September is the start to a new academic year. For many students, this means a fresh start and perhaps a chance to acquire some new study habits. Maybe this is the year you will stop putting everything off until the night before the exam? Now, there is some new evidence to explain why last-minute high-pressure cramming might not be the best way to retain information in the long term.
Curiosity-driven exploration is more likely to help you retain information than having a more urgent … [+]
Imagine you’re an art thief planning an art heist. That was the role people played in a computer game under guidance of researchers from Duke University. But what they remembered about it one day later depended on the instructions they got when they started the game.
In this study, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, over four hundred volunteers were randomly divided into two groups. One was prompted to work urgently and under pressure while the other was encouraged to let their curiosity drive them.
“For the urgent group, we told them, ‘You’re a master thief, you’re doing the heist right now. Steal as much as you can!’,” study lead Alyssa Sinclair told Duke University. “Whereas for the curious group, we told them they were a thief who’s scouting the museum to plan a future heist.”
Both groups played the same game, in which they navigated a museum to locate the most expensive art while avoiding an in-game security guard. A day later, they all got a surprise quiz to test how much they remembered from the art they saw in the game.
Sinclair noticed that the two groups scored differently on this test. “The curious group participants who imagined planning a heist had better memory the next day,” she said. “They correctly recognized more paintings. They remembered how much each painting was worth.”
The urgent group, on the other hand, did very well in the game itself and collected the most high value art. However, when they were quizzed the next day they did not remember as much about what they saw as the group who was allowed to explore without pressure.
Most of us aren’t planning any art heists, so what does this finding mean?
According to Duke Institute for Brain Sciences director Alison Adcock, who was co-author on this study, it shows that both high pressure and curious mode have value in different situations.
“It’s valuable to learn which mode is adaptive in a given moment and use it strategically,” she said.
If you need to take short-term action, it can be effective to have a high-pressure mindset. That was shown in the game by the urgent group performing better. However, if you need to retain information for a longer period of time, it can be more useful to get in a curiosity driven mindset.
So, yes, you can cram for an exam the night before and do great. But if you want to remember the information beyond that, it’s probably more effective if you allow yourself to explore the material with less pressure and be guided by curiosity instead.
Denial of responsibility! TechCodex is an automatic aggregator of the all world’s media. In each content, the hyperlink to the primary source is specified. All trademarks belong to their rightful owners, and all materials to their authors. For any complaint, please reach us at – [email protected]. We will take necessary action within 24 hours.
Jessica Irvine is a tech enthusiast specializing in gadgets. From smart home devices to cutting-edge electronics, Jessica explores the world of consumer tech, offering readers comprehensive reviews, hands-on experiences, and expert insights into the coolest and most innovative gadgets on the market.
