{"id":6850,"date":"2017-05-09T13:12:55","date_gmt":"2017-05-09T20:12:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/?p=6850"},"modified":"2018-03-29T12:57:46","modified_gmt":"2018-03-29T19:57:46","slug":"interview-dr-barbara-oakley","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/2017\/05\/09\/interview-dr-barbara-oakley\/","title":{"rendered":"Should You Listen to Music While Studying, The Pi Model and Learning How to Learn w\/ Dr. Barbara Oakley"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Should You Listen to Music While Studying, The Pi Model and More w\/ Dr. Barb Oakley\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/uDtA9cWNUYY?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>I recently interviewed Dr. Barbara Oakley, the author of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Mindshift-Obstacles-Learning-Discover-Potential\/\">Mindshift<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Mind-Numbers-Science-Flunked-Algebra\/\">A Mind for Numbers<\/a> and co-instructor for <a href=\"https:\/\/www.coursera.org\/learn\/learning-how-to-learn\">Learning How to Learn<\/a>, the most popular online course of all time. We talked about a number of interesting topics on how to learn effectively, pulled from the research for her new book.<\/p>\n<p>Here are some interesting bits:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><strong>Scott<\/strong>: So I wanted to start with a small issues that I think is quite an interesting one and the research on should you listen to music while you\u2019re studying?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Dr. Oakley<\/strong>:\u00c2\u00a0That\u2019s an interesting question and it\u2019s kinda funny because when I speak in public that\u2019s always one of the biggest questions I have and I think it\u2019s because we often hear that you shouldn\u2019t listen to music but the interesting thing is that if you go an look at the research on whether or not you should listen to music you can find research that supports pretty much any position you\u2019d like to have supported!<\/p>\n<p>So if you don\u2019t like music you\u2019ll find research that says no, don\u2019t listen to music and you\u2019ll find other research that says that it\u2019s quite alright!<\/p>\n<p>The only things that research says for sure is that you shouldn\u2019t listen to super loud music when you\u2019re trying to study and if the music has lyrics and you\u2019re trying to do anything verbal (reading) you may not want to listen to music because the lyrics will interfere with learning.<\/p>\n<p>&#8230;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Scott<\/strong>:\u00c2\u00a0 After all the research, through your course Learning How To Learn (where you worked with millions of students) so what do you think is the most useful piece of advice that is the most infrequently applied when it comes to learning?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Dr. Oakley<\/strong>: It\u2019s unquestionably the idea of <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Chunking_(psychology)\">chunking<\/a>. Chunking is a way of gaining procedural fluency in whatever topic you\u2019re trying to become an expert in. To explain that, let\u2019s take something simple like backing up a car. So when you first back up a car it\u2019s so hard, do you look behind you? Do you look in the side mirror? Do you look in the front mirror? It\u2019s very difficult and you might be thinking, I will never be able to back up a car.<\/p>\n<p>But within a few days or a week or two, you begin to learn to back up the car. In fact, after a little bit, you can do it while you\u2019re talking to your friends or listening to the radio. It\u2019s super easy. So backing up a car has become one united neural chunk in your mind so all you have to do is call that into your working memory. Because it\u2019s one thing, it doesn\u2019t block out other parts of your working memory so you can actually do other things at the same time.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>For those interested in the full interview, they can watch the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=uDtA9cWNUYY\">video above<\/a> or read the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/Interview-with-Barbara-Oakley-and-Scott-Young.pdf\">transcript as a PDF here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I recently interviewed Dr. Barbara Oakley, the author of Mindshift, A Mind for Numbers and co-instructor for Learning How to Learn, the most popular online course of all time. We talked about a number of interesting topics on how to learn effectively, pulled from the research for her new book. Here are some interesting bits: [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[3,682],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-6850","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-personal-development","7":"category-nc-learning","8":"entry"},"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Should You Listen to Music While Studying, The Pi Model and Learning How to Learn w\/ Dr. Barbara Oakley - Scott H Young<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/2017\/05\/09\/interview-dr-barbara-oakley\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Should You Listen to Music While Studying, The Pi Model and Learning How to Learn w\/ Dr. Barbara Oakley - Scott H Young\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I recently interviewed Dr. Barbara Oakley, the author of Mindshift, A Mind for Numbers and co-instructor for Learning How to Learn, the most popular online course of all time. 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