I’d tell you why.
Firstly, the influence of hormones on hippocampal function, particularly those secreted as a consequence of activation of the hypothalamo-pituitary-adrenal axis (HPA) mainly as a response to stress, has been acknowledged for several decades. The hippocampus has the highest concentration of corticosterone receptors in the brain , and the profound effects of stress on hippocampal function, and in particular on learning and memory processes, have been attributed to this. An interesting, and perhaps predictable, finding is that stress levels of glucocorticoids have a profound inhibitory effect on hippocampal cell activity , while low levels of glucocorticoids enhance activity, and this pattern is repeated with respect to glucocorticoid levels and LTP. Therefore, high concentrations of circulating glucocorticoids, consistent with marked stress, inhibited LTP while low concentrations of glucocortocoids enhanced LTP.
To cut the long story short, the bottom-line is that stress has a negative impact on your ability to store information. So, go running or eat as much as you want (you can burn off those fats later), just don’t be too stressed!
Secondly, and I cant emphasize enough, sleep is important for memory consolidation! Despite the well-known fact that sleep is extremely important for one’s mental and physical well-being, many people continue to sacrifice their precious sleep. If you think that an hour more of mugging and less of sleeping is going to get you a better grade, THINK AGAIN.
If you are tired, nothing you read is going to be encoded in your brain as sleep deprivation can impair later memory for recently acquired declarative and procedural memory. Moreover, REM sleep, when most dreaming occurs, has been shown in a number of studies to be important in consolidating procedural (skill) learning, while non-REM (slow-wave) sleep seems to be more important for declarative (knowledge-based) learning. A new study using brief daytime napping confirms the role of non-REM sleep for declarative learning. Volunteers who memorized pairs of words and practiced tracing images in a mirror test scored 15% better in the word test if they had been allowed a nap in the six hour period before being tested.
According to some psychologist called Walker "When you're asleep, it seems as though you are shifting memory to more efficient storage regions within the brain. Consequently, when you awaken, memory tasks can be performed both more quickly and accurately and with less stress and anxiety."
I know it is easier said than done, but try. I am one perfect example of a person who insists on sleeping early and sleeping enough, and my grades aint too bad, right?
All that I mentioned are not gibberish that I came up with but theories proposed by psychologists who had conducted intensive research in this field. Trust me, if you relax a bit and sleep more, your grades will suffer less!
(pardon for being so naggy, im trying to recall what I just studied heh)
posted by dreamz @ 4:09 PM
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