Physics GRE Discussion Forums

Taking into account the stakes, I think I'm probably not the only one who didn't get any sleep the night before they took the test. So I had been awake for 24 hours before taking the test and I can really tell it tooks its toll after the first hour or so. I eventually managed to answer 71 questions (59 of them right) and landed with 750 (65%).

I was wondering if someone has experience on for example taking the test on Oct without any sleep and then taking it properly on Nov? Did you perform significantly better after good night's sleep?

I only took it once, with little sleep, so my story is very similiar to yours.

I remember reading some studies though, that showed that lack of sleep does not effect memory recall (stress does, however), but it does severely effect mathematical ability.

A lot of calculations on the PGRE are route, memorization based, "plug and chug", however there are usually tricks and a lot require some cleverness.

So, sleep is definitely a major issue, though perhaps not as much as people think. (the stress caused by worrying about lack of sleep may have greater effect than the lack of sleep itself)