Are there only 2 reasonable answers choices for any Lsat Question? (PT Review Implications) Forum

[SunDevil14]

When I review my PT's I uses a variation of blind review. I circle all questions that I am not 100% sure of while doing the test. I then score the test, and mark which questions I go incorrect, but I do not circle or provide the correct answer next to that question. A few hours or a day after the test I review the circled and incorrect question. I reinforced my thought process for the question I am not 100% sure, and select a different answer for the incorrect problems.

At the moment, I average in the mid 160's on the first attempt. On the second attempt I get scores in the high 170's. I am not sure whether these results are indicative that outside of timing constraints, and the minor stress/anxiety to come along with it, that I am really improving my accuracy. Another possible outcome is that nearly all of the LSAT questions only have 2 reasonable answer choices.

I am not sure which of the hypothesizes above I am confirming?

My experiences are most applicable to the Logical Reasoning Sections. Without time constraints I can easily get nearly if not all logic games and reading comprehension questions correct. I am strong content reader, though I struggle a little with speed. The games are just games,there is a 0% or 100% degree of certainty with games, right and wrong answers are easily identified with no time constraint.

[Sweetneers]

There is only one correct answer.

The LSAT is written by experts, and taken by several thousand wanna-be lawyers. After taking, LSAT releases the full test to those students. Those students can appeal to LSAC to review any question they feel they got wrong, but think is correct. LSAT will review and provide a written answer to the student. Upon further appeal, LSAC will send the question to a panel of experts. They will decide if the question was worded incorrectly or has more than one correct answer.

There's only one reasonable answer, and there is always four that are empirically incorrect.

[flawedargument]

No--I suspect what your review process shows is that you are great at getting down to 2 answers. In your case, I'd guess those two are usually the correct answer and the most tempting incorrect answer.

It's a mistake to think of answers as reasonable or unreasonable. For each question, there is 1 correct answer and there are 1-2 more tempting answers. The number of questions on any given LSAT that are truly arguable is 0 or close to it. Maybe 1 or 2--if any--and I would just assume the number is 0... Definitely not 10 or more.

The good news: you are close to making the breakthrough that will propel you into the 170s: being able to make the fine distinction between the correct and the most tempting incorrect answer.

The bad news: Most people in the high 160s are probably in the same boat, and most of those people don't make it to an official 170 on the real thing.

Keep practicing, and review those 10-15 questions you were "down to 2" on over and over.

[Blueprint Mithun]

When I review my PT's I uses a variation of blind review. I circle all questions that I am not 100% sure of while doing the test. I then score the test, and mark which questions I go incorrect, but I do not circle or provide the correct answer next to that question. A few hours or a day after the test I review the circled and incorrect question. I reinforced my thought process for the question I am not 100% sure, and select a different answer for the incorrect problems.

At the moment, I average in the mid 160's on the first attempt. On the second attempt I get scores in the high 170's. I am not sure whether these results are indicative that outside of timing constraints, and the minor stress/anxiety to come along with it, that I am really improving my accuracy. Another possible outcome is that nearly all of the LSAT questions only have 2 reasonable answer choices.

I am not sure which of the hypothesizes above I am confirming?

My experiences are most applicable to the Logical Reasoning Sections. Without time constraints I can easily get nearly if not all logic games and reading comprehension questions correct. I am strong content reader, though I struggle a little with speed. The games are just games,there is a 0% or 100% degree of certainty with games, right and wrong answers are easily identified with no time constraint.

Might I propose a third possibility? I've found that it's often the case that one makes a reading error when doing a particular question. Usually this is just reading past a single word like "no" or confusing "only" with "the only." As you likely know, the language on the LSAT is precise, and imprecise reading takes you down the wrong path. Sometimes the makers of the LSAT (imo) prey on such a reading error and craft an answer choice that follows the reading error to its logical, but unfortunately incorrect, end.

