going to be to get an “A” on it, and when it came down to taking the test, not a single concept could be retrieved from my mind to help me pass the test. All I could remember was how confident I felt looking over the notes I previously written down, and looking at the practice problems we did in class months prior to the exam and thinking, “Yeah, I’ve got this!”. I was just following my old high school studying procedure and little did I know my whole world about studying was in for a rude awakening.

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Unlock the Secret Clue: Narrative Rehearsal Hypothesis

By Makayla Behm

Starting College

Starting college is extremely hard. There are many things that you have to worry about but most importantly how to study and learn the information effectively. When starting out in college there are so many things that you have to worry about but learning how to rehearse the information you are getting should not be on one of your worry lists. 

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Survival of the Studious: How Adaptive Behaviors Can Improve Your Learning

By Daizjah Shannon

Active learning techniques like summarizing, note-taking, and quizzing help you engage with the material and remember it better. These techniques are adaptive because they help you retain important information for future use. Active learning techniques can be used in a variety of ways to help improve your learning and retention of information, such as.

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Interleaving: Improving Memory and Recall

By Hunter Hall

Learning and retaining information for many people within today’s school system is a struggle. Information can become skewed, easy to forget, mixed around and confused with other topics learned along with the information you’re trying to retain. There are many techniques or tips and tricks one can use to become more efficient in storing information in their mind and keeping it there. One of these techniques is interleaving. Interleaving is a technique used for retaining information at a higher rate in both short term and long term memory. The process of interleaving involves mixing around questions or terms from different topics while studying or learning new material. However, there is an argument against the effectiveness of interleaving. As Doug Rohrer, a professor of psychology at the University of South Florida, states in his article about interleaving, the argument is that some believe it can lead to an individual confusing certain information with one another (1). The example given was the words “illusion” and “allusion” (1). Despite this, research held on interleaving has shown that it does indeed improve recall. 

Buff Doge vs. Cheems Meme | Students Who Use The; Students Who Use The; Interleave Method; Block Method | image tagged in memes,buff doge vs cheems | made w/ Imgflip meme maker
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