How Can You Deal With Test Anxiety? | College Life with PaperHelp

The end of the academic year is approaching, and you can see the summer vacations on the horizon. Excepting questions like - "is paperhelp.org safe for students to use?" or "How to write an essay?" - there are many reasons to feel nervous, including the exam period. This period is stressful and a headache for every student. However, some students feel great anxiety before the exams, even incapacitating them to be able to take them.

What is test anxiety?

Test anxiety is understood as a fear of great intensity that persists over time in situations related to the exams interfering significantly in their daily life. Experiencing stress or anxiety in this situation is normal, we speak of a test anxiety problem when its frequency, duration and intensity is so high that it makes it impossible for the person to cope with the situation.

It is a type of performance anxiety, i.e., it appears in situations where your performance is going to be evaluated. The anxious symptomatology can appear in an anticipatory way while studying to prepare. That is to say, sometimes it is not necessary for the person to experience the situation of taking an exam to suffer the emotion of anxiety.

The most frequent symptoms

Physiological level: increased heart rate, hyperventilation, dry mouth, sweating, heat or trembling are some of the most common. Also, headache, stomach ache or worsening of a previous physical pathology may be experienced.

Cognitive level: catastrophic anticipatory thoughts appear about how bad the exam is going to be or the inability to cope with it. In addition, it becomes really difficult to concentrate on the study or the exam and, sometimes, the person may feel a blockage or have the perception that "he/she has gone blank".

Motor or behavioral level: it is frequent that the student avoids facing the exam or that he/she takes the exam, but hands it in after a few minutes due to the great discomfort they feel.

10 tips to combat test anxiety:

Accept that stress and mild anxiety can be expected in this type of situation without being harmful.

Train abdominal diaphragmatic breathing or relaxation exercises to reduce physiological activation.

Maintain healthy habits: ensure approximately 8 hours of sleep, have a healthy and balanced diet and avoid the consumption of narcotics.

Practice physical exercise, it will help you to rest at night and to disconnect from the study.

Look for a study place that suits your needs in terms of comfort, noise, light, temperature, etc.

Organize the time and material necessary to study and prepare for the exam in question. Use useful services like paperhelp.org.

Take care of your internal dialogue. Being aware of the negative thoughts and worries that overwhelm us will make it easier to get out of the loop to focus on the effort we are making to prepare for the exam.

Plan to arrive on time for the exam to avoid extra stress due to traffic or arrival time.

Distribute the time you have on the exam: read the instructions carefully, as well as the questions, and start answering those questions that are easiest for you.

If despite trying to manage it through these tips, anxiety is still limiting you, the ideal is to go to psychological therapy.