Don't drink Red Bull before an exam

[Psycho Doctor]

I learned that lesson today. After getting virtually no sleep and having two exams today, I could make it through the first one ok with some coffee. But by afternoon and when a couple more cups of coffee was doing nothing for me, I figured the Red Bull was the boost I was looking for. Wrong....it totally messed me up. It made my heart race worse than it already was and actually made me shake. In addition, I had to take a leak like I've never had to before. I seriously thought my bladder was going to burst in the middle of the exam, making it impossible for me to concentrate.

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[Gimlet]

I learned that lesson today. After getting virtually no sleep and having two exams today, I could make it through the first one ok with some coffee. But by afternoon and when a couple more cups of coffee was doing nothing for me, I figured the Red Bull was the boost I was looking for. Wrong....it totally messed me up. It made my heart race worse than it already was and actually made me shake. In addition, I had to take a leak like I've never had to before. I seriously thought my bladder was going to burst in the middle of the exam, making it impossible for me to concentrate.

Oh PD, haven't you learned your lesson yet about being well rested for exams yet? I would think that you of all people would have figured out by now that you're better off getting some sleep than going into an exam dog-ass tired.

 

[Psycho Doctor]

Oh PD, haven't you learned your lesson yet about being well rested for exams yet? I would think that you of all people would have figured out by now that you're better off getting some sleep than going into an exam dog-ass tired.

unfortunately i'm a very slow learner 🙁

 

[DarkFark]

unfortunately i'm a very slow learner 🙁

Results w/Red Bull vary. I took my MCAT, as well as several midterms & finals, guzzling the stuff. Although I've used it alot less since I found out taurine supposedly is not very good for you. Or something like that.

 

[fun8stuff]

I learned that lesson today. After getting virtually no sleep and having two exams today, I could make it through the first one ok with some coffee. But by afternoon and when a couple more cups of coffee was doing nothing for me, I figured the Red Bull was the boost I was looking for. Wrong....it totally messed me up. It made my heart race worse than it already was and actually made me shake. In addition, I had to take a leak like I've never had to before. I seriously thought my bladder was going to burst in the middle of the exam, making it impossible for me to concentrate.

the "impossible to concentrate" is probably a symptom due to lack of sleep and high stress. after coffee quits working, red bull normally gives me a good boost of energy. but like u said, it makes u really have to piss if u drink after coffee has worn off.

 

[medhacker]

Results w/Red Bull vary. I took my MCAT, as well as several midterms & finals, guzzling the stuff. Although I've used it alot less since I found out taurine supposedly is not very good for you. Or something like that.

What's the deal with taurine?

 

[tupac_don]

Oh PD, haven't you learned your lesson yet about being well rested for exams yet? I would think that you of all people would have figured out by now that you're better off getting some sleep than going into an exam dog-ass tired.

I totally disagree with you man. Yea I think its very important to have at least an hour preferrably 3hrs of sleep before an exam. But I can work with that. Some of my best scores came with very little sleep. I find that gives you the extra juice for that minutae stuff and plus you get to have it real fresh in your mind. I am not saying that it will work for everyone b/c people are different, but it works wonders for me.

 

[Pontifex Maximus]

Red Bull does nothing for me but the taste. Good with vodka!

 

[Gimlet]

I totally disagree with you man. Yea I think its very important to have at least an hour preferrably 3hrs of sleep before an exam. But I can work with that. Some of my best scores came with very little sleep. I find that gives you the extra juice for that minutae stuff and plus you get to have it real fresh in your mind. I am not saying that it will work for everyone b/c people are different, but it works wonders for me.

See, I'm totally the opposite. I feel the benefits of getting a good night's sleep way more than the benefits of staying up that extra 6 or 7 hours to study. I've tried it both ways, and I definitely have had better results with sleeping. I'd rather be fresh the next day and be able to use my clear mind to "logic out" answers that I don't know off the top of my head. To each their own, I suppose....obviously PD needs to try something different, though. We're talking about the guy who passed out during an exam in undergrad!

On the other hand, in undergrad I would never study the day of the test. I always figured I had learned everything I was going to know by then. In med school, though, I always make sure to page through my notes at least once or twice the morning of the exam. This has helped me get more than a few precious points by randomly noticing something in my notes and having it be fresh in my mind. So I see your point to some extent.

 

[tupac_don]

See, I'm totally the opposite. I feel the benefits of getting a good night's sleep way more than the benefits of staying up that extra 6 or 7 hours to study. I've tried it both ways, and I definitely have had better results with sleeping. I'd rather be fresh the next day and be able to use my clear mind to "logic out" answers that I don't know off the top of my head. To each their own, I suppose....obviously PD needs to try something different, though. We're talking about the guy who passed out during an exam in undergrad!

On the other hand, in undergrad I would never study the day of the test. I always figured I had learned everything I was going to know by then. In med school, though, I always make sure to page through my notes at least once or twice the morning of the exam. This has helped me get more than a few precious points by randomly noticing something in my notes and having it be fresh in my mind. So I see your point to some extent.

