CASA Center for Academic Support and Advancement

Indiana University Purdue University Fort Wayne

Test Anxiety Tips

Test anxiety is the name given to the uneasy feeling experienced by most people as the time for a test approaches. The extent to which people experience test anxiety varies greatly, and the symptoms experienced differ from person to person. Many people feel that mild test anxiety is beneficial because the mind is made more alert, and the attention is focused as the body gets ready to do “battle” with difficult material. However, severe test anxiety can be overwhelming, leaving the test taker with a racing heart, sweaty brow, nauseous stomach, and only fragmented thoughts. Test anxiety can occur before a student starts preparing for a test, while studying for a test, and while taking the test. Here are some ways to avoid or lessen anxiety:

Don’t come to the testing area too early.

While you need to assure that you will be on campus and at the test site before a test begins, you should arrange your time so that you will arrive at the testing site right before the test begins. Being excessively early, or arriving at the test site more than a few minutes before the test starts frequently causes anxiety. Talking with classmates and sharing their fears and problems about the up-coming test only add fuel to existing anxiety. Then, when the test actually begins, all of these negative emotions come rushing back into memory to haunt already nervous students. If this description fits you, avoid your nervous classmates by not arriving early and try to keep yourself busy thinking about other things.

Use positive self-talk.

Anxiety frequently is accompanied by a little voice in our heads that tells us that we can’t succeed--that we will fail. Counteract this negative voice by consciously telling yourself that you can succeed, that you’ve studied the material. In the few minutes before the test starts, set a positive framework. Repeat over and over to yourself, “I can do it! I will do it! I can do it! I will do it!” This will help build your confidence. Talk positively to yourself. It will help you be a winner.

Use relaxation techniques

For those who have tape recorders or CD players, it may be a good idea to take about five minutes before a test to play relaxing music. Find a quiet corner; play your relaxing tape. Empty your mind of conscious thought. As the music plays, let your mind flow with whatever images present themselves. This procedure not only will relax you, but it will stimulate the kind of brain waves needed to improve test performance. If anxiety occurs during the test, it usually will affect one of the major muscle systems of the body (stomach, back, arms, legs, etc.). Make a conscious effort to relax if you feel anxiety building up. Breathing deeply can help a person relax. It is hard for anxiety to build up if you are concentrating on breathing deeply because your mind is occupied with something other than the test.

Use visualization.

Visualization, creating mental pictures, can remove anxiety and help students briefly focus their attention away from the cause of their anxiety. What to visualize may depend on the problem or situation, but every student should visualize success! Visualizing success takes positive self-talk one step further. See the professor handing back the tests, and yours has a giant red A at the top. Visualize celebrating a good grade with friends and class mates. Remember that most people live up to their own expectations, good or bad. If you continually see yourself with shortcomings, you increase your chances for failure. To answer test questions efficiently, nursing students could visualize themselves working in a hospital as they answer procedure questions, or education students could visualize themselves teaching as they are taking the test. To relax and escape the stress of the test, students could visualize a warm Caribbean beach with the white sand and hear the relaxing sounds of the blue water.

Test Preparation

1. Plan ahead for your study time

You should know the first week of classes when the instructors hand out the course syllabi the times all tests are scheduled. As soon as you find out this information, note test days on a calendar, and write the date one week ahead of each test. It is a good idea to use two different colors of ink in writing down this information so that there is no possibility of confusing the two different dates--the actual test date and the begin-studying date. Equally important, if students wait until the last minute for study, a serious problem exists if they find that they don’t understand some of the material. Other students are studying for themselves and cannot be bothered by helping someone else. It is too late to reach the teacher or to get a tutor. There is not even much time to think through the material. However, by beginning study a week early, by going through text and notes once, students can see which items they know and can get together with other students, with the instructor, or with a tutor. They can have the time to think out the problem themselves.

2. Decide what to study

Another way to think about this next test taking preparation tip is THINK before you study. All course material is not equally important. Ask yourself: what material has been most important; what did we spend a week, two weeks, etc. working on; what did we spend a full day on; which text chapters seem more important; during lectures where did the instructor emphasize text material or differ from text material; what kind of material was on the last test? Instructors frequently ask the same types of questions again. For example, if an earlier test contained several researchers’ names, later tests will do the same. If an earlier test contained many questions on theories, the later ones will too. Use your answers to previous test questions as guides for your study.

3. Develop a study procedure

Now you’re ready to actually begin studying. Go through all of your material once. Don’t stop on anything you don’t know. Then, go back through the material studying only what you didn’t know the first time. Study the third time only what you didn’t know the second time. Continue going over your material until you know and understand it. As you study, divide your time into 30-40 minute periods. Long study periods without breaks are inefficient. Study for a half hour; take a short break (5 minutes); study again, then break again. Repeat this process until you feel confident about your material. On breaks, reward yourself for work well done. Do something short that you like to do (eat, listen to music, etc.). Following this pattern can enhance studying. Remember that there really is no short cut for studying, only more efficient methods!

