Signs that you are studying too much at the expense of other stuff

author By Mary Boies
overstudying-effects-and-remedies

Studying is important in college because it is through it that you understand concepts better and pass your exams. While studying is important, it should not be overdone. In other words, you should never study too much. This is because studying too much often results in negative effects such as insomnia, stress, and poor academic performance. 

Effects of overstudying and how to overcome them

You are in the right place if you suspect you are studying too much. The signs below will help you tell if you are studying too much.

How to Tell  if You Are Overstudying or Not

Some significant signs indicate that you are studying too much and might need a break, find help, or balance things.

1. You do not get enough sleep

Sleep is important. You need enough sleep daily to reset, renew, and recharge. Failure to get enough sleep daily will negatively affect your memory, mood, motivation, and perception. Despite the importance of sleep, many students do not get enough of it daily because they spend a significant part of the night studying.

If you do not get enough sleep daily because you spend a significant part of your nights studying, then you are most likely studying too much. While it may seem beneficial to you that you are studying a lot at night, in the long run, it isn�t. Eventually, you will get to a point where you will break down.

You need between six to eight hours of sleep daily to function properly. You need it for good mood, good memory, good judgment, enhanced perception, and improved motivation. So while it is okay to study at night, make sure you don't overdo it. Do this by ensuring your study timetable allows you to get between six and eight hours of sleep every night.

2. You do not eat right

If you forego meals from time to time in the name of studying, you are probably studying too much. It is okay to miss a meal every now and then to get some work done at the library or in your college dorm room. However, it is not okay to consistently miss meals in the name of studying.

You need to eat right to function correctly. This is because your body is a machine, and food is the fuel that keeps it going. Thus, you need to refuel it occasionally to continue operating optimally. This means you should never study to the level where you end up postponing or skipping meals regularly.

Create a good study plan with snack and meal breaks, and respect these breaks. Spending ten or twenty minutes preparing or taking a meal won't negatively affect you. It will improve your concentration, your memory, and your mood.

3. You do not have a good social life

You will likely study too much if you do not have a good social life in college. Do not get us wrong; it is okay to focus on your studies in college. However, you can do two things at the same time. You can focus on your studies and still have a good social life in college. You should visit your university's counseling center if it is impossible.

When you get to the center, ask to talk to a counselor about your studies. When you can speak to one, tell them you want a good social life but think it is impossible and still study hard. They will likely convince you it is possible and help you create a study plan to give you free time for social activities.

Once you create such a study plan, you should stick to it. This means you should never do any studying during your free time. Instead, you should try to do social activities with friends. Social activities like gathering for dinner, games, sports, and so on will help to make you a well-rounded college student.

4. You spend many hours on end at the library

Spending two or three hours at the library is undoubtedly okay studying. After all, you are in college to acquire knowledge, and the library is where you get the books and the silent environment you need to study. However, if you spend many hours at the library daily, you will likely study too much.

You certainly do not need to do this. You do not need frequent 7 or 10-hour sessions at the library to get good grades. You need a proper study schedule with plenty of time for yourself. This is because studying for extended periods is not very optimistic.

The reason is that after two hours of studying, your concentration and ability to retain information are significantly reduced. So studying after two hours is virtually pointless. Therefore, create a plan that allows you to spend no more than 2 hours studying in the library.

5. You do not retain information like you used to

This is one of the most significant signs that you are over-studying. If you do not retain information like you used to, your mind is exhausted or tired. It means you are burned out. Continuing to study after you feel like you do not retain information as you used to will not benefit you.

Overstudying usually entails spending too much time reading or doing academic work at the library. Repeating this repeatedly for many hours throughout the day can be exhausting. If you feel exhausted and no longer retaining information, you are over-studying.

You need to take a break to refresh and create a new schedule that will allow you to study hard without burning out again.

6. You drink too much coffee

If you drink too much coffee, you are probably constantly exhausted, which means you do too much work. And if you are doing too much work as a student, you are most likely overstudying.

Coffee provides a significant energy boost, and we all frankly need it from time to time. However, if you feel you need it throughout the day, you are likely overstudying, and you should do something about it (change your study plan) to change the situation.

7. You constantly feel sleepy

If you constantly feel sleepy in class, study groups, and studying, you will most likely study too much. Studying a lot during the day or night will make you feel tired and sleepy. And if it continues for a while, you will get to the level where you are genuinely sleep-deprived and cannot function optimally as a human being.

The solution to constantly feeling sleepy is sleeping more. Adequate sleep and rest will help you recover and go back to functioning optimally. It will also help you to understand things better and to achieve better grades.

8. You feel somewhat depressed

If you feel somewhat depressed and think it is because of overstudying, it probably is. As a student, you must create a schedule that balances studying and social activities. Failure to do this could result in overstudying and you participating in minimal or zero social activities.

Social activities may seem unimportant and a waste of time, but they are not. Activities such as dining out with friends, running around, playing sports, hiking trails with acquaintances, and club-hopping can significantly improve your mood. Therefore, you should do your best to balance studying and social activities to avoid depression due to overstudying.

9. You've got never-ending backache

If you spend most of your days sitting and studying, you will probably develop a never-ending backache. You will also develop general body pain as your muscles get exhausted, supporting you in the same strained position.

The human body is designed to move around. Sitting for long periods in a slouched position will negatively affect your back and cause pain. If you already feel back pain due to sitting for extended hours, you should try to study less and spend more time stretching and exercising.

Stretching and exercising will reduce your back and body pain by stretching and exercising your muscles.

