StudyDuo
Knowing how to study a subject you hate starts with knowing why you hate it. If it feels pointless, write down how it connects to your life. If you're lost, catch up first, because boredom and poor results feed each other. If it's dull, bundle it with a small treat, and start with ten minutes instead of a whole evening.
Why the subject you hate keeps getting worse
Putting it off isn't laziness. Fuschia Sirois and Timothy Pychyl describe procrastination as short-term mood repair (Social and Personality Psychology Compass, 2013). It happens most with tasks that feel aversive, and delaying them makes you feel better now while your future self pays.
Boredom then works like a loop. Reinhard Pekrun and colleagues followed 424 college students through a year-long course and measured boredom and test results five times. Boredom lowered later test scores, and lower scores raised later boredom, even after accounting for prior achievement and interest (Journal of Educational Psychology, 2014). Each method below breaks the loop at a different point.
How to study a subject you hate: 7 methods
1. Find out what kind of dislike it is
Advice on how to study a subject you don't like often skips this step, but the fix depends on the cause. Match yours to a method:
| Why you hate it | What it looks like | What to try |
|---|---|---|
| It feels pointless | "When will I ever use this?" | Method 2: write why it matters |
| You're behind | Every class builds on one you missed | Method 3: catch up first |
| It's dull | You read the same page three times | Method 4: bundle it with a treat |
| Starting feels awful | You open the book and close it again | Method 5: a ten-minute start |
| Tests scare you | Your mind goes blank in the exam | Method 6: write the worry down |
| You're alone with it | Nobody around you is studying it | Method 7: study it in company |
2. Write down why it matters to you
Relevance can be built, not just felt. In a randomized field experiment in high school science classes, Chris Hulleman and Judith Harackiewicz had some students write about how the material connected to their own lives. For students who expected to do poorly, interest in science and course grades both rose (Science, 2009).
Do the same after each topic. Write a short paragraph on where it shows up in your life or plans, as specifically as you can:
- Statistics: judging whether a health headline rests on a real study.
- Accounting: knowing whether a small business of your own would make money.
- A language: the one conversation you want to have on your next trip.
Keep the paragraphs in one place and reread them before a session on the subject.
3. Catch up before you expect to like it
If you're lost, interest isn't the first problem. The boredom loop above means that getting better at the subject is one of the most direct ways to find it less boring. Anyone asking how to study a subject you find boring should check this first: is it dull, or just too far ahead of you?
Go back to the last point you clearly understood and work forward from there. Choose practice problems you can mostly solve, so each session ends with wins. In Pekrun's data, better results went with less boredom later, so the dislike should ease as your scores rise.
4. Pair it with something you enjoy
Katherine Milkman, Julia Minson and Kevin Volpp called it temptation bundling. In their study of 226 people at a US university, one group got gripping audiobooks they could only listen to at the gym. A second group was only nudged to keep its audiobooks for the gym, and a control group had neither (Management Science, 2014):
| Condition | First 7 weeks | All 9 weeks |
|---|---|---|
| Control group | ||
| Encouraged to save audiobooks for the gym | ||
| Audiobooks kept at the gym only |
Most participants, 86%, were undergraduates, and the gym-only audiobooks waited in a locker at the gym. The effect faded after the Thanksgiving break, yet afterwards 61% of participants chose to pay for gym-only access to the audiobooks. A later field experiment with 6,792 people found a smaller but lasting lift: audiobooks plus the bundling idea raised weekly workouts by 10 to 12%. For studying, pick a treat that doesn't compete for your attention: a favorite drink only on chemistry nights, or an episode you watch only after the session. Two rules carry over from the gym study. The treat has to be something you really want, and you only get it with the subject you hate.
5. Make the start smaller than the dread
None of these methods for how to study a subject you hate help until you start, and starting is the moment you've been avoiding. If putting it off is mood repair, the fix is a start that feels small. Set a timer for ten minutes and do one thing: one problem, one page, one deck of flashcards. When the timer rings, you may stop, or choose another ten.
Make the first step concrete before you sit down. "Do problem 1 on page 84" can be started; "revise physics" can't.
6. If it's the tests you dread, write the worry down
Some hate is really fear of failing. Gerardo Ramirez and Sian Beilock ran two lab and two classroom experiments in which students spent a few minutes writing about their worries just before an important exam. The writing raised exam scores, most for students who were usually anxious about tests (Science, 2011). Try it before your next quiz: write freely about what worries you, without editing, then start the test. A few minutes is enough, and nobody has to read it.
If worry follows you outside the subject and gets hard to control, talk to a doctor. The NHS describes the core sign of generalized anxiety as stress or worry that affects daily life and is difficult to control.
7. Study it in company, at a fixed time
A subject you hate is easiest to skip when nobody notices. Studying where others are working gives it a start time and a witness; Can't Study Alone? explains the research behind both.
On StudyDuo, Study Hour runs daily at one set time, which the app shows in your local time. It's one hour of focus with no breaks, followed by a check-in asking whether you got it done. Focus Room works at any hour: write "Statistics, problem set 3" as your task and pick 30 minutes. In the app, you can also put the subject in Tasks with a reminder, and "Work on this" shows the task under your name in the room. The study with me page shows how the live rooms work.
One week with a subject you hate
Here's how to study a subject you hate across a single week, combining the methods above:
| Day | Session | Methods |
|---|---|---|
| Monday | 30 minutes: find the last topic you understood | 1, 3 |
| Tuesday | 10-minute start, then one problem set at your level | 3, 5 |
| Wednesday | Study Hour, then a paragraph on why this topic matters | 2, 7 |
| Thursday | Practice problems, with your favorite drink | 3, 4 |
| Friday | A practice quiz, with worry writing first | 6 |
| Weekend | One review session, then the episode you saved | 4 |
Keep the sessions short and the days fixed. On StudyDuo, any day with 30 minutes of study keeps your streak going; how a study streak works explains the rules.
When it's more than one subject
If every subject has become hard to start, not just this one, the cause is probably outside the subject. Burnout, short sleep, low mood or a routine that fell away can all look like hating your coursework. Why Can't I Study Anymore? helps you tell them apart, with the point at which to see a doctor.
The same goes for a dislike that turns into dread. If you lie awake over one class or feel sick before it every week, that's worth raising with a doctor or your school's counseling service, whatever the subject.
FAQ
Does temptation bundling work with studying?
The tested versions paired audiobooks with gym visits, not with studying. A reward that plays during reading competes for your attention, so save it for the break or for right after the session.
Can you learn to like a subject you hate?
Often, yes. In Suzanne Hidi and Ann Renninger's model of interest development, interest moves through four phases, from a triggered spark that a situation creates to a well-developed interest of your own.
What if I hate the teacher, not the subject?
Change the source, not the subject. A different textbook, another university's open lecture videos or a study group from your course can make the same syllabus feel like a new class.
