Exam anxiety can boost grades

Sitting in exams may often turn out to be nerve-wracking. But being anxious beforehand can boost your grades, a new study has found.

Sitting in exams may often turn out to be nerve-wracking. But being anxious beforehand can boost your grades, a new study has found.

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Researchers have found that being anxious only has a negative impact on results if a child's memory is poor.

However, if a young person has a good memory, his tendency to feel anxious is linked with getting better marks, the BBC News reported.

The research assessed 96 children aged 12 to 14 in memory and anxiety tests. A questionnaire established how anxious the children usually felt, and the results were measured against their ability to perform computerised tests involving "complex" or working-memory skills.

"For those with high working-memory capacity, an increase in anxiety was linearly associated with higher test scores," researchers said.