A student sat paralyzed as the minutes ticked by.  One hour later, time was up for the exam in a Statistics class, and he turned in his work.  It was completely blank, except for his name.

A student walked into the classroom for the final exam in her Literature course feeling prepared.  She had studied her carefully prepared flashcards and notes, and she felt confident that she knew the information she had been asked to study.  As the professor began handing out the exams and giving instructions, waves of nausea began to come.  Her palms were sweaty, she felt faint, and she quietly excused herself and ran to the restroom.  After a few minutes of trying to regain her composure, she returned to her exam, but she was unable to recall all of the information that she knew she had studied.

With final exams a few weeks away, a student knows that he should begin studying and preparing.  The thought of freezing on a test and not doing well is so overwhelming, the student continually puts off studying to ease the stress of the upcoming tests.  

A student feels like she has never been a good test taker.  It seems as though every test she has ever taken, whether she studies hard or not, always ends in failure or a lower grade than she wanted.  Now on the day of her History exam, she decides to skip the exam and take an F, because she feels like it's no use since she will fail anyway.

Test Anxiety is typically described as the "worry" or "fear" caused by having to take a test.

The anxiety and stress adversely affects your ability to perform well on the test, even when you are well-prepared.  Common symptoms include, but are not limited to, sweaty palms, jitteriness, nausea, butterflies in the stomach, upset stomach, trouble sleeping, racing pulse, headache, blank mind, and feelings of helplessness.  

TRUE test anxiety comes when you have studied and done what you can to be prepared, yet you still experience feelings of extreme stress.  It is often a very easy excuse to blame poor test results on test anxiety, however, feeling stressed due to being unprepared for an exam is not true test anxiety.  Poor study habits and lack of preparation is purely poor time management and misuse of study resources available to you.  Again, true test anxiety comes when you have done the work and put in the time to be prepared and ready for an exam and then are unable to perform.

The good news is that test anxiety is a learned behavior.  Because it is learned, it can be UNLEARNED!  You do not have to be plagued by test anxiety forever.

There are many different causes of true test anxiety.

**Pressure to earn a certain grade on the exam or in the course
**Past failure on similar exams or in similar courses
**Unfamiliar testing style of a certain professor
**Uncertainty about the test format  (Will she make us write an essay?  Will it all be short answer?  Will there be a word bank?)
**Uncertainty about the test content (Will it really be over our lecture notes like he said?  Or is he going to throw in book material, too?)
**Competition from classmates
**Rumors of difficulty of a certain professor or exam
**Current issues with depression and/or anxiety

There are a variety of tips and strategies that you can employ that will begin your journey to overcoming test anxiety.  

1)  The first and most important thing that you can do is to BE PREPARED.  Simple things like attending every class period, attending all study and tutoring sessions available for a course, and staying on top of any and all homework and reading may not seem like they has anything to do with testing, but they absolutely do.  You do not have to worry about missing any crucial pieces of information.  Make sure that you never cram for a test or an exam.  Cramming is not studying.  Cramming is only an invitation for stress, exhaustion, and throwing your mental and physical self all off track.  Developing a healthy study schedule in which you are studying chunks of material DAILY will ensure that you are actually learning and retaining the information.  

2)  Test day preparation is also a necessary part of cutting down on test anxiety.  We've all heard that you should eat a good healthy breakfast before a test.  This is only true if this is your normal routine for everyday.  If you are not a breakfast eater normally, and you eat heavily before an exam, you could be possibly be setting yourself up for stomach issues in the middle of your exam.  Make sure that you follow your average routines so that your body isn't trying to cope with any new behaviors on top of the anxiety of the test that you are getting ready to take.  Try not to arrive too early for your exam (definitely don't arrive late).  Arriving too early causes you to have time to do nothing but sit and think unnecessary irrational thoughts about the test.  Briefly glance over your notes; do not try to do any strenuous studying once you are in the testing room.  Breathe, relax, get comfortable, and remind yourself that you are well-prepared.

3)  During the test, it is very helpful to take a few minutes at the very beginning to jot down any important notes or formulas in the margins of the test.  That way, these will be available to you later on in the test as you may need them.  If your professor will allow you to, use a blank white sheet of paper to cover up everything on the test except the question that you are working on.  This will help you concentrate on one question at a time.  Also work through the test answering the questions that you know first, then use your remaining time to go back through the other questions carefully.  Look back through other answers or questions on the test to gain hints that might spark your memory.  

A study was conducted recently (2011) by the University of Chicago that proved that students who took about 10 minutes to jot down their quick feelings about an upcoming exam or test actually had a 5% increase in performance over students who took the exam without writing out their feelings about it.  

The study found that there was a correlation between getting out the feelings of anxiety or failure on paper and lessened anxiety during the actual test.  

These notes do not have to be of any great depth or taken in even a formal journal format.  Simply jotting down "I am really nervous right now" or "I really think I might fail" on a scrap piece of paper is effective.  To give words to the feelings of anxiety seems to take away a lot of their power.

Try it!

Calm down!  You've worked hard, and you've prepared well.  You can do this!

One test will not make or break you.  It may feel as though everything rides upon the outcome of one exam, however, if you have stayed on top of all of your assignments and are fulfilling all other components of the course, then one test will not deem you a failure.

Don't worry about what everyone else is doing!  It doesn't matter if you are the first one to turn your test in or the last, and it doesn't matter that you are the only one who seems stressed.  Everyone handles things differently, so your classmates reactions to an exam do not mean anything regarding you or your feelings.

Be well rested and well nourished.  Your body would not be able to perform a physical test without the proper rest and nourishment, so don't expect that this mental test can be handled any differently.

If you still experience extreme anxiety issues that hinder your ability to function or cope, please seek professional help.  The university counselor's services are available.  

This workshop was written by a member of the Academic Success Center staff at Ouachita Baptist University.