To make a long story short, I'm suggesting that, when you see a stimulus you've read before with fresh eyes, you are unlikely to make such a reading error, and you may even find that you'd missed straightforward questions because of such a reading error. I'd encourage you to keep on the lookout for these errors when you do your review. Ask yourself if you might have had a slightly different understanding of the stimulus the first time around.

[SunDevil14]

When I review my PT's I uses a variation of blind review. I circle all questions that I am not 100% sure of while doing the test. I then score the test, and mark which questions I go incorrect, but I do not circle or provide the correct answer next to that question. A few hours or a day after the test I review the circled and incorrect question. I reinforced my thought process for the question I am not 100% sure, and select a different answer for the incorrect problems.

At the moment, I average in the mid 160's on the first attempt. On the second attempt I get scores in the high 170's. I am not sure whether these results are indicative that outside of timing constraints, and the minor stress/anxiety to come along with it, that I am really improving my accuracy. Another possible outcome is that nearly all of the LSAT questions only have 2 reasonable answer choices.

I am not sure which of the hypothesizes above I am confirming?

My experiences are most applicable to the Logical Reasoning Sections. Without time constraints I can easily get nearly if not all logic games and reading comprehension questions correct. I am strong content reader, though I struggle a little with speed. The games are just games,there is a 0% or 100% degree of certainty with games, right and wrong answers are easily identified with no time constraint.

Might I propose a third possibility? I've found that it's often the case that one makes a reading error when doing a particular question. Usually this is just reading past a single word like "no" or confusing "only" with "the only." As you likely know, the language on the LSAT is precise, and imprecise reading takes you down the wrong path. Sometimes the makers of the LSAT (imo) prey on such a reading error and craft an answer choice that follows the reading error to its logical, but unfortunately incorrect, end.

To make a long story short, I'm suggesting that, when you see a stimulus you've read before with fresh eyes, you are unlikely to make such a reading error, and you may even find that you'd missed straightforward questions because of such a reading error. I'd encourage you to keep on the lookout for these errors when you do your review. Ask yourself if you might have had a slightly different understanding of the stimulus the first time around.

I admit that this does occur, though for the most part it never accounts for more than a few questions on the entirety of the test. Usually I make those small errors towards the end of a section in which I am pressed for time.

One trend I recognize is that I am susceptible to pick the incorrect reversal on assumption question when 1. The question stem is very convoluted. 2. When I am pressed for time.

[SunDevil14]

No--I suspect what your review process shows is that you are great at getting down to 2 answers. In your case, I'd guess those two are usually the correct answer and the most tempting incorrect answer.

It's a mistake to think of answers as reasonable or unreasonable. For each question, there is 1 correct answer and there are 1-2 more tempting answers. The number of questions on any given LSAT that are truly arguable is 0 or close to it. Maybe 1 or 2--if any--and I would just assume the number is 0... Definitely not 10 or more.

The good news: you are close to making the breakthrough that will propel you into the 170s: being able to make the fine distinction between the correct and the most tempting incorrect answer.

The bad news: Most people in the high 160s are probably in the same boat, and most of those people don't make it to an official 170 on the real thing.

Keep practicing, and review those 10-15 questions you were "down to 2" on over and over.

Great advice thanks. "Reasonable Answer" is a misnomer. Like you mentioned, what I meant by 2 reasonable answers is equitable to the correct and most tempting incorrect answer. I suppose I have gotten to a point where I can easily eliminate 3 answers, which is relative to my personal aptitude.

[Jeffort]

When I review my PT's I uses a variation of blind review. I circle all questions that I am not 100% sure of while doing the test. I then score the test, and mark which questions I go incorrect, but I do not circle or provide the correct answer next to that question. A few hours or a day after the test I review the circled and incorrect question. I reinforced my thought process for the question I am not 100% sure, and select a different answer for the incorrect problems.

At the moment, I average in the mid 160's on the first attempt. On the second attempt I get scores in the high 170's. I am not sure whether these results are indicative that outside of timing constraints, and the minor stress/anxiety to come along with it, that I am really improving my accuracy. Another possible outcome is that nearly all of the LSAT questions only have 2 reasonable answer choices.

