During the class evaluations, one of my suggestions was lengthening the time given on the quizzes. At the time, I simply felt that the added element of time created a pressure that was intercepting my ability to focus. Having read the past few lessons, I understand much more what the effect is of time and pressure on my ability to work out answers to certain types of questions.
I find that the nature of the quizzes is highly suitable for this course. Rarely taken verbatim from the lessons, the questions require a higher learning level by testing true understanding of the information covered rather than simply knowing facts. Also, putting a time limit on the quizzes ensures that students can’t simply look up information in their lesson notes for each question. However, I found that in early examples, having one minute per question seemed to cause me to answer incorrectly and then discover that I actually understood the material afterward and simply rushed.
Although sometimes a victim of poor encoding or retrieval, this week’s lesson provided another answer to the confounding issue. Given the analytical nature of the questions, a certain amount of problem solving is necessary when taking the quizzes. Studies have shown when pressure is added, high working memory groups perform worse than they would have performed without pressure. This felt more in line with what I was experiencing (rather than an issue with memory) because I would have brief moments where I struggled with restructuring the problem in my mind.
According to the lesson, which relates this issue to a study involving pressure added to subjects completing math problems, “the pressure and the anxiety it creates cause the HWM participants to use more of the WM to deal with the anxiety…According to this idea, anxiety caused by stress competes for WM capacity that under less stressful conditions could be focused solely on the math problem” (Goldstein 352). Having experienced this during the first two quizzes, my goal for the third and fourth quizzes was to fix it.
By being aware of the effect, I was able to push more of my focus to the questions and ignore the time element. Obviously, time still played a factor, as there was still a limit on the quiz. However, by acknowledging that time was created an unnecessary obstacle to my problem solving abilities, I was able to analyze the situation more realistically. Time was not my enemy (as evidenced by the fact that I generally finished all quizzes with time to spare) but rather the idea of time that was affecting my skills. This resulted in an increase in grades over the last two quizzes, and a realization that will carry over into other aspects of life.
It also doesn’t hurt that the time limit increased by 5 minutes, perhaps in recognition of this affect.
Source:
Goldstein, E. B., (2011). Cognitive Psychology: Connecting Mind, Research, And Everyday Experience (3rd ed.). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning. (Original work published 2005)