Knowledge is the essence of smart thinking. No matter how much raw intelligence you have, you are not going to succeed at solving complex problems without knowing a lot. That's why we spend the first 20 (or more) years of our lives in school.

Robert Bjork and fellow PT blogger Nate Kornell have explored some of the study habits of college students in a 2007 paper in Psychonomic Bulletin & Review. Research on memory provides a number of important suggestions about the most effective ways to study. One of the most important tips is that students should study by testing themselves rather than just reading over the material. It is also important to study over a period of days rather waiting until the last minute to study. Kornell and Bjork's studies suggest that only about 2/3 of college students routinely quiz themselves, and a majority of students study only one time for upcoming exams.
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Of course, guidelines from memory research come from studies in idealized circumstances. Researchers bring participants (many of whom are college students) into a lab and ask them to learn material. Perhaps the recommendations drawn from these studies are not that helpful for real students