I am not sure which of the hypothesizes above I am confirming?

My experiences are most applicable to the Logical Reasoning Sections. Without time constraints I can easily get nearly if not all logic games and reading comprehension questions correct. I am strong content reader, though I struggle a little with speed. The games are just games,there is a 0% or 100% degree of certainty with games, right and wrong answers are easily identified with no time constraint.

Due to the first part bolded and underlined above, that you select a different answer than the one you selected when you took the PT timed, your 'blind review' results are certainly not reliably indicative of whether or not your true skills and accuracy level are actually improving. By taking the attractive trap answers that suckered you the first time off the table of options when you 're-attempt' the questions, you're radically lowering the difficulty of identifying the correct answer from the remaining four answer choices.

To reliably evaluate skill level/accuracy improvement as well as to more precisely pinpoint the types of issues/concepts/Q types/underlying types of logic/grammar and language use/etc. in LR questions that are still giving you trouble/are parts of your current weaknesses using 'blind review', it's essential that you do it in a way so that you are totally blind about each question when you re-attempt it during review. Aside from not knowing what the correct answer is when you review PT Q's, the most important other part to make it truly BLIND review that will be significantly beneficial (rather than just ego boosting by getting 170's range scores from BR) is to make sure as best as you can that you DO NOT know which incorrect answer choice you originally selected when 'blind reviewing'/re-doing missed PT questions. It's a super important part of the whole point of blind review that makes it effective by making it so that you will still have to consider, be tempted by, have to analyze and decide to keep or discard the trap AC you first somehow got suckered into selecting due to some mistake(s)/weaknesses you stand to benefit from figuring out, which is also part of what BR is meant to help you do to further improve your skills/abilities/true score range.

As said above by other posters, people like you that have the skills to hit scores in the mid-high 160's range on timed PTs already have the skills/skill level to be able to get it down to two contenders (usually one being the correct answer and the other being the most attractive incorrect trap answer) on nearly all LR questions under timed constraints. The huge difference between a mid-high 160's skill level test taker and a true 170+ skill/ability level test taker is having the abilities to quickly be able to differentiate the attractive trap answer from the usually not very attractive sounding/phrased correct answer under timed conditions on the high difficulty level LR questions based on logical reasons derived from your understanding and analysis of the content and logic involved in the stimulus.

When reviewing questions from a PT, it's really not blind review at all if you already know which answer choice you selected for questions you got wrong when you re-attempt the question during 'blind review', since you already know which attractive trap answer is wrong/not to select again (and it's probably the most attractive trap answer for the question for somebody of your current skill level), and then you end up only having 2-3 junk answers and the correct answer left to select from, therefore giving you very close to a 100% chance that you'll pick the CR during review using your current modified form of blind review.

Some of the most important things you can learn from doing blind review properly that are essential for identifying currently existing weaknesses that you need to identify and address in order to actually significantly improve your skill/ability and accuracy level are learned/gained from questions that you get wrong again during blind review by picking the same wrong answer you did under timed conditions and from ones you get wrong again but picked a different wrong answer than before, but not because you purposely avoided the wrong one you picked the first time cuz you knew which wrong one you originally selected.

The really skill/accuracy/score range boosting golden information you can get from blind review is gained from really deeply reviewing/studying/dissecting/analyzing LR questions you got wrong during blind review and when you took the PT timed. You may get a bit of a good eye opening shock if you start blind reviewing without knowing which AC you originally selected for ones you got wrong and end up getting many of those questions wrong again, especially if you pick the same incorrect AC again while under no time constraints. The same learning/skills building value lies in questions you get wrong again but picked a different wrong AC during true blind review, since with those ones it usually means you seriously misunderstood the content of and/or logic of and/or overlooked something of major significance in the stimulus.

