Stress is an integral part of our everyday life, and it’s something we all have to deal with in life almost every day. We don’t, however, have to let it take away the best of us. Examination stress is one of such stress that troubles almost every student, whether appearing for school exams or university exams. Everyone gets stressed during exams but it's important not to let it get out of control. Even thought of taking exams is bound to be stressful because of what's at stake. Students are usually under a weight of expectation from their family, peers, school, university or workplace to succeed and competition these days is obviously tough, many of them may be afraid that they are not good enough, or haven't prepared well or worked hard enough to live up to the expectations and may be scared of letting themselves down, or that they'll miss out a place in university, some job or career move. Your stress level may seem much worse if you are giving exams for the first time or after a long gap of time or appearing for some new pattern.
Final exam week is believed to be the most stressful time of the year for every high school and college student. With the preparatory holidays around the corner and your percentage hanging in the balance, the mere mention of the word "finals" can be enough to scare them. Constant comparison by parents, of their child with others, also increases the stress level because of the pressure to perform.
Examination stress is a combination of perceived physiological over-arousal with a constant feeling of worry, self-depreciating thoughts of fear of failure, tension, and somatic symptoms that occur during test situations. It is a physiological condition in which people experience extreme stress, anxiety, and discomfort during and/or before taking a test which may be in the form of a headache, forgetfulness or tiredness etc. If your stress levels rise too high for too long, it can prove to be harmful to both student and his performance during the exam. These responses can hamper drastically an individual's ability to give his best performance and would have a negatively affect on their emotional and behavioural development. Everyone's stress threshold has different levels. A situation that is too much for one person to tolerate may be normal to someone another. If you can control your stress at the right level, it can work to your advantage, because it can help you to produce your peak performance.
Symptoms of Examination Stress
- Difficulty in getting sleep or waking up in the morning on time
- Constant tiredness and headache
- Poor appetite
- Loss of interest in activities
- Worry and Dread
- Anger and a feeling of hopelessness
- Increased heart rate
- Migraines/headaches
- Forgetfulness
- Unexplained aches and pains
- Increased anxiety and irritability
- Blurred vision
- Dizziness
Causes of Exam Stress
- Poor motivation and procrastination
- Lack of confidence
- Competition
- Anxiety or obsessive-compulsive disorders
- Perfectionist tendencies and unrealistic expectations
- Negative self-esteem, self-statements, and criticism
- Inadequate study and test-taking skills
- Poor prior testing performance
- Pressure from peers, family, and teachers
- Unfavourable testing environments
- Invalid, flawed, and timed tests
- Ineffective teaching
- Poor eating, sleeping and exercising habits
Steps to Minimize Exam Stress
Taking an important test can be really stressful because most of the times at stake is your career or an important job opportunity. Day by day increasing competition and pressure to perform is also an important stress factor hence the need is to overcome this stress to give your best performance. Idea is to utilize this stress to be a booster for you instead of fear. Just remember that you can do best. Various steps to minimize stress are:
- Plan a Timetable: Planning for anything is the best way to start a work that you want to execute with high success rate. If you know exactly what you're facing, you can work out a plan for dealing with it, and this will go a long way helping you achieve what you aim for and towards putting your mind at ease. Get hold of the right information before start your action. Make sure you know that what all you can be asked from, how you will be examined, and what you'll be examined on. Make a list of important topics and plan some extra time for these topics. Get a copy of the syllabus also. Try to start your revision well in advance. Take time to plan a revision timetable that is helpful to you, realistic and flexible, and linked to your exam timetable, so you revise each subject and topic in the right order. While planning, give yourself clear priorities and balance your revision with all other needs such as- meals, sleep, chores or other commitments, as well as time for relaxing and other recreational activities. Identify your best hours of the day for studying, and make full use of them in your timetable. Everyone needs time for some leisure activity, and it's a very bad idea to abandon your social life and sporting activities, but for a period near the examinations, you may need to cut down on these activities. This may involve making hard choices. Always leave yourself a minimum of six units of free time per week so that you have a proper balance with your overall personality.
- Be Organized: To be successful in any field you need to follow certain rules and be organized. If you know exactly what you're facing, you can work out a whole plan for dealing with it, and this will help you a long way towards putting your mind at ease and making things really easy for you. Try to find out the right information before you start and make sure that you know how you will be examined, and what you'll be examined on and what you need to prepare for it. You can arrange for a copy of the syllabus. If you've missed out something catch up with it as soon as possible so that you've got all your notes up to date and well in your possession so that you can put them to use as soon you need them. Be organized with your study material and your work plan on how you will proceed. Check out all the resources from where you can get material and make arrangements for the same.
