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Downtime Boosts Long-term Learning

We recently published a column by Jackie Mulligan about why downtime is critical for your conference

"Many people report their most creative moments come to them when they least expect it, when they just begin drifting off to sleep, when they take a shower or simply ride a bus," Mulligan wrote. "New ideas squeeze into our consciousness when our mind takes a break. This is why downtime rocks."

Another reason downtime rocks is because it reinforces newly learned information. In an article to be published in the journal Psychological Science, a publication of the Association for Psychological Science, psychological scientist Michaela Dewar and her colleagues show that memory can be boosted by taking a brief wakeful rest after learning something verbally new and that memory lasts not just immediately but over a longer term.

“Our findings support the view that the formation of new memories is not completed within seconds,” Dewar said. “Our work demonstrates that activities that we are engaged in for the first few minutes after learning new information really affect how well we remember this information after a week.”


During the wakeful resting portion, participants were asked to just rest quietly with their eyes closed in a darkened room for 10 minutes while the experimenter left to “prepare for the next test.” It didn’t matter what happened while their eyes were closed, only that they were not distracted by anything else and not receiving any new information.




We now live in a world where we are bombarded by new information, and it crowds out recently acquired information. The process of consolidating memories takes a little time and the most important things that it needs are peace and quiet.

Remember that the next time you attend or plan a conference. 

(Story materials via the Association for Psychological Science.)

Conversation (2)
  • thom singer July 27, 2012

    We live in a world where organizers for conferences want to cram in as much learning as possible.  But the downtime matters.... and so do the "Hallway Conversations".  People seem to get more from a conference when they talk with others about what the speakers said (I have not done a study, but I have seen it happen).

    We put a lot into the "learning objectives" of our sessions... but we need to highlight the "learning objectives" of the networking breaks.  

  • john nawn August 07, 2012

    there's lots of research supporting the benefits of downtime: greater job satisfaction, improved communication, greater trust and respect for colleagues, increased learning and self-development, better products/services for clients, and a better work/life balance. the list goes on. 

    yet, to thom's point, it's routinely ignored (by practically everyone). 

    like many other professionals, meeting professionals are having to do more with less. that's the new normal. my unscientific survey finds people working longer hours (mostly out of fear) with fewer resources. 

    besides more emphasis on on informal learning opportunities to process and reflect, i'd like to see more emphasis on working 'smarter', time management tips and techniques, better use of technology to manage rote tasks, etc. there needs to be more formal educational sessions like this at industry events. 

    we also need to see a shift away from the tactics nature of meeting planning to the strategic nature of meeting design. it's largely a focus on logistics and the lack of measuring value that's preventing us from being more strategic and limiting the value we provide. 

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