Now mind you I don't advocate staying up all night, that is not good. I find that if I dont' sleep at all, I defiently see that my ability to "reason out" answers drops. However, working till say 1 am and then getting up at 4 or 5. That give me solid 4-5 hours before the exam to go over the notes. But I found that doing that was much better for me. Then say getting a good nights sleep and then having 1-2hrs maybe to review stuff. Now mind you, I studied consistently, throughout, so it's not like I am looking over brand new stuff, its only review. I read somewhere, that by doing that you are inducing the recency effect, which helps in having better recall. I mean most of the time I do this, I just let my eyes more or less run over the page, and see what they catch. But for some reason I noticed that almost always when I do this I find that I save at least a question or two that way. I find that I naturally focus in on the potential exam questions.

p.s. You can page through the notes once or twice the morning of the exam??? That's pretty impressive, I find it tough to go over all the notes just once that way. I mean that would mean going over 300 pages or so, I usually reserve the most difficult material for morning of the exam or most difficult to remember.

 

[DarkFark]

What's the deal with taurine?

Supposedly it's given a couple of people heart attacks, and it's not good for your brain, but to me this is all just hearsay. I have nothing to back it up.

 

[Psycho Doctor]

To each their own, I suppose....obviously PD needs to try something different, though. We're talking about the guy who passed out during an exam in undergrad!

you're not supposed to remember the things I say about my past experiences. 😀

 

[funshine]

Cramming info up until the last minute and at the expense of sleep works only when the test asks for a straight-forward recall of every little detail you've learned. I haven't had that kind of test since high school. Most of my college exams required a lot of problem-solving and conceptual thought so sleep-deprivation + coffee + nerves just helped me fail some exams. On the other hand, you need those tedious details memorized the night/morning before in order to do the relevant problem-solving, so it's a no-win situation.

 

[Gimlet]

p.s. You can page through the notes once or twice the morning of the exam??? That's pretty impressive, I find it tough to go over all the notes just once that way. I mean that would mean going over 300 pages or so, I usually reserve the most difficult material for morning of the exam or most difficult to remember.

Mostly that is just looking at the stuff I have put red stars next to throughout the block, which denote either a major point summed up succinctly, or a piece of minutia that I have a feeling the professor might ask about. So I am going through 300+ pages, but really only looking at about one thing on each page on average. Sorry if I was misleading. Your system of letting your eyes scan the page sounds similar.

 

[funshine]

you're not supposed to remember the things say about my past experiences. 😀

psychodoc, I'm curious: are your exams mainly straightforward questions that just require you to KNOW all the tedious details, or do you have to do a lot of critical thinking as well?

 

[Gimlet]

Cramming info up until the last minute and at the expense of sleep works only when the test asks for a straight-forward recall of every little detail you've learned.

You obviously haven't taken the Block 3 Biochemistry exam at my school. 🙂 That is one exam on which I probably would have benefitted from an all-nighter. Overall, I've been amazed at how little problem-solving skill med school exams require. You just need to be able to regurgitate the facts.

As an example, our last Neuroscience exam was ridiculous. No one studied for the exam because the course is so poorly taught that no one knew what to study. The things they tested on were ridiculously obscure (in fairness, I think neuroscience is intrinsically a rote-memorization class). Nevertheless, I did pretty well on the exam. Answering questions had nothing to do with my understanding of the material, though. I got questions right just because I could recognize words in the answer choices that looked like they belonged with the words in the question stem. One of my buddies summed it up nicely when he said, "That exam could have been given in a different language for all I know."

 

[fun8stuff]

Cramming info up until the last minute and at the expense of sleep works only when the test asks for a straight-forward recall of every little detail you've learned. I haven't had that kind of test since high school. Most of my college exams required a lot of problem-solving and conceptual thought so sleep-deprivation + coffee + nerves just helped me fail some exams. On the other hand, you need those tedious details memorized the night/morning before in order to do the relevant problem-solving, so it's a no-win situation.

You can't really generalize. Some people are able to work well on less sleep than others. Caffeine, to a point, has been shown to improve mental accuity- but after a point (which is variable person to person) mental acuity goes down. It is probably not a good idea to drink more caffeine than you normally do on exam day.. .

I think everyone has their optimal amount of sleep that they need to concentrate and reason for a test. At the beginning of college I needed at least 8hrs. I remember for one exam that I stayed up craming for I got like 6 hrs of sleep before and did poorly. However, at the end of college I was able to get 4-5 hrs of sleep and rock exams. It was just something that I had to adjust to.

I've been doing well in med school by getting 4-5 hrs of sleep the last couple days before exams.

Certainly there is a point at which people will do poorly on an exam due to lack of sleep---but this point is going to be variable from person to person. You can learn to function on less sleep.

 

[Psycho Doctor]

Cramming info up until the last minute and at the expense of sleep works only when the test asks for a straight-forward recall of every little detail you've learned. I haven't had that kind of test since high school. Most of my college exams required a lot of problem-solving and conceptual thought so sleep-deprivation + coffee + nerves just helped me fail some exams. On the other hand, you need those tedious details memorized the night/morning before in order to do the relevant problem-solving, so it's a no-win situation.

i really don't cram at the last minute; i learn as i go along and then recram or something like that....

psychodoc, I'm curious: are your exams mainly straightforward questions that just require you to KNOW all the tedious details, or do you have to do a lot of critical thinking as well?

actually a combination of both...