4. Have good health habits

Be sure to eat right during your study times. Coffee or other caffeine or high sugar items only have short term benefits. At exam time, it is particularly important to maintain a balanced diet. While a piece of fruit may give a quick burst of energy before a test, the best aid to effective study is a balanced diet. Adequate sleep is also important. People who are well rested are better able to function during tests than those who are tired.

GENERAL TEST-TAKING TIPS

What should I do when I first get the test?

The most important element in determining whether or not you will do well in a testing situation is understanding test directions. Listen to and read all directions before answering any test questions. In each class there are people who will lose points--and sometimes lose a huge number of points--because they don’t follow directions.

Now, before actually writing down anything, read very quickly through the entire test. You want to know how many pages are on the test and what the point values for each section are. This information will help in planning test taking strategy. You will know which sections count most heavily so that you can plan your time to be sure to allow sufficient time for those parts.

What strategies should I use when I take the test?

Sometimes tests have only one section for which specialized knowledge is needed. Do this section first. For example, some nursing tests have math calculation problems at the end. These problems are the only area of the test for which math formulas are needed. By finding this section, writing down the necessary formulas, and doing these problems right away, the student can dump this easy-to-forget knowledge and concentrate on subject specific items. Read through all of the test questions answering only those that you know. By doing this, you assure yourself of all of the points for these questions. If you don’t follow this procedure, you might not get to questions near the end of the test--questions which you might know. Another reason for following this procedure is that, especially in objective tests, it is quite common that later questions may help to answer earlier ones. A final reason for doing questions we know first is the “light bulb phenomenon.” Frequently, a person will read a question and have no idea of the answer. Then, maybe even 20 questions later, that person will suddenly know the answer to this earlier question. If this happens to you, write the answer down immediately. If you don’t, the light may go off, and the answer may not return. In answering each question, read the entire question including all answer options carefully. Many mistakes occur because people read questions too quickly. They may read information that is not there or miss words that change the meaning of the question. Similarly, many people read answer choices until they find one that looks right, mark that answer, and quit reading. Frequently, these people do not read the choice that is the best answer. Careful reading will assure that this will not happen. As you are getting down to the end of the test, if you find there is an answer which you don’t know--GUESS. Answers left blank are most frequently marked wrong. Even a wild guess gives a chance for points. Let’s suppose that you have plenty of time to answer all questions. There is a great temptation to leave as soon as the test is finished. The best advice about leaving early is--DON’T. If time remains, re-check answers, especially those you really weren’t too sure of. Remember that in a test situation, the mind and hand work very fast. And they don’t always cooperate.

TIPS FOR OBJECTIVE TESTS TRUE OR FALSE

Are there clues for taking tests? Yes, but these clues should only be used to help answer questions if you have followed these first two principles that supersede all other clues: Obviously, study until you know and understand the material. If you know the right answer from your study, it doesn’t matter if it violates all of the clues. It doesn’t matter if it seems too easy to be right. If you know it’s right, it probably is. The second principle is use common sense. We have all lived long enough to have stored up a fund of experience--our schema. If logic, based on our experience, tells you a thing is right, it may well be right. Trust yourself. Here are some techniques that are helpful to know when working with true-false questions.

1. It is useful to begin with the assumption that the statement is true; your job is to find any reason why the statement might be false.

2. Keep in mind that general statements, those which allow for no exception, are likely to be wrong answers. When you see words like “all,” “no,” “only,” “always,” “never,” often called absolute words, expect the statement will be false.

3. Be sure that the entire statement is true. Sometimes the statements are written so that the first part is true, but the last part is not. This is one instance where careful reading is important. Read the entire statement to be sure that it is totally true. A variation of this same type of statement occurs when the true-false statement gives a reason. Part of the statement is true, but the reason given is false. When a true-false statement is only partly true, you must mark the answer false.

4. A final clue about true-false questions is to be alert for negatives, such as the word “not” or a negative prefix, in the statement. Once again, careful reading is essential. If you don’t pay attention to that negative word, you will answer the question incorrectly.

MULTIPLE CHOICE

The other main type of objective test question is the multiple choice question. This type of question has two parts--the stem (the question or statement) and the options (the answer choices). An effective way to answer this type of question is to read it as a series of true-false questions. Read the stem with each option separately as you answer whether that particular choice is true or not. In this manner you are less likely to be confused by several slightly different choices because as soon as you find one answer that you can eliminate, you can cross that one out and only concentrate on the remaining possibilities. Deal with each option in the same way. The clues for true-false statements will equally apply to the individual options in multiple choice questions. There are some additional clues as you look at multiple-choice items:

1. See if you can find two options that are opposites. If so, one of these is likely to be the answer.

2. Watch for repetition of a word or idea. If material from the stem is repeated in one option or if two options use similar words, look for the answer among the ones repeating key words or ideas.

3. “All of the above,” “none of the above,” “a + b only,” etc. tend to be correct answers. In dealing with these options, it is important to remember some basic facts. First, remember that the words “all” and “none” allow for no exceptions. That means that when you are reading the options for the question, if you find even one option that doesn’t fit, you have, in effect, eliminated two possibilities.