For Those Who Beast the Logical Reasoning Section on PT's.. Forum

[Dr. Strangelove]

Any tips? I always seem to get around -4 to -10 wrong on this section.
How do you deal with some of the trickier problems?

[dominkay]

I usually get -1 or -0 on LR. Honestly, it's time management. I hit the easy questions aggressively, leaving myself enough time to figure out the ones that are not so easy. Exactly how I attack a tricky question really depends on what kind of question it is. But generally speaking, I go slow, leaning heavily on process of elimination. I've spent as long as five minutes on a single ridiculous LR question (and still finished the section with time to spare).

[rockstar4488]

Be cognizant of the time suck problems that have large blocks of text and ones that require you to read through all the answer choices (like EXCEPT problems). Move on and do the easy/short ones first. They are all worth the same point.

[balzern]

+1


I usually get around a 20, and it is just sketching and making key inferences. Also, not getting worked up if you don't immediately understand the game is a good idea also, relax and focus.

good luck!

[RPK34]

A few questions that would make answering this easier:

1. Is time an issue (do you feel rushed on the last few questions)
2. When you see the correct answer, do you pretty much immediately understand why you were wrong, or do you have to agonize over it, or even not get it?
3. Are you able to narrow it down to the two best answers? Usually there are two that are similar and often look correct at first glance.
4. Is there a specific problem type you are struggling with?

[skinsfan2386]

+1


I usually get around a 20, and it is just sketching and making key inferences. Also, not getting worked up if you don't immediately understand the game is a good idea also, relax and focus.

good luck!

I'm guessing RC isn't your best section.

[nsideirish]

A few questions that would make answering this easier:

1. Is time an issue (do you feel rushed on the last few questions)
2. When you see the correct answer, do you pretty much immediately understand why you were wrong, or do you have to agonize over it, or even not get it?
3. Are you able to narrow it down to the two best answers? Usually there are two that are similar and often look correct at first glance.
4. Is there a specific problem type you are struggling with?

For me..

1. I always finish with around 3 minutes to spare...but always -4 to -7
2. Yes...and I usually put a little check while I'm taking the test to an answer that I thought was possible for when I go back to check. On the last few problems, I always seem to narrow it down to two choices and cannot differentiate between them so I have to take a 50/50 guess on one.
3. See my answer to 2
4. Yes..problems numbered 18-26.

Very frustrating indeed.

[stintez]

I usually get -1 or -0 on LR. Honestly, it's time management. I hit the easy questions aggressively, leaving myself enough time to figure out the ones that are not so easy. Exactly how I attack a tricky question really depends on what kind of question it is. But generally speaking, I go slow, leaning heavily on process of elimination. I've spent as long as five minutes on a single ridiculous LR question (and still finished the section with time to spare).

+1000000 for your tar

[AdamatUCF]

Someone suggested to me one: "With LR sections, do questions 1-15, and then go to the last question and work backwards"

The reasoning being that first 10-15 questions are easier (the first 10 especially), and that the hardest questions usually seem to be 16-22 or so. So if you do 1-15, and then work your way backwards from the end, you pick up the last few questions, which are presumably a bit easier. Difficulty is, of course, subjective, as not everyone will find 22-25/6 easier, but I do, and several people I've suggested this to all found that it gave them much more time to work with.

Burn through 1-15
Do 26, 25, 24, 23 fairly quickly.
Plod through 16-22 in the remaining time, secure in the fact that you won't have problems to work with after you finish the hardest one, and that you don't need to budget time for them.


Working this way, I took the Sep 27, 2009 LSAT and out of all ~50 LR questions, I think I missed about 4.

[Dr. Strangelove]

I often find myself stuck on really long questions for a few minutes- might be better if I do these last, since LR is the one section I just finish in time while I usually have at least 10 minutes to spare for LG/RC.

[Dany]

I often find myself stuck on really long questions for a few minutes- might be better if I do these last, since LR is the one section I just finish in time while I usually have at least 10 minutes to spare for LG/RC.

I would definitely skip those and come back at the end, then.

Some things that have helped me: for questions that take a long time, like parallel reasoning, I pick one part and use it to eliminate answers. For example, if the conclusion in the stimulus says, "Therefore, X WILL happen." you can cross out any answers that have a weaker conclusion, such as "Y COULD happen" or "therefore, there is a possibility that Y will happen." Also on longer problems, abstraction is great. Just thinking about the problem in general terms can get you around any weird terms/phrasing, and if there's ever conditional reasoning, I substitute phrases with A, B, etc. to get the general pattern. Finally, on questions which ask you to identify the assumption, you should already have the answer before you hit the questions, which can save you a TON of time. Generally, when you're reading those, in the conclusion there will be some new piece of information that will make you think "wait... what?" and that piece of info will be half of the right answer. The other half will link it back to some premise or cause.

