What Happened to Studying?

The author of “What happened to studying? ” really seems to have hit the jackpot with the situation regarding the study habits of college students. As a college student myself, the data that is brought to the readers is something that I can completely relate to. Many college students, including myself, can easily say that we are able to keep a consistent, well rounded GPA while studying less than 14 hours a day.

With that being said, there are many interesting pieces of evidence in this article including, the survey’s that were taken by students as well as the false assumption that technology has drastically changed studying habits. It is astonishing how in 1961 students studied an average of 24 hours a day and now the average is down to 14 hours. The studying “dilemma” also isn’t affecting only a certain demographic but all demographics. One of the surveys written about in this article was conducted at the University of California and taken by 160,000 undergraduates.

The students “were asked to list what interferes most with their academic success. ” The second most common answer was “students were depressed, stressed or upset” and the number one answer was when “they struggled with one problem frequently or all the time.

” To me, the results were honestly not very surprising because, both of those interferences are something that I can completely relate too. At the same time, it is relieving to know that I am not the only one who is facing these problems and in fact, many other teenagers are as well.

If I was assigned to research the changes in studying habits, I would most likely blame technology because it seems to be the most obvious answer. This is because teenagers are bombarded with technological innovations left and right and with so many social networking sites such as Facebook, Myspace, Twitter, ect it is pretty hard to ignore. Surprisingly, according to Babcock and Marks that isn’t the issue and there are many different reasons. As a matter of fact, according to the article, declining in studying was linked before computers were placed into schools.

One of the reasons regarding the decline of studying that Babcock and Marks discussed in their research, which I found very interesting, was about the relationship between a professor and a student. How both sides try and want to do as little as possible. For me, I know this is always the case because I never like heavy work load from a class.

Though, I do have a lot of sympathy and respect for professors because, the harder they make an assignment the tougher it is on them because it requires a lot more work on their part in the long run.

Babcock and Marks also mention that there is no incentive to make assignments hard because all that leads to is complaining and an extension to office hours. This article was very eye opening and something that I will most likely be thinking about throughout my college career. I honestly never knew or even put in time to think about how studying habits have changed so drastically over 50 years. How much further can the studying habitat decline? Time will tell but, I can see the issue becoming very serious in the future when professors and students have no incentive to work hard.