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The “10,000-hour Rule” Debunked

Writer's picture: Tommy SangchompuphenTommy Sangchompuphen

I recently wrote about the importance of remaining focused as you’re studying for the bar exam. Staying focused during long stretches of studying allows you to retain more information and perform better.

But according to psychologist and journalist Daniel Goleman in his book, Focus: The Hidden Driver of Excellence, choosing to pay attention to one thing rather than another involves a push-pull process between the bottom-up and top-down minds.


In Focus, Goleman explains that the bottom-up mind—which is responsible for our automatic and routine mental activity—is very fast, driven by our emotions, and impulsive. In contrast, Goleman describes the top-down mind—which is responsible for planning, reflecting on, and learning new skills—is slower and requires voluntary attention and self-control.


I analogize the bottom-up mind as being responsible for rote memorization of the rules and the top-down mind as being responsible for understanding how to apply the rules and applying a systematic problem-solving approach to answering bar questions. You need both minds working properly and equally to maximize your performance in the bar exam.


Those of us who simply rely on using our bottom-up minds are far more likely to lose focus and lose awareness of our immediate environment, just like how I lost focus that day on the golf course when I made an 18 on a Par 3. After I hit my first tee shot in the water, I should have paused and re-evaluated the situation before hitting my next tee shot. Instead, I lost focus—and patience—and continued to hit ball after ball, using the same swing and same strategy, without taking a moment to think whether I needed to approach the tee shot differently given the circumstances.


In Focus, Goleman, like many researchers, debunked the “10,000-hour rule” mythology to reveal the more complex truth beneath the popular rule of thumb. The myth of the “10,000-hour rule” is based on the notion that we can become experts at a particular task simply by performing it repeatedly. In other words, by simply using our bottom-up minds.


But Goleman argued that:


The “10,000-hour rule” — that this level of practice holds the secret to great success in any field — has become sacrosanct gospel, echoed on websites and recited as litany in high-performance workshops. The problem: it’s only half true. If you are a duffer at golf, say, and make the same mistakes every time you try a certain swing or putt, 10,000 hours of practicing that error will not improve your game. You’ll still be a duffer, albeit an older one.


No less an expert than Anders Ericsson, the Florida State University psychologist whose research on expertise spawned the 10,000-hour rule of thumb, told me, “You don’t get benefits from mechanical repetition, but by adjusting your execution over and over to get closer to your goal."


“You have to tweak the system by pushing,” he adds, “allowing for more errors at first as you increase your limits.”


Preparing for the bar exam requires practice—lots of practice. Lots of multiple-choice practice. Lots of essay practice. And lots of performance test practice.


But you want to make sure you don’t fall into the trap of simply mindlessly completely questions without taking the appropriate time to review the explanatory answers or sample responses to understand why you may have answered the question incorrectly or incompletely. You will also want to take the time to carefully review the questions you even answered correctly because you might have answered the question correctly but for the wrong person.


A good rule of thumb is that you will want to spend an equal amount of time reviewing the explanatory answers as the amount of time it took you to answer the questions.


Examinees sometimes ask me, “How many multiple-choice questions do I have to complete.” The answer is the quintessential law school answer: “It depends.” But you should be more concerned about the quality of the completion and review of the questions rather than the quantity of questions you might be breezing through. Completing 10,000 hours of multiple-choice questions—even if that were possible—isn’t the magic answer. Nor is it effective.


As you’re doing practicing questions, remember to use the top-down mind to actively reflect on the bottom-up mind that contributed to you selecting the answer, which will enable you to improve your performance on the bar exam.

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© 2024 by Tommy Sangchompuphen. 

The content on this blog reflects my personal views and experiences and do not represent the views or opinions of any other individual, organization, or institution. It is provided for informational purposes only and is not intended to constitute legal advice or create an attorney-client relationship. Readers should not act or refrain from acting based on any information contained in this blog without seeking appropriate legal or other professional advice on the particular facts and circumstances at issue.

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