do all nighters actually help pull a better grade on tests?

skim milk

Diamond Member
Apr 8, 2003
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Is there a proven study or something... or is sleep more important?

I guess it depends on the situation... but from personal experience, do you perform better on tests after studying all night or....other?
 

Buttzilla

Platinum Member
Oct 12, 2000
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nope not at all. i remember studying for a bio-chem midterm. we just ended up messing around in the 24 hour study hall. you get tired and delirious after awhile. it gets to a point where you just can't cram anymore info.
 

azncoffeeboi

Senior member
Jun 21, 2001
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staying up a bit later than usual then sleeping works the best for me. I find myself doing stupid mistakes if i stay up all night. =-/
 

Glitchny

Diamond Member
Sep 4, 2002
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nah staying up only works for papers cramming causes more harm then its worth, being tired actually makes u forget everything
 

iotone

Senior member
Dec 1, 2000
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for me, it was all about getting as much rest as possible the nite before... i usually didn't do well on tests where i didn't sleep much, and the lack of sleep made it hard to concentrate sometimes...

if anything, you should get some sleep before a test at the minimum
 

BaboonGuy

Diamond Member
Aug 24, 2002
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well if you dont know anything anyways, they definetly help. just make sure to get SOME sleep before the test (even 20 min is enough) and you'll be good to go for at least the test. don't expect to give a rousing 20 minute presentation
 

Kermy

Senior member
Sep 15, 2000
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Recently (a week or two ago) there was an article on msn/msnbc about whether a good night's rest or all nighter was more important. Think the people that slept got on avg 7% better scores than those that studied all night. You might wanna do a search on msn or msnbc.
 

Spoooon

Lifer
Mar 3, 2000
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If you haven't studied at all, then yes, an all nighter will help.

But if you've been keeping up with the material, it'll only hurt you. Sleep is much more important.

Even when I pull an "all nighter" I try to get a 3 hour nap in.

edit: My last all nighter netted me a 92 on a statistics test. :D
 

digitalsm

Diamond Member
Jul 11, 2003
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If you slack off and dont keep up with the material an all nighter can only help you.

If you keep up, theres no point of an all nighter.
 

AvesPKS

Diamond Member
Apr 21, 2000
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It's like, if you can stay up until 3-4 hours before your test, go to sleep, and then wake up, and take the test, for about 2 hours after I wake up, I'm usually okay. Then I go into Zombie Mode. If I stay up the whole night, I'm usually good until 4-5, but then at 6 I start going into Zombie Mode, which usually doesn't work out to well. I'd advise getting some sleep, if you can.
 

Whisper

Diamond Member
Feb 25, 2000
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Like pretty much everyone else has said: If you haven't studied at all, an all-nighter can only really help you. But do make sure to get at least an hour or two of sleep. Less than that and you probably won't be able to concentrate well enough to remember any of the material that you spent all night reading.

I've found that if you've kept up with the class, that it's still better (at least for me) to review material for a few hours than it is to just relax completely. If I read the text too far ahead of time, then I'll end up forgetting most everything by the time of the exam. Thus, I usually don't start studying until a week (at most) before the test date.
 

dighn

Lifer
Aug 12, 2001
22,820
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doesn't work well for me. i tried it a couple of weeks ago. not only did i feel like shlt and couldn't think clearly, it messed up my sleeping schedule for the next few days and weakened my immune system so i got some kinda skin infection :|

procrastination = very bad
 

Aimster

Lifer
Jan 5, 2003
16,129
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wont work. you will fail trust me. tried it.. your brain cant cram all that information overnight. If it is math then yea I guess that's easy because it's just formulas.. but for like biology... dont count on it.
 

Konigin

Platinum Member
Jan 21, 2003
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Originally posted by: minendo
Sleep is important.
Sleep? What is this you talk of? I've had 3 hours of sleep in the last 48. Took a couple of tests, got A's. The amount of sleep really doesn't seem to matter, though I usually do really good when I haven't had much sleep. Now back to my essay....
 

CoBRaXT

Golden Member
Mar 11, 2002
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i've found out that sleep doesn't really affect my test scores....pulling an allnighter sure does though!
 

dionx

Diamond Member
Mar 11, 2001
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i pulled nothing but all nighters during college. i graduated chemistry in 4 years. did i retain any of that knowledge? some of it. and whatever i did forget, the ones i did need to know for the work force was easy to learn and holds its retention better the 2nd time learning it.
 

BamBam215

Golden Member
Feb 17, 2000
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Originally posted by: Aimster
wont work. you will fail trust me. tried it.. your brain cant cram all that information overnight. If it is math then yea I guess that's easy because it's just formulas.. but for like biology... dont count on it.

if only that was true
 

digitalsm

Diamond Member
Jul 11, 2003
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Originally posted by: BamBam215
Originally posted by: Aimster
wont work. you will fail trust me. tried it.. your brain cant cram all that information overnight. If it is math then yea I guess that's easy because it's just formulas.. but for like biology... dont count on it.

if only that was true

Ive never successfully crammed for a math test. Other subjects I have.
 

Spoooon

Lifer
Mar 3, 2000
11,563
203
106
Originally posted by: Konigin
Originally posted by: minendo
Sleep is important.
Sleep? What is this you talk of? I've had 3 hours of sleep in the last 48. Took a couple of tests, got A's. The amount of sleep really doesn't seem to matter, though I usually do really good when I haven't had much sleep. Now back to my essay....

Some experiments show that your cognitive functions are improved when the duration of your sleep in hours is a multiple of 3. Has to do with the number of complete REM cycles or something.

So, 3 hours is better than 4. :D
 

BamBam215

Golden Member
Feb 17, 2000
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Originally posted by: digitalsm
Originally posted by: BamBam215
Originally posted by: Aimster
wont work. you will fail trust me. tried it.. your brain cant cram all that information overnight. If it is math then yea I guess that's easy because it's just formulas.. but for like biology... dont count on it.

if only that was true

Ive never successfully crammed for a math test. Other subjects I have.

it's easy to cram for a math test given it's a computational math class. otherwise, u're assed trying to cram proofs and applications.
 

DXM

Senior member
Jul 26, 2003
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Originally posted by: Aimster
wont work. you will fail trust me. tried it.. your brain cant cram all that information overnight. If it is math then yea I guess that's easy because it's just formulas.. but for like biology... dont count on it.

My thoughts exactly.

I stay up all night studying for math tests, but never for any class that requires rote memorization.

But instead of studying all night, I study as much as I can then try to get at least 2 hours of sleep before the test, otherwise I'll be completely useless for the rest of the day.