Battling Test Anxiety For High Schoolers
Nervousness, anxiety, stress. We all experience these emotions from time to time, whether we’re giving a speech, dealing with social issues, or most commonly for high schoolers: taking a test.
For ten million teenagers in North America, test scores heavily affect self-esteem, occasionally arousing distressing feelings of self-harm. The fear of getting a bad grade, disappointing parents, or not living up to an older sibling has become overwhelming to the point where some psychologists consider test anxiety among adolescents to be a serious epidemic.
Manifestations of Test Anxiety
Student responses to their anxious feelings can vary greatly over the spectrum from stable to dramatic. For one senior in New York, tests meant one thing: a threat to her temporarily perfect 4.0 GPA. Along with the burden of expectation to be accepted into her family legacy school, Columbia University, this senior found herself oftentimes staring blankly at a wall, hyperventilating during AP exams, and developed multiple harmful habits, such as hitting herself whenever she made a mistake on a test. When she was rejected from Columbia a few months later, she collapsed into the misery of herself, wallowing in depression to the point where her mother tearfully said, “I would give my life for her to be happy again.” We have reached a point where tests are causing teenagers to frequently consume anxiety medication, contemplate committing suicide, and hate themselves for their flaws.
Science Behind Test Anxiety
Psychologists commonly classify sources of test anxiety into two main categories: situational causes or mental causes. Situational causes have to do with the environment of test-taking. This can include the pressure of taking timed tests, poor time management, lack of studying and unpreparedness, etc. Mental causes have to do with emotional and psychological attitudes towards tests. This manifests as a fear of bad grades, pressure of living up to a certain standard, or even negative self-talk. Psychologist Jed Applerouth, the founder of Applerouth tutoring services, explains, “On the whole, test anxiety occurs when a student views a test as a threat.”
Whenever the human brain identifies a threat, the brain’s center for fear processing, or the amygdala, initiates the body’s response to stress and releases stress hormones. As the nervous system is aroused, the heartbeat begins to gradually increase. A rapid heartbeat usually ends up making a student even more stressed, and they might blank out on a question or have difficulty concentrating on the test. This fear-based response to standardized testing is usually the explanation for why many students seem to demonstrate a proper understanding of a concept on homework, but somehow become “bad test-takers” whenever they’re faced with a major assessment.
Balancing Stress
Although stress is typically viewed as harmful, a good balance of stress can be beneficial for test-taking. According to the Yerkes-Dodson curve shown below, eustress, or optimal stress, enhances your performance on tests and projects. Some of history’s greatest inventions have been created due to time crunches, which provide a healthy amount of eustress. Maintaining an appropriate level of stress improves problem-solving abilities and can serve as motivation during a test. The real issue arises when students put too much pressure on themselves to the point where they turn to distress. This ends up being counterproductive, as the problem-solving part of your brain is deactivated and you begin focusing on potential outcomes. Train your brain to view stress as a useful tool rather than a threat.
Links to Anxiety
One suspected link to the early development of anxiety likely has to do with technology. Jean Twenge, an American psychologist, referenced a study by the University of Michigan’s Institute for Social Research, which tracked the general happiness levels for students in 8th, 10th, and 12th grade over the course of 30 years. In an analysis of the results, Twenge wrote, “Students are less happy due to fundamental shifts in how they spend their leisure time,” suggesting that the immense decline in mental well-being has to do with exposure to technology. In addition to the technology usage rise with COVID-19, high schoolers spend an average of 6 hours per day on a screen as leisure time. In turn, most teenagers are receiving less than 8 ½ hours of sleep each night, which is causing their emotional self-regulation to suffer.
Severity of Anxiety
Although this issue may not seem shockingly dire, a recent report found that 1 in 3 adolescents develop an anxiety disorder by the time they turn 18, and that suicides by minors peak close to major exams, such as finals, AP tests, and SATs. Whether it's dealing with the pressure to succeed in a highly competitive environment, or the obligation to make your parents proud with good grades, many students are simply not equipped with the mindset or emotional maturity to handle the stress of test-taking.
Tips for Dealing with Test Anxiety
#1 Study Ahead of Time
If you manage your time well and prepare ahead of the test date, you can avoid that anxious feeling of unpreparedness when you take the test. Create a study plan in advance and attend office hours outside of class time to clarify any questions you might have. Rather than staying up late the night before a test, get a good night’s rest so that you feel fresh and awake while you take the test.
#2 Get Exercise Before the Test
Instead of doing any last-minute cramming, trust that you have studied well and get some fresh air to clear your head of any worries or distresses. Numerous studies have shown that going on a quick jog before an assessment can improve your overall performance.
#3 Enforce Positive Self-Talk
One bad grade is not the end of the world. We have a tendency to “catastrophize” small inaccuracies and blame ourselves for every mistake. Instead of walking into class with the mindset, “I must get 100% on this test or I am a failure,” shift your focus to the present rather than imaging the worst possible scenario. Additionally, if you end up making a mistake on a test, be wary of using strong words like ‘failure’ or ‘stupid,’ and give yourself credit for the questions you got right.
#4 Be Aware of Your Language
When using the word ‘anxiety,’ be aware of its definition and distinguish severe anxiety from common stress. It’s normal to feel nervous or anxious before a test, but there is a difference between the regular emotional reaction of stress and intense clinical anxiety. ‘Anxiety’ and ‘depression’ have become casual terms, and are used interchangeably with the word ‘stress.’ This is devaluing the severity of anxiety, which is a psychological condition, whereas stress is a natural emotional reaction. The language we use can affect the way we perceive our own abilities, which is why developing a better sense of awareness with the usage of these terms is important.
#5 Ask For Help When You Need It
If you are feeling overwhelmed with test anxiety, talk to a school counselor or a teacher for assistance in building a strong mindset towards tests and for additional help with the class. Many students battling test anxiety feel ashamed to admit their struggles to anyone else, which results in a sudden tipping point due to their bottled-up emotions. For young adults who experienced test anxiety in high school, when asked what they wished they had done differently, the majority said they wished they had asked for help early on and had confided in a friend or parent.
To put it simply, test anxiety is anything but easy. The genuine fear and worry that high schoolers express upon the approach of an exam signify the importance of altering this aspect of our education system. For anyone struggling with test anxiety, know that you are not alone in your struggles. There are reliable figures in your life who are here to help you get through these challenges. Find them, confide in them, and take life one day at a time. Begin reshaping the way you think about your fears: accept stress, welcome challenges, view tests as a chance to grow. If you get a bad grade, transform your regrets and frustration into an opportunity and change your studying tactic for the next test. Over time, we begin to see issues that once seemed like ‘the end of the world’ as simple and straightforward. In the same way, in a few years, tests will soon seem harmless, and today’s fears will soon seem pointless. As your next test approaches, take a deep breath and channel that energy spent worrying into determination. Remember: you’ve got this.