Oh, and there's one type of problem that you can usually get done in about 20 seconds: If you're reading a stimulus and it says something like "A certain person's opinion is ___________, but they are mistaken." OR "But this is invariably false." OR "However, that is a mistake." then 9 times out of 10, that little sentence saying the first opinion/plan/whatever is the main conclusion, and the question will ask you to identify it. Let me know if it's not clear what type of question I'm talking about, but that's just one of those little tricks that you can pick up on to save time.

Those are just a few of my thoughts on LR, I'm usually -1/-2, and most of it has simply come from doing so many sections. After a while, my speed picked up and I started really seeing the patterns, and that there are rarely any 'new' questions. There's a limited number of question types, and the thought patterns are always the same. Good luck!

[balzern]

+1


I usually get around a 20, and it is just sketching and making key inferences. Also, not getting worked up if you don't immediately understand the game is a good idea also, relax and focus.

good luck!

I'm guessing RC isn't your best section.

Excuse me for not properly spending the appropriate ammount of time answering OP's question that you saw fit. First, if you spend a ton of time going over various games, you will see that even the most difficult games are navigable. For me at least, the hardest part about the difficult games is remaining calm. If I get anxious at all with these games valuable time is wasted. Remain calm and try to use skills (conditional reasoning ect.) from other game types to aid in your diagramming. When it comes down to it, diagramming and inferences in ALL game types makes the biggest difference in terms of time management. Satisfied?

[skinsfan2386]

+1


I usually get around a 20, and it is just sketching and making key inferences. Also, not getting worked up if you don't immediately understand the game is a good idea also, relax and focus.

good luck!

I'm guessing RC isn't your best section.

Excuse me for not properly spending the appropriate ammount of time answering OP's question that you saw fit. First, if you spend a ton of time going over various games, you will see that even the most difficult games are navigable. For me at least, the hardest part about the difficult games is remaining calm. If I get anxious at all with these games valuable time is wasted. Remain calm and try to use skills (conditional reasoning ect.) from other game types to aid in your diagramming. When it comes down to it, diagramming and inferences in ALL game types makes the biggest difference in terms of time management. Satisfied?

Well this confirms my suspicions, you are not good at RC.

Good to hear that you are comfortable with LGs though.

In response to the OP, I also use the strategy of doing the first 15 questions and then skipping to last question. I find that this gives me a good deal of time to really focus on those challenging questions in the middle.

[balzern]

+1


I usually get around a 20, and it is just sketching and making key inferences. Also, not getting worked up if you don't immediately understand the game is a good idea also, relax and focus.

good luck!

I'm guessing RC isn't your best section.

Excuse me for not properly spending the appropriate ammount of time answering OP's question that you saw fit. First, if you spend a ton of time going over various games, you will see that even the most difficult games are navigable. For me at least, the hardest part about the difficult games is remaining calm. If I get anxious at all with these games valuable time is wasted. Remain calm and try to use skills (conditional reasoning ect.) from other game types to aid in your diagramming. When it comes down to it, diagramming and inferences in ALL game types makes the biggest difference in terms of time management. Satisfied?

Well this confirms my suspicions, you are not good at RC.

Good to hear that you are comfortable with LGs though.

In response to the OP, I also use the strategy of doing the first 15 questions and then skipping to last question. I find that this gives me a good deal of time to really focus on those challenging questions in the middle.

1. How would you know if I am good at RC or not?
2. I get 20+ on RC (sorry I don't spend a ton of time proofreading and picking apart user comments).
3. It is pretentious egotistical people like yourself that influences people not to comment on posts or ask questions. Get over yourself.

[NayBoer]

If you're battling against -10 per section, then do triage and skip the hardest ones until the end. The ones with 5 long choices where you need to draw an analogy (and pick the one that parallels the question) always took me the longest.

But if your goal is to get -0, then focus your studying on the question types you're getting wrong. Also, pre-phrasing (as PowerScore calls it) is an awesome way to speed things up.

[jjlaw]

Pre-phrasing should be your best friend. Process of Elimination should be your next best friend. Never hesitate to re-read the stimulus if you're up against a 50/50 -- you'll see subtle nuances that will lead you to the correct answer choice.

[balzern]

Pre-phrasing should be your best friend. Process of Elimination should be your next best friend. Never hesitate to re-read the stimulus if you're up against a 50/50 -- you'll see subtle nuances that will lead you to the correct answer choice.

+1000000000000000000000

Pre-phrasing helped me sooo much to get rid of answer choice quickly.

[Dany]

I'm guessing RC isn't your best section.

Excuse me for not properly spending the appropriate ammount of time answering OP's question that you saw fit. First, if you spend a ton of time going over various games, you will see that even the most difficult games are navigable. For me at least, the hardest part about the difficult games is remaining calm. If I get anxious at all with these games valuable time is wasted. Remain calm and try to use skills (conditional reasoning ect.) from other game types to aid in your diagramming. When it comes down to it, diagramming and inferences in ALL game types makes the biggest difference in terms of time management. Satisfied?

