What I found was this research by Walck-Shannon, Rowell and Frey (2020) who looked at the relationship between study habits and exam performance.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Before digging into their research, it is worth knowing a few things.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n With these in mind, the authors wanted to see what study strategies their cohort of students used and whether the strategies they used predicted their performance on exams. Their cohort included 600+ students doing an introductory biology course.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n The authors asked students, immediately after 2 exams, what study strategies they used, the time spent studying, how often they were distracted, how early they started studying, how many days they studied and a few more similar questions.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n They then looked to see if there were any patterns of studying that reliably predicted better exam performance.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n What they found helps provide a basic blueprint you can use for your own exam preparation.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n First, total study time and class attendance predicted exam performance, meaning the basics of showing up and allocating reasonable time to your studies remain important factors. Granted this has been a bit harder in the times of COVID, but attendance, even in a digital environment builds commitment muscles \ud83d\udcaa<\/span><\/p>\n Second, the cohort of students they studied used a combination of active and passive strategies, but the authors noted (happily) a higher use of active strategies than they expected, suggesting students are clueing in to the benefits of active study strategies and taking advantage of the active study opportunities afforded by lecturers (e.g. quizzes, past exams, extra problem sets etc). It seems perhaps that people like me rabbiting \ud83d\udc07 on like I do might have an impact.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Third, active strategies were associated with better exam performance whilst passive strategies were not. There were significant gains found for those using active strategies.\u00a0<\/span>For example a 2-3% increase in performance for each additional active strategy used. A 4-7% increase in performance for each of problem-sets, explaining concepts, self-quizzing and attending review sessions. A 5-10% increase in performance if most study time was spent using active strategies.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Fourth, cramming (which most of us use, but is generally viewed as a poor study strategy) was not associated with exam performance, in either a positive or negative way. It might be the case that concentrated periods of study before an exam are OK if you are using that time to implement active study strategies.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Fifth and finally, distraction during study was found to impair performance but the impact in the study was fairly small. For every 10% of time spent distracted, students lost 1% of exam performance.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Plain words summary:<\/b><\/p>\n On the basis of this study (and similar studies before), a good exam preparation might involve the following:<\/span><\/p>\n Whilst cramming remains a popular strategy and was found to be neutral in this study, it is typically found to be detrimental to performance, so where possible, start studying earlier than you might normally, so you can get a) extra total study time and b) extra time to utilise active study strategies.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Got questions about how to study better?<\/b><\/p>\n Make sure you follow the Student Learning Support Service (t<\/span>heir FLO topic is the best place<\/span><\/a>).\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n\n
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