本文的核心观点是，通过优化反馈机制可以显著提升学习效率。关键在于确保反馈的准确性、速度和丰富性。准确的反馈能够避免从错误信息中学习，快速的反馈能够及时巩固正确的思维模式，而丰富的反馈则能提供更全面的指导，避免重复犯错。文章还提供了具体的实践方法，例如在练习中及时核对答案、向经验丰富的人寻求反馈，以及在解决问题后回顾关键步骤和思考过程，从而帮助读者更好地应用这些原则，加速技能提升。

✅ **准确反馈**: 学习过程中，确保反馈来源的准确性至关重要。从可靠的评估来源学习，远比从嘈杂的来源学习更有效率。例如，导师提供的反馈如果总是准确的，学习速度会更快。

⏱️ **快速反馈**: 获得反馈的速度越快，对思维模式的修正效果越好。在学习过程中，应尽量缩短反馈周期。例如，做练习题时，每完成一小部分就立即核对答案，而不是等到完成整个练习。

📚 **丰富反馈**: 详细的反馈比简单的评价更有价值。提供反馈时，不仅要指出错误，还要说明正确的做法。例如，解决问题后，回顾关键步骤和思考过程，分析成功和失败的原因。

💡 **实践练习**: 选择一项想要提升的技能，分析当前获取反馈的机制，并思考如何优化反馈的准确性、速度和丰富性。可以考虑增加预算，寻找更优质的反馈来源，或者调整学习方法，以获得更及时的反馈。

Published on February 26, 2025 2:24 PM GMT

(This post is to a significant extent just a rewrite of this excellent comment from niplav. It is one of the highest-leverage insights I know for learning faster.)

Theory

To a large extent we learn by updating on feedback. You might e.g. get positive feedback from having an insight that lets you solve a math problem, which then reinforces the thought patterns that lead you to this insight.

Key insight: Feedback should be accurate, fast, and rich.

Accurate

This one is obvious: The feedback should rarely be bad. Learning from an accurate evaluation source is much faster than learning from a noisy one.

Example: If you research with an advisor who gives you feedback on your ideas as you have them, you learn faster if the feedback is always good than if the advisor sometimes makes mistakes.

Fast

The faster you get the feedback for something you have done, the fresher are the thought patterns you used in your mind, the better you can update.

Example Applications:

If you learn for an exam by calculating through a full practice exam, and then take out the practice exam solution and see what you did wrong, this is inefficient. Much better to stop after every small exercise and check whether you got it right or what mistake you made.If you want to learn making calibrated estimates even in cases where motivated reasoning might apply, you can make an estimate on whether your proposed solution is correct briefly before you look up the solution.If there are people more experienced than you (in a particular subfield), get feedback from them as often as you can manage (e.g. often write quick drafts to share).
Perhaps even try to convince them to watch you work and give you feedback for what kind of mental moves might be better and why.^[1]
E.g. for learning programming, learning to solve math problems, learning to write emails well, ...

Rich

When someone tells you “you screwed up”, this is less useful than when someone tells you “you screwed up, here’s what you should’ve done instead …” (assuming accurate feedback). Supervised learning is faster than reinforcement learning.

Example Applications:

After you solved a problem, review what the key insights were, and if possible also how you found them, and also where you wasted time on unproductive angles. Ask yourself how you could’ve succeeded faster. What were the key properties of the thinking avenues which were or were not useful? (Related.)(Advanced: The more precise you know what thought patterns you use and ought to have used, the faster you can learn. (Related.))

(Recall reminder for reader: You have the option to pause and quickly summarize what you learned from reading this post so far, to better consolidate your understanding.) 

Exercise

Pick a skill you currently want to learn/improve-upon.^[2]Clarify the mechanism of how you currently get feedback to improve that skill.Optimize your feedback. Answer the following questions. You might want to initially relax constraints by e.g. asking "If I had unlimited money for learning this, how could I get more accurate/fast/rich feedback?". (If you feel like you've already maxed out in a dimension, feel free to skip this dimension.)
How could you get more accurate feedback?How could you get faster feedback?How could you get richer feedback?
Clarify your plan for how to learn that skill.^[3](Optional:) Post your notes from this exercise in the comments.(If you can afford the time, please share feedback in the comments about how this exercise worked for you and about what parts you found difficult.)

1. ^{^}

   I recommend telling your tutor to just say thoughts that are relatively close to your current skill level, so you sorta could've thought of that. Your tutor shouldn't just go ahead and present the advanced solution which you didn't have a chance to find.
   Btw, I didn't test whether this kind of tutoring works well, but I'd guess it does, at least if you have a decent tutor.

2. ^{^}

   If you don't have one, change your life so you always have at least one.

3. ^{^}

   Bonus points if you apply the murphyjitsu technique (shorter post) to optimize your plan.

Discuss