Almost always, cramming doesn’t do much good to students. Students who choose to sacrifice their sleep to get extra studying time tend to get worse academic results compared with their well rested peers.

Why do students cram before an exam, test or quiz? There are a number of reasons why. First, they fear failure because of learning disabilities. Students who also have over-committed schedules with little or no time to study tend to cram before exams. This can happen to working students, to those who have family obligations or who may be involved in too many extracurricular activities. Cramming may even be caused by low motivation to study on a regular basis before any given test.

Cramming for a test can lead to several results. Confusion of facts that the students already learned is one thing, especially for students with specific learning disabilities. Cramming leads to inability to connect new facts to prior learning which is necessary to input ideas into memory, and it give enough time for the brain to process the information and make critical connections in concepts. Reading fatigue during study and low energy levels during the test can lead to lower scores.

If the students are already well prepared for an exam, a light study before the test can be helpful. Going over some concepts a few minutes before the test may help the student feel more comfortable and confident going into the test.