In addition, to get the full skills/ability/score level improvement benefits from BR, you should also review/re-do questions you got correct completely blind too (meaning you don't know which AC you originally picked when you re-attempt it during BR). Re-doing all the questions isn't absolutely necessary, but can be helpful. People that do full BR of all questions frequently end up missing some during non timed BR re-attempt that they got correct under timed conditions when they first took the PT timed. If you don't want to be that thorough, you should at least circle the questions that you aren't 100% certain of your answer at the moment you finish the Q while taking the PT timed and BR those ones too even if you got them correct.

People that fully BR entire sections, not just questions they missed and ones they got correct but circled during PT cuz not 100% confident about the AC they selected at the moment usually end up finding that they also missed some questions that they felt 100% confident about at the time they selected an answer while taking the PT timed.

In short, to really get the skills/accuracy and score improving benefits of BR and also for it to give you a reliable indicator of improvement and remaining weaknesses, you really need to do it fully blind and should re-do/review more than just the questions you got wrong, ideally re-doing both LR sections in their entirety or at least circling and re-doing/reviewing blind question #s you're not 100% confident of your answers for at the moment you make your AC final answer selection during the timed PT.

With the main/most attractive trap answer taken off the table as an option when re-doing questions for BR, you're guaranteeing that your BR score will be much higher than your PT score, likely giving you an artificially inflated belief/sense of confidence about your true skill/ability/sore range level.

It's not hard to blind yourself from the answers you selected when you took the PT timed if you marked up the AC letters and have to review with the same copy of the test. Just use a small index card or post-it note to cover the AC letters for each question when you re-attempt them during BR.

The difference between mid-high 160's and 170's range scores, when it come to the LR sections, is largely determined by how well you're able to handle the tip-top high difficulty level questions that frequently have super cryptic, hard to understand/hard to see the logic or relevance behind why the CR is correct and/or that have really well written attractive trap answers good enough to fool even the best most skilled test takers. Those questions, just like most other lower difficulty level questions, usually boil down to just two attractive contenders even for people with low-mid-high 160's true ability level, so being able to get it down to recognizing that there are only two 'reasonably logical/correct' sounding AC's for most LR questions in no way reliably indicates whether your accuracy and skills are actually improving enough to take you from mid 160's into the 170's range.

Think of it this way, to increase your score from mid 160's to 170+, you have to get at least twice as good in terms of cutting down the number of questions you get wrong, and at that score range level, we're talking about getting those points from the highest difficulty/hardest questions in that test. For example, Pt 77 scale: 82 raw out of 101, missed 19 = 165. 91 raw out of 101, missed 10 = 171. So, to go from 165 to 171, you had to cut the number you got wrong almost in half/by almost 50%! The same rough mathematical relationships regarding the large percentage you need to cut your number of missed questions by to increase your score from mid 160's into the 170's, especially into the mid to high 170's (from 50% up to 100%) holds true with the scales from every administered LSAT. And as I mentioned above, at these score range levels, you have to double to triple to quadruple, etc. your accuracy rate in order to get from mid 160's/165 into the hallowed 170's score range, which is why only a very small percentage of test takers (less than 3%) ever achieve 170+ scores on test day but around 10% of test takes achieve mid 160's 164/165 scores. It sounds and looks soo close on paper with 165 being only 5 digits away from 170, making people think they're really close/almost there, but in reality, it's actually a giant very steep hard to climb mountain skill wise from 165ish to 170+, thus really deserving much more thorough and rigorous review/proper blind review done in a way that will humble and challenge you rather than give you a false sense of confidence/overestimation of your true test day timed conditions LSAT skills and abilities.

HTH

[SunDevil14]

When I review my PT's I uses a variation of blind review. I circle all questions that I am not 100% sure of while doing the test. I then score the test, and mark which questions I go incorrect, but I do not circle or provide the correct answer next to that question. A few hours or a day after the test I review the circled and incorrect question. I reinforced my thought process for the question I am not 100% sure, and select a different answer for the incorrect problems.

At the moment, I average in the mid 160's on the first attempt. On the second attempt I get scores in the high 170's. I am not sure whether these results are indicative that outside of timing constraints, and the minor stress/anxiety to come along with it, that I am really improving my accuracy. Another possible outcome is that nearly all of the LSAT questions only have 2 reasonable answer choices.

