The techniques for dealing with test or performance anxiety can be divided into 5 basic principles :
1. Be healthy : If you are physically and emotionally exhausted, your body and mind are less able to tolerate stress and anxiety. You can improve your resistance to anxiety by getting adequate rest, eating appropriately, and taking care of your physical health. If you find you don't have time to be healthy, consider seeking assistance with time management.
2. Be prepared : Practice... practice... practice... study... study... study. Sounds a bit repetitive, but nothing can help reduce anxiety like confidence. In fact, if you over-prepare a bit, your responses become more automatic, and your performance will be less affected by anxiety. Preparation for an exam may include improving your study and test-taking skills. Be on time and have all the "tools" you may need for an exam (e.g., #2 pencils, calculator, pen). Finally, learn and practice the anxiety management techniques in the following points 3-5.
3. Practice the performance : The time limits of an exam, the tied score of a game, or the audience at your performance-all are stimuli that increase your level of arousal and add to your experience of anxiety. If you practice under similar conditions, you'll become less sensitive to these stimuli. For an exam, work through a practice exam (or two!) under the same time constraints that will exist when you take the exam (don't look at your notes, create as many conditions of the actual exam as possible). For an athletic or artistic performance, practice with distractions or with an audience. For conditions that you cannot actually reproduce, create them in your mind-close your eyes and "see" the audience in the seats, give the play-by-play of the last seconds of a tied game. Imagination is a powerful tool-it can help you be less anxious when reality hits!
4. Regulate your arousal level : In cases of anxiety, the goal is to lower your level of arousal. Some of the most effective ways involve altering your physical responses like breathing and muscle tension.
- Deep breathing : When anxious, we often take shallow breaths. We feel like we aren't getting enough air, and get more anxious. If you focus on breathing deeply and slowly, this cycle is interrupted and the body and mind begin to relax. To learn to breathe deeply, place your hand on your stomach and inhale in a way that makes your abdomen expand. As you exhale, your abdomen should move inward. Practice taking 10-15 slow deep breaths in a row, 2-3 times per day-training your body to breathe deeply and relax. Then, during a stressful situation, focus on taking 2-3 deep breaths, and your body will relax.
- Progressive muscle relaxation : We also tense our muscles when anxious. Consciously relaxing your muscles will help your body and mind relax. Practice muscle relaxation during deep breathing by focusing on a particular muscle group (e.g., shoulders) and alternatively tensing and relaxing the muscle. Then, focus on releasing all of the tension in the muscle, repeating "relax" in your mind. Add muscle relaxation to deep breathing in a stressful situation.
- Reduce distractions : Distractions are additional stimuli that increase arousal. Explore ways to reduce the distractions in your immediate environment, e.g. sit in a back corner of the room, take a sweater so you aren't distracted by being cold, change seats if you are distracted by the person sitting next to you.
- Rituals : Rituals are repetitive behaviors that give us a sense of familiarity, help us focus, and reduce anxiety. The basketball player who bounces the ball three times before shooting a free-throw has a ritual. You may already have some rituals-getting a drink of water just before an exam or using a particular pencil or pen. Just a note of caution-make sure your rituals are not harmful or distracting to yourself or others (tapping your pencil 10 times before each question may annoy your classmates!).
5. Control the fear : The underlying source of test or performance anxiety is the fear of failure. Pay attention to what you are thinking and saying to yourself in anxious situations. This self-talk will likely reflect an expectation or fear of failure. You can begin to control this fear or change the expectation by changing your self-talk.
- Positive self-talk : Purposefully filling your mind with positive statements about yourself and your abilities can offset or crowd-out the negative self-talk. Even if you don't believe the positives, say them anyway-"I'm ready…I can do this…Do it!" Determine the most important positive messages for yourself by writing down your 3-4 most common negative thoughts (e.g., "I can't do this"). Next, write down the opposite for each statement ("I can do this"). Repeat the positives to yourself daily for at least two weeks, and again just before and during the test or performance.
- On-task self-talk : Counter distractions and help yourself focus on the task at hand by telling yourself what to do-talk yourself through the task step-by-step, and tell yourself you're succeeding! Thinking about past mistakes or future consequences is not helpful. Keep your mind focused on the present-one thing at a time!
- Gaining perspective : Sometimes the negative thoughts people have in stressful situations focus on potentially drastic consequences of failure. In most cases, these drastic consequences are much more severe than the reality of the situation-this is called catastrophizing. Focusing on such catastrophic consequences increases anxiety and interferes with performance. It is important to recognize that one mistake does not equal failure and that one bad performance does not mean you're worthless. Take some time to evaluate the most likely consequences of your performance. If you find that you tend to catastrophize, develop some phrases that are more realistic and repeat these phrases to yourself prior to and during the exam or performance. An example might be "This is just one exam."
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