Must Be False questions Forum

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GGforLSAT

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Must Be False questions

Post by GGforLSAT » Fri Aug 17, 2012 3:09 pm

From time to time when answering MBF questions, I forget that it is MBF and instead assume it is MBT. I think this happens because 1) Both MBT and MBF are of the same question type in my head, and 2) I am trying to go through the questions fast which makes me default to answering it like a MBT question since MBT questions are more common. I know the difference between MBT and MBF, but I just end up answering MBF questions as MBT.

Has anyone else encountered this, and if so, how did you or do you plan to overcome it?

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05062014

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Re: Must Be False questions

Post by 05062014 » Fri Aug 17, 2012 3:10 pm

Look at post below
Last edited by 05062014 on Fri Aug 17, 2012 3:51 pm, edited 1 time in total.

GGforLSAT

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Re: Must Be False questions

Post by GGforLSAT » Fri Aug 17, 2012 3:19 pm

That's interesting. I usually write "MBF", "MBT", "Str", etc. next to the stimulus to help me remember, but usually its nothing that stands out too much. What you seem to be doing, at least compared to my approach, is to really exaggerate to question type for MBF questions. I like that. Usually I try to make my annotations more time efficient, but for MBF questions maybe I should focus less on creating a time efficient annotation and more on an annotation that prevents me from confusing the question type. Seems intuitive enough.

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05062014

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Re: Must Be False questions

Post by 05062014 » Fri Aug 17, 2012 3:36 pm

working through a section MBF Q's def. require a total 180 in train of thought. It does not take long to write something to make the question pop out. I usually find that these questions always killed the most time and it took longer because i usually forgot what I was looking for in the heat of the moment. Cannot be true Q's are some of the hardest like RC q's that ask you what was NOT asked in the passage. I hate that shit

Edit: Cannot be true questions are different from Must be True EXCEPT questions. One of them is which COULD BE FALSE (MBT-except); and the other is MUST BE FALSE (Cannot be True).

Both questions kill time and make your head hurt sometimes but they're doable if you know exactly what you're looking for. Good luck

drive4showLSAT4dough

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Re: Must Be False questions

Post by drive4showLSAT4dough » Fri Aug 17, 2012 3:47 pm

abdistotle wrote:I cross out the must be true EXCEPT in the stim. and write in big letters MUST BE FALSE??? usually does the trick for me
This is not correct. For "Must be true EXCEPT" questions, TCR is that which COULD be false. "Cannot be true" and "Must be False" are different questions than "Must be true EXCEPT"

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05062014

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Re: Must Be False questions

Post by 05062014 » Fri Aug 17, 2012 3:49 pm

drive4showLSAT4dough wrote:
abdistotle wrote:I cross out the must be true EXCEPT in the stim. and write in big letters MUST BE FALSE??? usually does the trick for me
This is not correct. For "Must be true EXCEPT" questions, TCR is that which COULD be false. "Cannot be true" and "Must be False" are different questions than "Must be true EXCEPT"
Beat you to it.

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Re: Must Be False questions

Post by drive4showLSAT4dough » Fri Aug 17, 2012 3:52 pm

abdistotle wrote:
drive4showLSAT4dough wrote:
abdistotle wrote:I cross out the must be true EXCEPT in the stim. and write in big letters MUST BE FALSE??? usually does the trick for me
This is not correct. For "Must be true EXCEPT" questions, TCR is that which COULD be false. "Cannot be true" and "Must be False" are different questions than "Must be true EXCEPT"
Beat you to it.
tl;dr, but you did.

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05062014

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Re: Must Be False questions

Post by 05062014 » Fri Aug 17, 2012 4:52 pm

drive4showLSAT4dough wrote:
tl;dr, but you did.
lol. You and the OP have sick names btw

GGforLSAT

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Re: Must Be False questions

Post by GGforLSAT » Fri Aug 17, 2012 5:18 pm

Actually, I realize that this problem is not limited to MBF/MBT questions. I encounter the same issue with any EXCEPT question. I am going to try to emphatically notate when these questions come up. I may decorate it with a few stars as well.

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05062014

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Re: Must Be False questions

Post by 05062014 » Fri Aug 17, 2012 5:34 pm

Yeah I was thinking about strengthen and weaken with except questions. Some of the hardest ones don't have except in the stimulus so I never really had issues in that area. There is a point of diminishing returns if you have to notate too many things and don't just internalize the stimuli and question stems as you come across them. That comes with drilling and experience. For now, yeah, it does seem like a good idea to master all the question types and derivations of each of them. You can focus on speed later.

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Cerebro

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Re: Must Be False questions

Post by Cerebro » Fri Aug 17, 2012 9:53 pm

GGforLSAT wrote:That's interesting. I usually write "MBF", "MBT", "Str", etc. next to the stimulus to help me remember, but usually its nothing that stands out too much. What you seem to be doing, at least compared to my approach, is to really exaggerate to question type for MBF questions. I like that. Usually I try to make my annotations more time efficient, but for MBF questions maybe I should focus less on creating a time efficient annotation and more on an annotation that prevents me from confusing the question type. Seems intuitive enough.

I do something similar, but I write next to each answer choice. LRB suggests separating the ACs into "Contenders" and "Losers". When I first started studying LR, I used to write "C" or "L" next to each answer choice as I was going through it, unless I knew with 100% certainty that the AC was incorrect, in which case I would cross out the letter next to the answer choice. Later, I added a +/- feature to the "C"/"L" system to indicate how strongly I thought the answer was a contender. So for example, C+ would indicate that the answer was a strong contender, wherease C- was a marginal contender which may have an issue, such as scope of quantifier.

However, later, I modified this further so that rather than C/L, I would write (depending on the type of question), W/X, S/X, T/P/F/X (T=True, P=Possible (i.e., could be true), F=False, X=Irrelevant/Out of Scope/Clearly Incorrect).

So, when doing Weaken questions, for example, I write W next to an answer choices that I think Weaken the argument in the stimulus, again using my +/- notation, or an X next to answer choices that do not weaken the argument. For WeakenX questions, this technique helped me to avoid getting confused (for WeakenX, I select the answer marked with an X, whereas for Weaken, I select the answer that is marked with the W (or W+ if there were two that seemed to weaken the argument).

You may think that this sounds complicated/unnecessary, but it has helped me quite a bit, particularly with the EXCEPT questions, where I would sometimes find myself getting confused as I read through the answer choices.

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Re: Must Be False questions

Post by GGforLSAT » Sat Aug 18, 2012 2:46 am

Sure it is complicated, but it seems like a good idea if you can get it down. I simply just mark across an answer that I determine to be wrong, but that mark doesn't indicate WHY I determined the answer choice to be wrong. What often happens is halfway through I'll forget its a MBF question and selecting choices based on what MBT. You approach seems like it would be a way to get around the problem of forgetting whether its a MBF or MBT since, either way, you're dictating for each choice what must be true/false. So, if I forget halfway through whether the question is asking what MBF or MBT, it doesn't matter. So long as I can figure out a way to reference the question type, I should be in good condition. Good tip.

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Re: Must Be False questions

Post by bp shinners » Mon Aug 20, 2012 11:23 am

We run a ton of numbers from our PTs, and something like 1/6 incorrect answers are because the student thought they were answering a different question (i.e. they picked the right answer to a MBT, when it's MBF). So you're not alone.

I always write out the question type by the prompt. If it's an 'EXCEPT' question, I cross that part out and rewrite it as the correct (i.e. easier to read) question type. Then, before picking an answer, I reference it again quickly just to be sure.

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