How to Build Study Habits That Actually Work: What the Research Shows

Most students study the same way: reread the textbook, highlight key lines, maybe rewrite notes. A landmark 2013 review of learning techniques published in Psychological Science in the Public Interest, led by psychologist John Dunlosky, tested ten common study strategies against classroom and laboratory evidence — and found that these popular methods rank among the least effective, while two lesser-used techniques stand out as the most reliable.

The two techniques with the strongest evidence

Dunlosky and colleagues rated only two of the ten techniques as high utility: practice testing and distributed practice. Practice testing means actively recalling information — using flashcards, answering end-of-chapter questions, or taking a practice exam — rather than simply looking at notes again. Distributed practice means spreading study sessions across days or weeks instead of concentrating them into one long session, according to the review.

A 2021 meta-analysis by researchers John Hattie and Gregory Donoghue, which examined 242 studies covering more than 169,000 participants, likewise concluded that distributed practice and practice testing were the most effective of the strategies analyzed, according to a summary of the analysis published by Evidence Based Education.

Why rereading and highlighting fall short

The Dunlosky review rated five strategies — including summarization, highlighting and underlining, and rereading — as low utility. According to a summary of the findings published by Kent State University, the review's lead author found it surprising that techniques students rely on heavily, such as rereading and highlighting, provide so little benefit to learning, and suggested replacing rereading with delayed retrieval practice.

The review's authors also suggested that one reason these low-utility techniques persist is that stronger alternatives are largely absent from the educational psychology textbooks used to train new teachers, so many teachers are never introduced to them during their training, according to the Kent State University summary.

Research-based steps for exam preparation

1. Start early and space sessions out. Instead of one long cramming session, split the same total study time across several days — for example, five hours over five days rather than five hours at once — since distributed practice produces better long-term retention than concentrated study, per the Dunlosky review.
2. Quiz yourself instead of rereading. Use flashcards, practice problems, or blank-page recall ('write everything you remember about this topic') before checking notes, since active retrieval strengthens memory more than passive review, according to the research summarized above.
3. Revisit material after a delay, not immediately. Testing yourself a day or more after first learning something — rather than right away — forces harder retrieval and produces stronger retention, per the same body of research.
4. Protect sleep before and after studying. A meta-analytic review covering multiple studies found that sleep deprivation before learning was associated with a medium-to-large memory impairment (effect size g = 0.621), while sleep deprivation after learning showed a smaller but still significant impairment (g = 0.277), with the effect roughly halved when recovery sleep occurred before testing.
5. Break study time into focused blocks if long sessions cause fatigue. The Pomodoro technique — alternating 25-minute focused work periods with 5-minute breaks — is one such structure, examined alongside other break styles in the 2025 university study described below.
6. Don't assume one break style beats another. A 2025 study of 94 university students comparing the Pomodoro technique, self-regulated breaks, and the 'Flowtime' method found no significant differences between the three in overall productivity or task completion, though Pomodoro users showed a faster rise in fatigue as sessions progressed, according to the study published on PMC.

Comparing study techniques by evidence strength

Managing study time without burning out

Beyond memory techniques, researchers studying break styles have focused on fatigue and motivation rather than raw productivity. In the 2025 comparison study, the Pomodoro and Flowtime groups both showed a steeper decline in motivation as a two-hour study session progressed compared with students who took self-regulated breaks, though average motivation and fatigue levels were otherwise similar across all three groups.