Well this confirms my suspicions, you are not good at RC.

Good to hear that you are comfortable with LGs though.

In response to the OP, I also use the strategy of doing the first 15 questions and then skipping to last question. I find that this gives me a good deal of time to really focus on those challenging questions in the middle.

1. How would you know if I am good at RC or not?
2. I get 20+ on RC (sorry I don't spend a ton of time proofreading and picking apart user comments).
3. It is pretentious egotistical people like yourself that influences people not to comment on posts or ask questions. Get over yourself.

Because you've posted twice with logic games advice when every other person in this thread is talking about logical reasoning. He was simply making the point that you clearly hadn't read the thread title/OP very well, not asking you to tell us how amazing you are at RC, too.

[balzern]

hahah oops guess that is what happens when your multi-tasking with too many things!

Sorry

[Dany]

hahah oops guess that is what happens when your multi-tasking with too many things!

Sorry

No worries! Just wanted to stop the disconnect between you and skinsfan.

[Remnantofisrael]

*edit* I know you've answered some of the questions below, but keep the other ones in mind as well. *edit*

First, I must state I haven't read anyone other responses, just the initial post. Second, I'm assuming you are taking the test on Monday. That said...

At this point, you can't learn anything before Monday. HOWEVER what you can do is tweak a bit. Ask yourself how often you second guess your answers? How often you predict an answer, see that exact answer choice, but then keep reading the answer choices? Really ask yourself where your folly exists.

some other common issues.

Do you tend to read ALL the answer choices and run out of time?
Do you usually have plenty of time but just seem to miss a bunch?
Are you reading the stim or question first?
Are you predicting whenever you can?
Are you using formal logic on the really difficult questions?
What kinds of questions are you sucking at? (para, point at issue, etc.)
Are you finding the first two pages take as long as the next two pages?
Are you bubbling after every page?

There are so many little things that can be tweaked, but we'd need to know exactly how you approach it.

My approach is based on a solid foundation of logic. I read the question, then the stim, then I predict, then I move into the answers, in order A-E. IF I see something that basically matches my prediction exactly I circle it, and move on. If I see something that is close, I put a ? next to it. Something I know is wrong I just cross right out. 8/10 I can find based on my prediction and move on, spending less than 60 seconds on a question. 1/10 I get down to two choices and can compare and contrast to find the right one, say 1:15. 1/10 I get stuck a bit and have to spend a bit more energy breaking it down, often formally.

IF I get truly stuck, I circle and move on. I can always come back.

Once I pick an answer, I let it go. If I'm unsure I'll circle and go back to it later if time is there. But I don't obsess.

The secret is to get to that last couple pages of 4-6 questions with 10 minutes on the clock. It makes it so you won't rush those, and often have time to go back. People who spend 10 minutes on two questions because they are stumpers might get those right, but now they screwed themselves on the test and are likely to miss a lot more than two later down the line.

Really, we need more details on how you go about it.

At this point, I basically don't miss questions. If I do, its because I'm an idiot who skips a word (EXCEPT, NOT) even if it is bold, or something like that. When I see I got a question wrong, and I look at it again, I know why without looking at the explanations. If you aren't there, don't stress out about improving that before Monday. If you are, these little tweaks can save you some pain.

[lifestooquick]

I just want to say thanks for asking this question cause I'm in the exact same boat. The worst part is, when I review, I ABSOLUTELY GET what I did wrong and see how clear the right answer is.

Here's hoping we both overcome this struggle on Monday!

[Remnantofisrael]

Hey life-

I had that problem up until a few weeks ago. I took someones advice and started every section by saying, "Ok, you know this stuff, trust the force", or something similar. It was an issue of doublethink for me. For others, it can be overconfidence.

I BET if you compile all the questions you miss, you'll find something in common with a bunch. A LOT of the ones that are hard to do when you are mentally drained or stressed in the moment deal with negation. Like a principle that is "If you are a good person, you don't eat meat" and the parallell using the same principle is "You punch babies, so you aren't a good person" or something like that. Bad example, but you get the idea.

For some its that they get trapped on "EXCEPT" questions (my biggest weakness).

Figure out if there is something in common (formal logic even?) and then drill that a bit and it can improve you dramatically.

[lifestooquick]

Thanks! Yeah, I have a problem with weaken questions They piss me off. I've been drilling them so hopefully I'll see some improvement

The last PT I took (after some serious LR bootcamp type studying), I didn't get ANY wrong on the first LR section until the last part and missed 5 of the last 6 questions. I don't know if it was getting tired/reading more lazily or that they get harder at the end. But I felt pretty damn good about the earlier part of the section

[blhblahblah]

hahah oops guess that is what happens when your multi-tasking with too many things!

Sorry

A FOR EFFORT