Before revision:  Since it reduces the stiffness of the problem , the resulting approximation technique is called softFEM . The two key advantages of softFEM over the standard Galerkin FEM are to improve the approximation of the eigenvalues in the upper part of the discrete spectrum and to reduce the condition number of the stiffness matrix.
After revision:  Since it reduces the stiffness of the problem . The two key advantages of softFEM over the standard Galerkin FEM are to improve the approximation of the eigenvalues in the upper part of the discrete spectrum and to reduce the condition number of the stiffness matrix.