Graham O'Connell reports on the growing popularity of the concept of unlearning - and how letting go of old learning can ensure we are more open, more willing and more able to take on the new.

Research in Denmark and the USA sheds new light on how most adults learn. It is based on the old concept of unlearning. As adults, much of the time we need to unlearn what we have picked up in the past before we can properly take on the new learning. We probably all know this from personal experience, but what this research does is take our understanding of that process to a new level.

"When we learn we lay down neural pathways, and when they become really embedded they are like ruts in a track. It is hard to break out and take a new path."

At the University of Copenhagen, Professor Avril Einn has been working on the psychological principles behind this approach. "It is rather like having to empty a glass before we can fill it again," says Professor Einn. "Except that is not what actually happens in the brain. It is a mere psychological trick. If we believe we are letting go of old learning then somehow we are more open, more willing and more able to take on the new." This is based on ideas in psychosynthesis. "If you write down on a piece of paper something that has been troubling you and then tear up that paper, or burn it, somehow that symbolic act allows us to let it go. We have conducted research with over 2,000 subjects asking them to symbolically let go of past learning. Some have done this using their imagination, just in their own heads. Some have spoken it out loud. And some have written it down and torn it up."

What is most significant is the second phase of the study. What they have found is that almost every person is able to learn more and faster immediately after taking this preparatory action. On average people are able to learn, remember and use 39% more than was the case in a control group. This is a staggering increase. I have looked over the comprehensive research evidence and I have to say it looks both sound and compelling.

Meanwhile in the USA, parallel research has been going on around how this works from a neurological perspective. Dr. Witz at the South Illinois Leadership and Learning Institute and Professor Tolo from the Neural Unification Testing Institute have come to remarkably similar conclusions. When we learn we lay down neural pathways, and when they become really embedded they are like ruts in a track. It is hard to break out and take a new path. Professor Tolo believes that unlearning helps the brain to be less reliant on those existing tracks and be more ready to lay down new ones. Now, here is the amazing thing. Their research suggests that this applies to pretty much any type of learning – from management skills to learning origami. They have conducted NMRI scans that show those new pathways being laid down more readily in people who have recently undertaken unlearning activities. Their sample size is smaller – just over 200 – but they have shown a 38% increase in learning potential using symbolic unlearning techniques.

In a training context, this shows how important it could be to get students to undertake a short unlearning ritual at the start of a course. I'm a great believer in not asking others to do what we are not prepared to do ourselves. So, I'd like to invite you now, as a personal experiment, to write down something you have learnt, perhaps around other learning theories that are now defunct. Then screw up that piece of paper (H&S considerations prevent me suggesting you set light to it) and jump up and down on it. It is important to exaggerate your actions, to speak out that you are letting it go and to kick it over to a bin and discard it. I know this is a big ask but you should write as much as you can as fast as you can and should make the ritual stamping on the paper last for several minutes.

Once you have done this, return here to test out your increased ability to learn.

TEST

You have four minutes to complete this self-managed learning test:

1. Work out what the German word Witz means
2. Translate Tolo from Portuguese
3. Memorise the acronyms for the South Illinois Leadership and Learning Institute and the Neural Unification Testing Institute
4. Puzzle out the relationship between Professor Avril Einn and today's date.

Once you have completed the test you are free to print your results and stamp up and down upon them.