I am not sure which of the hypothesizes above I am confirming?

My experiences are most applicable to the Logical Reasoning Sections. Without time constraints I can easily get nearly if not all logic games and reading comprehension questions correct. I am strong content reader, though I struggle a little with speed. The games are just games,there is a 0% or 100% degree of certainty with games, right and wrong answers are easily identified with no time constraint.

Due to the first part bolded and underlined above, that you select a different answer than the one you selected when you took the PT timed, your 'blind review' results are certainly not reliably indicative of whether or not your true skills and accuracy level are actually improving. By taking the attractive trap answers that suckered you the first time off the table of options when you 're-attempt' the questions, you're radically lowering the difficulty of identifying the correct answer from the remaining four answer choices.

To reliably evaluate skill level/accuracy improvement as well as to more precisely pinpoint the types of issues/concepts/Q types/underlying types of logic/grammar and language use/etc. in LR questions that are still giving you trouble/are parts of your current weaknesses using 'blind review', it's essential that you do it in a way so that you are totally blind about each question when you re-attempt it during review. Aside from not knowing what the correct answer is when you review PT Q's, the most important other part to make it truly BLIND review that will be significantly beneficial (rather than just ego boosting by getting 170's range scores from BR) is to make sure as best as you can that you DO NOT know which incorrect answer choice you originally selected when 'blind reviewing'/re-doing missed PT questions. It's a super important part of the whole point of blind review that makes it effective by making it so that you will still have to consider, be tempted by, have to analyze and decide to keep or discard the trap AC you first somehow got suckered into selecting due to some mistake(s)/weaknesses you stand to benefit from figuring out, which is also part of what BR is meant to help you do to further improve your skills/abilities/true score range.

As said above by other posters, people like you that have the skills to hit scores in the mid-high 160's range on timed PTs already have the skills/skill level to be able to get it down to two contenders (usually one being the correct answer and the other being the most attractive incorrect trap answer) on nearly all LR questions under timed constraints. The huge difference between a mid-high 160's skill level test taker and a true 170+ skill/ability level test taker is having the abilities to quickly be able to differentiate the attractive trap answer from the usually not very attractive sounding/phrased correct answer under timed conditions on the high difficulty level LR questions based on logical reasons derived from your understanding and analysis of the content and logic involved in the stimulus.

When reviewing questions from a PT, it's really not blind review at all if you already know which answer choice you selected for questions you got wrong when you re-attempt the question during 'blind review', since you already know which attractive trap answer is wrong/not to select again (and it's probably the most attractive trap answer for the question for somebody of your current skill level), and then you end up only having 2-3 junk answers and the correct answer left to select from, therefore giving you very close to a 100% chance that you'll pick the CR during review using your current modified form of blind review.

Some of the most important things you can learn from doing blind review properly that are essential for identifying currently existing weaknesses that you need to identify and address in order to actually significantly improve your skill/ability and accuracy level are learned/gained from questions that you get wrong again during blind review by picking the same wrong answer you did under timed conditions and from ones you get wrong again but picked a different wrong answer than before, but not because you purposely avoided the wrong one you picked the first time cuz you knew which wrong one you originally selected.

The really skill/accuracy/score range boosting golden information you can get from blind review is gained from really deeply reviewing/studying/dissecting/analyzing LR questions you got wrong during blind review and when you took the PT timed. You may get a bit of a good eye opening shock if you start blind reviewing without knowing which AC you originally selected for ones you got wrong and end up getting many of those questions wrong again, especially if you pick the same incorrect AC again while under no time constraints. The same learning/skills building value lies in questions you get wrong again but picked a different wrong AC during true blind review, since with those ones it usually means you seriously misunderstood the content of and/or logic of and/or overlooked something of major significance in the stimulus.

