Overall trend of LSAT problems in the past one or two years? Forum

[taylorswiftfan]

I just took PT 67 (October 2012), and scored several points below my average. I've been taking PTs pretty regularly with scores around what I should be scoring. It was really disappointing, but there's no use in complaining when I'm about to take the LSAT in two weeks. I don't know what happened, and really hope this doesn't happen on test day. It really messed with my confidence and nerves in terms of all the work I've put into studying for the Dec. exam.

I'm just wondering- what are the recent trends on the LSAT? What types of questions is the LSAT focusing more on now over the past few exams?

[drawstring]

In my opinion recent logic games tend to require more of a brute force approach than they did in the past, which for me leads to more hypotheticals.

[taylorswiftfan]

In my opinion recent logic games tend to require more of a brute force approach than they did in the past, which for me leads to more hypotheticals.

Thanks for the reply- do you mean games tend to be more back ended and less front-end (less you can derive in the beginning through your beginning diagramming and possible framing)?

[dosto]

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[drawstring]

In my opinion recent logic games tend to require more of a brute force approach than they did in the past, which for me leads to more hypotheticals.

Thanks for the reply- do you mean games tend to be more back ended and less front-end (less you can derive in the beginning through your beginning diagramming and possible framing)?

That's what I mean.

I haven't noticed much of a change in the other sections over the past year or so, though I thought that the LR stimuli for PT70 tended to be longer than usual. In that aspect they resemble the LR from PT 1-30 or so.

[062914123]

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[Jeffort]

In my opinion recent logic games tend to require more of a brute force approach than they did in the past, which for me leads to more hypotheticals.

Thanks for the reply- do you mean games tend to be more back ended and less front-end (less you can derive in the beginning through your beginning diagramming and possible framing)?

I agree with the LG sentiment, and I think how you interpreted it is correct.

RC seems the same for me honestly. LR seems to be getting wordier and a lot more nuanced.

I don't agree with this. Just like most test forms from the past, there is usually at least one game per section that is heavily front end/deduction driven with a pretty narrow set of possibilities you can reduce the game to if you find the key limiting deductions when you do the set-up. You are just overlooking those games/those available deductions and solving the questions through more brute force than up front deductions. Not finding deductions and using them to solve the questions doesn't mean they aren't there to find. Heavily deduction oriented games can also be solved via brute force, its just more time consuming to do them that way and is of course the back-up strategy when you don't find the key limiting deductions up front.

[bp shinners]

I don't agree with this. Just like most test forms from the past, there is usually at least one game per section that is heavily front end/deduction driven with a pretty narrow set of possibilities you can reduce the game to if you find the key limiting deductions when you do the set-up. You are just overlooking those games/those available deductions and solving the questions through more brute force than up front deductions. Not finding deductions and using them to solve the questions doesn't mean they aren't there to find. Heavily deduction oriented games can also be solved via brute force, its just more time consuming to do them that way and is of course the back-up strategy when you don't find the key limiting deductions up front.

I'm with Jeffort. I think a lot of this is the prevalence of some advocating a completely back-end approach, along with the relative "new"-ness of the games - thus, the places people search for answers haven't reached consensus on all the big deductions.

The big changes I've noticed:
RC moving closer to LR
LR having more complex prompts (but still asking the same things)
LG combining elements of normal game types to create something familiar-yet-different