Understanding Psychology (10th Ed)

Expect the unexpected.
You’ll never be able to escape from 
unexpected interruptions and surprises that require your atten-
tion. But by trying to anticipate them in advance and thinking 
about how you’ll react to them, you’ll be positioning yourself to 
react more eff ectively when they do occur.
Read Your Textbook Eff ectively
Reading a textbook is diff erent from reading for pleasure. With textbooks, you 
have specifi c goals: understanding, learning, and ultimately recalling the infor-
mation. There are several steps you can take to achieve these goals:
•
Read the front matter.
If you’ll be using a text extensively throughout 
the term, start by reading the preface and/or introduction and scanning 
the table of contents—what publishers call the 
 front matter
. It is there 
that the author has a chance to explain, often more personally than else-
where in the text, what he or she considers important. Knowing this will 
give you a sense of what to expect as you read. (Note: You’re reading part 
of the front matter at this very moment!)
•
Identify your personal objectives.
Before you begin an assignment, 
think about what your specifi c objectives are. Will you be reading a text-
book on which you’ll be thoroughly tested? Or, will your reading provide 
background information for future learning that won’t itself be tested? Is 
the material going to be useful to you personally? Your objectives for 
reading will help you determine which reading strategy to adopt and 
how much time you can devote to the reading assignment. You aren’t 
expected to read everything with the same degree of intensity. You may 
feel comfortable skimming some material. You’ll want to put in the maxi-
mum eff ort into other material.
•
Identify and use the advance organizers.
The next step in reading a 
textbook is to become familiar with the 
 advance organizers 
—outlines, 
overviews, section objectives, or other clues to the meaning and organi-
zation of new material—provided in the material you are reading. Look at 
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the start of every chapter in this book, which includes a chapter outline 
plus a set of questions at the end of the “Looking Ahead” section. You 
can also create your own advance organizers by skimming material to be 
read and sketching out the general outline of the material you’ll be read-
ing. These steps can help you recall material better after you’ve read it.
•