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Study Skills: Understanding the Psychology of Distractions

Study Skills

Avoiding distractions

Top Tips to Avoid Distractions

1. Clean your desk - a tidy work environment will help you feeling overwhelmed and distracted

2. Deal with hunger first - make sure you have healthy, filling snacks while studying, or just before you start studying or completing homework. Hunger is a major distraction!

3. Put that phone away! - everyone keeps telling you to put your phone away for a reason.....it is a MAJOR distraction source! The easiest way to avoid the distraction of a phone is to put it out of reach and place the phone on do not disturb.

4.Think about the environment that works best for you - do you like music or noise in the background when you study? do you need total silence? Create the environment you know you work best in to avoid distractions

5. Take frequent breaks - factor breaks in to your study schedule (10 minute break every 25 minutes is a good ratio)

The Psychology of Distractions

Distractions and our brain

                         

What's Happening to Our Brains When We Are Distracted?
 

It’s easy to blame digital distractions or a lack of discipline when we can’t focus, but a lot of it has to do with simple biology.

During neanderthal times, survival meant a keen awareness of motion and the present moment. Nowadays, we don't have to ensure we aren't distracted for survival. 

Success in modern life demands a complete reversal of how humans have evolved to behave. In just .1% of the timeline of human history, our society has changed to reward those who are able to sit still in their offices, oblivious to external stimuli, locked deep in thought.

The incentives have totally flipped… except we still have the same brains as before. That tension—between what evolution has prepared us for and what modern society demands—manifests as frustration and an inability to focus.