In addition, to get the full skills/ability/score level improvement benefits from BR, you should also review/re-do questions you got correct completely blind too (meaning you don't know which AC you originally picked when you re-attempt it during BR). Re-doing all the questions isn't absolutely necessary, but can be helpful. People that do full BR of all questions frequently end up missing some during non timed BR re-attempt that they got correct under timed conditions when they first took the PT timed. If you don't want to be that thorough, you should at least circle the questions that you aren't 100% certain of your answer at the moment you finish the Q while taking the PT timed and BR those ones too even if you got them correct.

People that fully BR entire sections, not just questions they missed and ones they got correct but circled during PT cuz not 100% confident about the AC they selected at the moment usually end up finding that they also missed some questions that they felt 100% confident about at the time they selected an answer while taking the PT timed.

In short, to really get the skills/accuracy and score improving benefits of BR and also for it to give you a reliable indicator of improvement and remaining weaknesses, you really need to do it fully blind and should re-do/review more than just the questions you got wrong, ideally re-doing both LR sections in their entirety or at least circling and re-doing/reviewing blind question #s you're not 100% confident of your answers for at the moment you make your AC final answer selection during the timed PT.

With the main/most attractive trap answer taken off the table as an option when re-doing questions for BR, you're guaranteeing that your BR score will be much higher than your PT score, likely giving you an artificially inflated belief/sense of confidence about your true skill/ability/sore range level.

It's not hard to blind yourself from the answers you selected when you took the PT timed if you marked up the AC letters and have to review with the same copy of the test. Just use a small index card or post-it note to cover the AC letters for each question when you re-attempt them during BR.

The difference between mid-high 160's and 170's range scores, when it come to the LR sections, is largely determined by how well you're able to handle the tip-top high difficulty level questions that frequently have super cryptic, hard to understand/hard to see the logic or relevance behind why the CR is correct and/or that have really well written attractive trap answers good enough to fool even the best most skilled test takers. Those questions, just like most other lower difficulty level questions, usually boil down to just two attractive contenders even for people with low-mid-high 160's true ability level, so being able to get it down to recognizing that there are only two 'reasonably logical/correct' sounding AC's for most LR questions in no way reliably indicates whether your accuracy and skills are actually improving enough to take you from mid 160's into the 170's range.

Think of it this way, to increase your score from mid 160's to 170+, you have to get at least twice as good in terms of cutting down the number of questions you get wrong, and at that score range level, we're talking about getting those points from the highest difficulty/hardest questions in that test. For example, Pt 77 scale: 82 raw out of 101, missed 19 = 165. 91 raw out of 101, missed 10 = 171. So, to go from 165 to 171, you had to cut the number you got wrong almost in half/by almost 50%! The same rough mathematical relationships regarding the large percentage you need to cut your number of missed questions by to increase your score from mid 160's into the 170's, especially into the mid to high 170's (from 50% up to 100%) holds true with the scales from every administered LSAT. And as I mentioned above, at these score range levels, you have to double to triple to quadruple, etc. your accuracy rate in order to get from mid 160's/165 into the hallowed 170's score range, which is why only a very small percentage of test takers (less than 3%) ever achieve 170+ scores on test day but around 10% of test takes achieve mid 160's 164/165 scores. It sounds and looks soo close on paper with 165 being only 5 digits away from 170, making people think they're really close/almost there, but in reality, it's actually a giant very steep hard to climb mountain skill wise from 165ish to 170+, thus really deserving much more thorough and rigorous review/proper blind review done in a way that will humble and challenge you rather than give you a false sense of confidence/overestimation of your true test day timed conditions LSAT skills and abilities.

HTH

Thanks for the thorough response. A lot of your points are what I was alluding to when describing my review process. I don't think that I chose the best words/explanation in my initial response. My main concern was that I am getting better at narrowing down questions to the correct answer and most tempting wrong answer, rather than a large increase in accuracy. The purpose being that I want to guard against false confidence, and gets some input of what my results and review process were indicative of.

[SunDevil14]

I did a "true blind review" today. Received a blind score in the mid 170's as opposed to high 170's. Makes me feel a little more confident that even without checking which questions I got wrong, I am still getting a good score in the blind review process.