3 tips on how to study effectively

During their training, medical residents learn countless

techniques, surgeries, and procedures which they’ll later use to save lives. Being able to remember these skills can quite literally be

a matter of life and death. With this in mind, a 2006 research study

took a class of surgical residents learning to suture arteries

and split them into two groups. Each received the same study materials, but one group implemented a small

change in how they studied them. And when tested one month later, this group performed the surgeries

significantly better than the other residents. We’ll discuss the secret

to that group’s success, along with two other highly effective

study techniques which can be applied both

in and out of the classroom. But to understand why these methods work, let's first unpack how the brain

learns and stores information. Say you're trying to memorize

the anatomy of the heart. When you’re introduced to a new concept, the memory is temporarily encoded

in groups of neurons in a brain area called the hippocampus. As you continue to learn

about workings of the heart in class or study its chambers

for an exam, you reactivate these same neurons. This repeated firing strengthens

the connections between the cells, stabilizing the memory. Gradually, the knowledge of heart anatomy

is stored long-term, which involves another brain area

known as the neocortex. How information is transferred

from short-term to long-term storage is still not completely understood, but it’s thought to happen

in between study sessions and perhaps most crucially during sleep. Here the new knowledge is integrated with

other related concepts you already know, such as how to measure heart rate,

or the anatomy of other organs. And the process doesn’t end there. Each time you recall heart anatomy,

you reactivate the long-term memory, which makes it susceptible to change. The knowledge can be

updated, strengthened, and reintegrated with other

pieces of information. This is where our first study

technique comes in. Testing yourself

with flashcards and quizzes forces you to actively

retrieve knowledge, which updates and strengthens

the memory. Students often prefer other study methods, like rereading textbooks

and highlighting notes. But these practices can generate

a false sense of competence, since the information is

right in front of you. Testing yourself, however, allows you to more accurately gauge

what you actually know. But what if, while doing this,

you can’t remember the answers? Not to worry— making mistakes can actually improve

learning in the long term. It’s theorized that as you rack your brain

for the answer, you activate relevant pieces of knowledge. Then, when the correct answer

is later revealed, the brain can better integrate this

information with what you already know. Our second technique builds on the first. When using flashcards to study, it's best

to mix the deck with multiple subjects. Interleaving, or mixing the concepts

you focus on in a single session, can lead to better retention

than practicing a single skill or topic at a time. One hypothesis of why this works is that,

similar to testing, cycling through different subjects forces

your brain to temporarily forget, then retrieve information,

further strengthening the memory. You may also find connections

across the topics, and better understand their differences. Now that you know how and what to study,

our final technique concerns when. Spacing your review across multiple days allows for rest and sleep

between sessions. While “offline,”

the brain is actively at work, storing and integrating knowledge

in the neocortex. So while cramming the night before

the exam may seem logical— after all, won’t the material

be fresh in your mind?— the information won’t stick

around for the long term. This brings us back to our

medical residents. Both groups studied the surgery

for the same amount of time. Yet one group’s training was

crammed in a single day, while the other more successful group’s

training was spread over four weeks. The reason all three of these

study techniques work is because they’re designed

with the brain in mind. They complement and reinforce

the incredible way the brain works, sorting through and storing the

abundance of information it’s fed day after day.