- Stop Comparing your Preparation: Every human is different from other and unique in every sense. There can never be any comparison between you and every other person around you. Avoid comparing your abilities with your fellow students. Don’t get worried that what you have prepared once has already been revised by your friend three times. Everyone approaches revision in different and their own unique ways, so don’t care what others do and just make sure you've chosen the right method that works out best for you. Make a realistic timetable and stick to it.
- Take a Break: Human is a social being, and socialization is a very important part of our day to day life. We just can’t sit and study for the whole day. A wise strategy is to have at least one distressing activity to look forward to each day which can either be enjoying a favourite television show, reading an interesting short story, talk to your friends, or anything else you like to do to take a personal time out. Breaks from academics must not consume huge amounts of time or something that can give you a mental tension; in fact, it would be dangerous to choose things that would encourage procrastination or divert your mind to something else. Anticipated study breaks can be things for what you make time at the end of the day, as a self-reward for an effective and a productive day of studying. It is really important to think about the activities that are de-stressing for you and to use them on a regular basis to prevent stress from building to an unhealthy level. Of course, if the stress has already arrived, some de-stressing techniques may be just what you need to get it out of you.
- Revision: Revision of the topics that you have prepared for your exams is very important to give out your best in the examination hall. You may tend to forget a topic that you prepared almost a week before your exam. You may have an understanding of the particular topic but you may have the problem reproducing the same without proper revision of the topic. Hence it is very important to have a proper time for revision. It will not always be possible to find out a peaceful and quiet place to revise. Try to arrange those at home and set time and space where you can work without being disturbed and if you cannot find such timing at your home, think about whether you could use other facilities at school, college, or your local library. You may even pot for public libraries or a nearby peaceful public park. If you study in a room where you also eat or sleep, try to keep the work area separate, so it's not always confronting you when you're not studying and distract you. While revising, change subjects and their levels of difficulty so that you don't get bored or disheartened. Switching between study methods helps you hold your interest and absorb information better. Try mixing some dull subjects with more interesting ones, for the same reason. If it’s hard to get started, begin with something that is easy. Spend equal time on recalling as well as on reading. Practising by writing answers as you would do in the exam is also very helpful. This will help you remember the important points when you answer each paper and time that you would take to attempt a particular section.
- Maintain Regular Sleep: There is a difference between a human and a machine, while a machine may continue to work for any number of hours as long energy is fed to it, a human cannot do so. Sleeping is an important part of the human cycle and no one can continue without this. A regular sleep of seven hours is mandatory for a human body to function normally. Also, sleep at a regular time; would not alter your sleeping cycle. It is not important whether you study late at night or get up early, as long as you get into the habit of being alert at the same time as that of the examination timing. It’s not desirable that you study whole night and almost sleepy inside examination hall. Try and stop working an hour before bedtime and will find it helpful to do some relaxation, which is particularly effective in relieving stress and give you a sound relaxing sleep.
- Think Positive: Positive thinking is very important for a successful life. A positive thinker always makes best out of every situation. Spend time with people who have a positive effect. It will rub off on you. Keep all unimportant and negative thoughts at bay. Avoid negative thoughts, such as 'Everyone else seems better organized, while I'm struggling.' Rather challenge such thoughts with positive thinking; for example, 'I have done well in exams before.' Be confident and believe in yourself.
On Exam Day
- Get a good night sleep. Don’t try to overdo by studying overnight thinking that you would remember everything this way. Studying overnight before the exam can simply harm your performance in the examination hall. Contrary to popular belief, cramming all night is not the best way to study. You’ll do much better during the exam if you are not nodding off in the middle of it. Get a sound sleep and relax. If you have prepared well, no one can stop you from performing well.
- Make sure you are on time. Running late will add to your sense of panic. There is no need to get up too early, but make sure you have enough of time to get ready and reach to the examination centre on time. Don’t be there too early or too late, and make sure that you carry everything that you need in your exam, which includes your hall admit card and all the stationery that you will need.
- Eat well before the exam. Make sure what you eat is not too heavy and also not something that would make you hungry again while you are in the middle of your exam. If your stomach is tied up in knots you may not feel like eating, but make sure you have something nutritious that will give you energy and help you focus on the exam. For a small energy buzz, bring small hard candies or chocolates to melt in your mouth while you write.
- Sometimes during the first ten minutes of the exam, you are completely blank and unable to remember anything that you studied. If you can’t remember the answer to a question, don’t panic. Take a deep breath, relax and move on to the next question. Sometimes other questions on the exam can trigger your memory and slowly-slowly you get on track and begin to remember everything that you learned.
- Go through the question paper briefly so you will know how to use your time. Time yourself, allow more time for questions that are worth more marks. Take time to read each question carefully so you know what is expected in your answer. Once you are finished with writing make sure you go through your answer sheet once again to check out if something you have left or maybe attempted in a wrong manner and plan in such a way that you have sufficient time for correction.