10. You don't have time for personal hygiene

If you frequently postpone taking a shower, doing laundry, getting your haircut, or cleaning your shoes to study, you are most likely overstudying. Moderate and well-planned studying usually leaves you with a lot of time to take care of your personal hygiene and grooming.

So if you feel that you have little time for anything other than studying, you are overstudying and should rework your study plan. Rework it to ensure you have time for your personal hygiene and grooming.

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Effects of studying too much

You now know all the signs of overstudying. So if you suspect you are overstudying, you know whether or not you are. If you are, you should know you are in a bad place. This is because overstudying leads to several negative effects. Researchers have reported the negative impacts of studyholism or study addiction. Let's understand some research findings on the dark side of studying too much.

Below are the main adverse effects of overstudying:

1. Headaches

Overstudying will give you a headache. Studying is a lot of work. It involves reading, highlighting, thinking, analyzing, memorizing, recalling, etc. Now imagine overstudying. It involves doing all these things but several times over. It often causes exhaustion and leads to headaches and migraines. So you should avoid overstudying to avoid headaches and migraines.

2. Back problems

Overstudying usually involves sitting on a chair for many hours. This is not what the human body is made for. The human body is designed for walking and activity. Therefore, you put it in an unnatural position when you sit down for long hours. This often leads to back problems and general body pain for people who sit for long hours studying.

3. Tension and stress

If you don't have a well-made study plan and end up overstudying for days, you will quickly start feeling tension and stress. This is because your mind will be overwhelmed by the work it has to do every day for hours. Your mind needs breaks to function optimally. Studying for many hours without breaks causes it to cause stress, tension, and sometimes depression.

4. Memory loss

One of the worst effects of overstudying is that it can cause memory loss. This may seem hard to believe, but it is true. Overstudying can trigger memory loss by triggering brain inflammation. In other words, studying too much can cause brain problems and make you lose memory.

5. Poor grades

You might be overstudying to get good grades, but things always do not work out that way. Overstudying can make you get poor grades because your productivity decreases when you do it consistently, and your brain's ability to retain and recall information deteriorates. These effects will almost always lead to poor grades in the end.

6. Poor social life

Overstudying will rob you of many opportunities to have college fun and make long-lasting memories. This is because it restricts you to your room throughout the day and night. To avoid having a poor social life in college, you should plan your studies well and ensure you have plenty of time daily for social activities.

7. Sleep deprivation

Most students who over-study do so at night because they often feel that sleeping for many hours wastes time. This is wrong. Sleeping is important. You must sleep at least six hours to continue functioning properly. Failure to do so will result in a low mood, unhappiness, and depression.

Strategies to prevent studying too much

While studying hard is considered a prerequisite for higher grades and a good GPA, you don't necessarily have to do it.

Knowing your learning style lets you plan around your studying preferences and avoid overstudying. For instance, study tips, strategies, and approaches work best for tactile or kinesthetic learners.

The problem is that we live in a world where we compare our efforts with others instead of focusing on our strengths and weaknesses to make things easier and to our advantage.

Below are some strategies you can use if you notice that you are overstudying and bearing no good results.

1. Create a simple study plan

If you are studying too much, you probably do not have a study plan or one that is too complicated with no breaks. If you do not have a study plan or a complicated one, you should get a simple one. The study plan should cover all the courses you are taking, and it should have breaks to help you rest and refresh after every hour or two hours. Such a simple plan will help you study and have free time for social activities.

2. Read your class notes daily

One of the reasons why people feel the need to over-study is that they usually do not read for most of the semester and only start reading a couple of weeks before the end-of-semester exams. If you do the same thing, you should stop. It is much easier to learn and understand concepts by reading them, analyzing them, and discussing them almost daily than trying to learn something by cramming information via overstudying for a couple of days. So avoid overstudying by reading your class notes daily.

3. Create a sleep schedule

You should try to sleep for at least six hours daily. The best way to do this is to create a sleep reminder on your phone. Sleeping for at least six hours is important daily because failure to do it leads to tension, depression, stress, etc. To create a good sleep schedule and put it as a reminder on your phone. Follow the schedule to the letter; ensure you sleep simultaneously every day. If you do this over time, there is no way you will find time to over-study, especially at night.

4. Avoid coffee and similar stimulants

If you are a heavy coffee drinker, your coffee may make you overstudy. Drinking coffee stimulates the brain and provides an energy boost. These things will make you feel strong enough to continue studying even when your body is exhausted. Thus, avoid coffee and similar stimulants and listen to your body when tired. This will help you to avoid overstudying.

5. Seek Assignment Help

Instead of studying too much, you can find assignments and homework help online. One way is by trusting our essay tutors to write for you your custom essays. As a leading paper writing website, you can be assured that we will handle all your classwork and free up your time. You can handle other stuff, go out, make friends, and network, and feel free to have the freedom to enjoy college and university life because we got your back. The good thing is that all our papers are 100% original, well-researched, referenced, and plagiarism-free. Do not stress yourself over assignments, homework, and writing academic papers; our professional writers are always ready to assist.

Final Remarks

The signs of overstudying include not getting enough sleep, not eating correctly, and not having a good social life. Overstudying usually has adverse effects, including headaches, tension, backaches, etc. Luckily, overstudying is a problem that you can overcome through various strategies, including creating a simple study plan.

Study hygiene is very important as you try to get the best grades. Ensure you have the best places to study and do homework because that determines your commitment, concentration, and dedication. 

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