 

[Psycho Doctor]

One of my buddies summed it up nicely when he said, "That exam could have been given in a different language for all I know."

i often feel that way

 

[CANES2006]

Red Bull does nothing for me but the taste.

YUCK! It tastes awful and makes my heart race. 😛

 

[akpete]

I don't know anything about red bull, but since a nearby Starbucks went 24 hours in November, I now have a second home during exams. For the last couple finals for the fall, I actually did stay there all night. And it's definitely to each there own, because I did very well on that final, even though I had zero sleep.

 

[Code Brown]

YUCK! It tastes awful and makes my heart race. 😛

How else would you make Jager-bombs?

 

[Pontifex Maximus]

Caffeine does nothing for me in general. I must be one of them fast metabolizers

 

[Agent Splat]

You obviously haven't taken the Block 3 Biochemistry exam at my school. 🙂 That is one exam on which I probably would have benefitted from an all-nighter.

No, it wouldn't have made a difference. Trust me, Andy. I prepared like a mother for that exam, only to be foiled by the glutaminase question. That evil, evil glutaminase question.

Personal story...in undergrad biochem I studied later into the night, then got up early to study more, and drank two grande sized Starbucks coffees....they were VERY VERY strong, and I had an empty stomach. It took about five minutes before I could think clearly and actually write something down without my hand shaking. I also literally ran around teh room twice before the exam started.

 

[Dr~Dave]

Hmm, shaking. Im sure your body wanted to burn some energy. Maybe next time take a jog to wake yourself up.

 

[docjolly]

to the OP, RedBull is a fascinating thing! I didn't hear of it until I got to medical school. My best friend here is hooked on that stuff, and she literally can't study without drinking a can of the taurine-containing elixir. The look on her face, and the rampant beating of her heart whenever she drinks it, is enough proof to me that maybe I should stay alway from RedBull One of my friends even mixes RedBull, from time to time, with Vodka

People in my class drink all sorts of things to stay away...RedBull, RockStar, Monster...some even take caffeine pills...

I think I'll stay away from those sorts of things, and try to stay awake on my own..

Just out of curiosity, though, is there any real harm to taking caffeine pills, as opposed to drinking a cup of coffee?

 

[Atheos]

I know it's offtopic, but I was just curious if anyone had a reference to this Quote: "Unless you assume a God, the question of life's purpose is meaningless." --Bertrand Russell. I cannot find the source anywhere.

 

[libbyruth]

Psycho doc, I know it's really none of my business, but will you please tell us what happened in undergrad? 😉

 

[synapse lapse]

I know it's offtopic, but I was just curious if anyone had a reference to this Quote: "Unless you assume a God, the question of life's purpose is meaningless." --Bertrand Russell. I cannot find the source anywhere.

I don't think bertrand russell said that, I was a philosophy major and that doesn't sound like something he would say. So I googled it and the only place he is cited as having said this is christian websites touting a book which is also quotes this, "The purpose driven life." I wonder whether the author cites the quote in the book. It is certainly not something he famously said, so I think a reference is in order. I imagine if Russell really said this it is being taken out of context. For example, Russell is saying not that life is meaningless, or that there is no purpose to life, but that the question of life's purpose is meaningless without positing a God. In other words, unless you assume a God there is no reasno to ask the question about a purpose for the meaning of life, as you would be then begging the question "is there a meaning of life?". So I think it quite obvious that either 1) he never said this or 2)it is taken way out of context. Typical for xtians.

 

[Psycho Doctor]

Psycho doc, I know it's really none of my business, but will you please tell us what happened in undergrad? 😉

??? lots of things happened; what are you talking about?

 

[Atheos]

I don't think bertrand russell said that, I was a philosophy major and that doesn't sound like something he would say. So I googled it and the only place he is cited as having said this is christian websites touting a book which is also quotes this, "The purpose driven life." I wonder whether the author cites the quote in the book. It is certainly not something he famously said, so I think a reference is in order. I imagine if Russell really said this it is being taken out of context. For example, Russell is saying not that life is meaningless, or that there is no purpose to life, but that the question of life's purpose is meaningless without positing a God. In other words, unless you assume a God there is no reasno to ask the question about a purpose for the meaning of life, as you would be then begging the question "is there a meaning of life?". So I think it quite obvious that either 1) he never said this or 2)it is taken way out of context. Typical for xtians.

I am a philosophy major at my undergraduate institution as well, and I don't remember Russell saying anything of that nature. I agree with you; if he did say it, then something was omitted or taken out of context. Russell would have denied an externally given purpose, but perhaps allowed for individual purpose. I think the author (Rick Warren) puts the quote at the beginning of the first chapter, but he doesn't give a citation for it. At least, this is being claimed by various forum dwellers.

Edit: Do you post in IIDB?!