as the amount of effort expended increases, the material internalized using good study techniques rises quickly until, around 5 hours, everything has been learned. For the bad study techniques, more effort still, of course, results in more material being internalized, but the rate of this acquisition is slower. It is not until the 11th hour (clever, eh?) that the bad study techniques finish learning the full material.
The lesson is clear. Studying is a technical skill. As with any such skill, the best results come from mastering the relevant techniques. Simply pouring on more effort proves an inefficient approach to accomplishing your goal.
Most students ignore this reality. They approach studying haphazardly, typically just reading and re-reading their notes as many times as possible. They don’t think about how they study. Instead, they consider only how long. Accordingly, they are stuck on the slow growing curve from our chart above. To get top grades, they have to invest a lot of hours. And that’s a large demand. Most settle for less.
You know better. Consider how you study, and you can drastically decrease the effort required to internalize the material. Technique grants so many more advantages than effort, it behooves you, for the sake of reducing study time, to hone your techniques to a sharp edge.