Tag: survival value

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Way of studying; Relating words to survival value

By: Joshua Stanley

Studying for classes or a test can be stressful at times, and prevent you from fully understanding the full material. Even when you prepare for a big exam you may not remember everything you studied and that can lead to an unwanted grade. A way to make your studying easier is by relating words or information to survival value. Doing this will make studying more effective because it taps into how human memory naturally works.

Our brains are wired to prioritise information that seems important for survival, so when something feels relevant to staying alive or solving real-life problems, the brain processes it more deeply and remembers it better. For example, instead of trying to memorize vocabulary or facts you can ask yourself how that information might help you in a real life situation, that way the information comes easier to remember because you related it to a real world experience. Say you were studying biology terms, you should think about how knowing them could help you identify or understand an illness.

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Survival of the Memory: How Can Our Memories Adapt

By Hallee Gauna

Introduction

“Survival of the fittest” is that old saying that goes on to describe that whoever comes out on top is guaranteed to survive and thrive. Adaptation is what we have to do to ensure the best outcome for survival, and it is not always a physical obstacle. Sometimes our memory is the reason we are able to come up with the survival strategies to adapt to our surroundings. This is called the survival and adaptive value, also known as survival processing and adaptive memory. So, what is survival processing and adaptive memory? Why does this pertain to our everyday lives, and why is it so valuable? Well, we all like to survive and live on to the next day. And, we all adapt to new obstacles everyday, but how much of that would you believe stems from our memory? So is it really “survival of the fittest” or survival of the best memory? 

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Efficient Encoding is the Secret to Success in College

By Makayla Bradley and Catherine Cunningham

When you’re a college freshman, you’re a bundle of emotions and have a million thoughts about what college is going to be like, running through your mind. We can safely assume that not one of these thoughts is centered around studying and getting good grades, which is a huge mistake. Before you know it, you’ll be eyeballs deep in readings, homework, papers, and tests, with no tools in your toolbox to combat the endless work you’re going to face. Many freshmen enter college not prepared for work they’ll be asked to complete and the difficulty of college exams. Although there isn’t much you can do to change the amount of work you’ll encounter, you can do something about the way you study for the exams.

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