Research Hit: Learn Better with Variety

Variety is the spice of life they say — and it is in learning too according to this research

Shouldn’t we be really focused on learning specific things — to not clutter the mind?

That always sounds like a good idea, known as specificity, but we know in many areas in life, focusing too early is not so good. I write in more detail on this in my section on the Knowledgable Brain in the Handbook of Your Brain in Business.

Handbook of Your Brain in Business: 2. The High-Performing Brain 2.2 Your Knowledgeable Brain

For example, you may think that children who focus early on a specific sport and train, train, and train, then become champions. Not true. Various studies have shown that champions later in life generally train less in a larger variety of sports before focusing on a specific sport (to a dramatic degree it should be noted: 90–95% of Olympic gold medallists!). The same applies to Nobel laureates, and I also reported on business success also previously.

So the rule is generalise first, and then focus.