The Strain of ‘Decision Fatigue’
Decisions, decisions!
A member of the Manhattan LSAT Forum community – who, like a good lawyer-to-be, is keeping himself anonymous – sent me an interesting article in the NY Times magazine that has some interesting implications for LSAT study. Take a look at the article and what he had to say about it – I think this is spot on:
The article is about “decision fatigue”: how merely making a large number of decisions (whether deciding LSAT questions or deciding your breakfast cereal) leads you to a point where you are more liable to make bad decisions or take shortcuts to avoid having to invest yourself in more decisions. There were a few things I think are relevant to LSAT study:
#1. This could underlie the fatigue students often feel towards the end of an individual test (it’s not just having to read a lot or analyze a lot of logic—it’s literally the act of making so many decisions)
#2. This could definitely underlie LSAT burnout. Having to make so many decisions in a short period of time has a major taxing effect. One test is about 100 decisions—when combined with the other decisions we make from day-to-day that’s a serious workout
#3. The way to recover from decision fatigue is through glucose, so this would support the idea of eating sugary snacks during the break. And that’s not just because you’re using energy in general—in fact making decisions doesn’t use more brain energy, it just shifts what parts of your brain are active.
I found it especially relevant when it said that decision fatigue leads to an otherwise wise person falling for misleading logic or tricks. And perhaps something to take from it aside from how it supports practices already done (like taking some time off before test day, etc.), would be that no matter how good a person is on the LSAT, merely making so many decisions will burn him out. It also may suggest that doing 6 or 7 section tests is not productive—according to the findings a person doesn’t build up more decision energy—they merely learn how to conserve it better. So doing 6 or 7 sections may in a person’s mind take the pressure off when it comes to 5 sections, but if decision fatigue is a major or deciding factor, it would seem that practicing with 6 or 7 sections would have little benefit.
It definitely also shows why it’s so important to do 5 section practice tests because it’s very possible that most people start to feel the effects of decision fatigue especially strongly after 4 sections—that would be the perfect zone for a person to falter.
Interesting stuff! I do think it’s still worthwhile for some people to try doing a 6 section LSAT just to push their mental stamina – learning to conserve your decision energy can actually be useful. It’s good to know when to think a lot, when to pull the trigger, when to simply guess. These are all characteristics of a good test taker.
Speaking of test taking skills, if you are in NYC on September 15th, stop by our office at 6:30 for a free workshop on maximizing your test taking potential.