Test Anxiety and the PMP® Exam
Learning how to control your internal self sabotaging “crazy roommate” is crucial for passing the PMP Exam.
We have increasing anxiety overall in our society (anxiety was up even before Covid but this raised the general level of anxiety even higher). The challenge is we already have something that increases anxiety for even the calmest amongst us – taking tests. The anticipatory anxiety with taking the Project Management Professional® (PMP®) exam is off the charts these days. It’s easy to see why this is happening.
It’s well known the PMP® exam is extremely difficult with a high first-time failure rate (anecdotal evidence suggests the current first-time failure rate for the PMP® exam is 80%). Add this on top of the general increase in anxiety and for some, just the idea of taking a test can create panic attack-like symptoms (racing heart, sweaty palms, dry mouth, inability to focus, emotional dysregulation, etc).
At Cheetah, after four days in our immersive accelerated learning program, Cheetah students take and pass the actual PMP® exam the next day to prove they have mastered accelerated learning (the majority of Cheetah classes, every single student passes the PMP® exam, on their first attempt). And most don’t even break a sweat.
What is it that happens differently for Cheetah students?
- Peak Performing Mind – BEFORE a Cheetah student even starts their Cheetah Exam Prep experience, they spend time learning how to get themselves into a peak performing mind with a holistic approach that involves a healthy diet that limits sugar and caffeine and includes plenty of veggies and healthy proteins (mostly what we all know is a healthy diet but seldom do). The students also practice prioritizing exercise and sleep and use binaural beat apps to condition their brain waves to a lower beta state to become familiar with how they experience life differently. People who are regularly anxious usually have higher beta brain wave states plus sugar and caffeine can put people into an even higher beta state which is precisely why these two become so addicting. I thought it was interesting several years ago one competitor was advertising they “let” their students have “Red Bull.” They aren’t in business any longer.
- State Conditioning – test anxiety is a form of state conditioning. Granted who wants to train themselves into a conditioned state of test anxiety but without paying attention to what is going on, many people do just that. We create an environment during their Cheetah Exam Prep immersive experience where Cheetah students retrain themselves into a conditioned state of relaxed focus when they are taking exams. So when they sit down to take the actual PMP exam, they have conditioned themselves to be calm and focused. Anxiety activates the limbic brain and makes it difficult for the executive functioning part of the brain to kick in – the part of the brain needed to logically deduce the correct answers to the difficult PMP exam questions.
- Pattern Interrupts – The brain that fires together wires together. Cheetah students learn to self-correct their own anxiety triggers with pattern interrupts specific to their triggers, rather than reinforcing those anxiety triggers. They learn how to do this in the first hour of the class and by the end of the second day are well practiced in using their uniquely designed pattern interrupt techniques so they quickly return to a place of calm curiosity, more receptive to learning.
Most Cheetah students report back, even years later, they were cured of their test anxiety problem because of their Cheetah Exam Prep experience. Passing the PMP exam while nice, is just the icing on the cake for those high performers who have suffered the effects of test anxiety for years.
Michelle LaBrosse, PMP, PMI-ACP, RYT
Chief Cheetah, www.cheetahlearning.com
“The first thing my boss said when I told him I was interested in getting my PMP certification was that if I was going to do it, he’d heard Cheetah Learning was the best.”