What's The Secret To Effective Learning? - Nick Morgan, Forbes

What’s the secret to effective learning? A recent study by a group of neuroscientists from the University of California, the University of Pennsylvania and Johns Hopkins University found that the less you work your brain when learning, perhaps, the better. The researchers studied subjects learning a simple game over a six-week period. Those who used the part of the brain least associated with conscious planning, the frontal cortex, did the best. It’s better, it turns out, just to practice and not over-think what you’re doing. You learn faster. The results were published in the journal Nature Neuroscience recently, and one of the researchers noted, “It’s the people who can turn off the communication to these parts of their brain (the frontal cortex) the quickest who have the steepest drop-off in their completion times. It seems like those other parts are getting in the way for the slower learners. It’s almost like they’re trying too hard.” http://www.forbes.com/sites/nickmorgan/2015/05/05/whats-the-secret-to-effective-learning/