Tests With "Double Negative Questions".

[Mitchell]

Hopefully this is okay to post in the main forum. It's a general question, even though it relates to my studying for my exam.

Have any forum members taken tests before with "Double Negative Questions".? Questions say.. about a particular topic, in my case.. insurance of course.

Say, if they are talking about an insurance claim, and the circumstances under which it would be approved or denied. They might say something like "Which of these statements is false, as per the circumstances that a claim would be approved". They then might give choices like "The claim would be approved if fraud was discovered" or "The claim would be partially approved, if they found out the insured accidentally misstated his medical expenses".

I guess what I'm trying to say is.. instead of the questions being worded in a straight forward manner, they seem to twist the wording, and use double negatives, to attempt to confuse people". I've gotten tripped up quite a few times. I find out tomorrow when my review course, and test is. I intend to mention this to Jay, my advisor, as well as to the review course instructors on the day the review is held, and ask them if they have any strategy to get around the "Double negative wording of the questions".

Thoughts on this?

 

[DontAskJusTckle]

I've taken several exams that ask these kinds of questions. Not about insurance, but technical engineering. They are fully intended to trip you up, make no mistake. They want to weed out lazy thinkers who don't take the time to fully grasp the question before answering. Their goal is for most people to fail, so that only the best and brightest pass. Most people get an answer wrong not because they lack the necessary information, but because they misunderstood the question.

You should see the certification exams for CCIE, CECP, etc. The key is to take one question at a time. If you get stuck on a ball buster, move on and then come back to it later.

 

[Mitchell]

I see your point.

In this case: When I do take the exam, I wont have a lot of time to think about any particular question. There are 150 questions, and the exam is only 2 1-2 hours long, so they give you an average of 1 minute a question. Luckily, you only have to get a 70% to pass the exam.

 

[Druidici]

Mitch good luck with the exam..I have a favor to ask. Please don't call my house at dinner time to sell me insurance...lol. Seriously..good luck brother. You can do it!

 

[Mitchell]

LOL Thanks, Druidici. I appreciate the good wishes.

 

[Strider]

I'm in the middle of prepping for the GMAT and the entire point of wording questions like that is to trip you up. The wording is often not straightforward at all because its ultimately a test of high level reasoning skills.

The GMAT goes so far as to put trap answers on many of the questions. For instance, you might be given a set of data regarding a store's inventory and the amount sold over a period of five days, with the question being what percentage the orginal stock was depleted by. However, one of the answer choices will be the percentage of the inventory that is left in stock after the sale's over even though that's not what was asked. So one of the answer choices is the right answer to the wrong question.

The upshot is that because of the constraints inherent in standardized tests, the testmakers tend to repeat the same structures. The key is to first, analyze the question and be sure what you're being asked for; and second, train yourself to recognize patterns.

 

[Mitchell]

Thanks for the advice and analysis, Strider. I wish you lots of luck on the GMAT.

My concern is that with only a minute to answer each question, I'm going to panic, and mess up a lot of answers, to things I actually know.

When I talked to my dad earlier today, he seems resigned to the fact that I'm not going to pass the exam the first time. He said no one he's heard of does. He claims he didn't pass the CPA exam the first time, even though I wonder if he just said that to make me feel better, because when I was younger I remember him telling me he did pass the first time.

To boot: I'm missing my second day of work this week, courtesy of my building. On Monday I had to leave because they shut the water off, and today they are grinding and banging, so I cant hear the training video. I look forward to them getting the fuck out of here tonight, because, except for my news show.. I may work through the night. I'm going to be in touch with my instructor by tomorrow at latest, and if the exam is soon, I;m not ready.

 

[Strider]

My advice is don't panic if you can't answer a question, and be willing to guess strategically if you find you're falling behind. Getting a few wrong answers won't hurt your score as much as not finishing the test.

 

[Mitchell]

Thanks.

I have to get a 70% score to pass, and there are 150 questions total. That means I can get 45 questions wrong, and still pass.

 

[Mitchell]

I was discussing this subject with my father at dinner tonight. He said that logically, he didn't see the point of the test providing so many false answers.. or wording the questions in sentences like "Which of these statements about insurance/insurance rules is FALSE.

As I've posted before: I have a day long review for the exam this Thursday, which my mentor feels will be beneficial, and, I believe, the exam on Friday, unless I'm forced to postpone it a week due to the low grades on my practice exams, or they feel I should postpone it a week.

I will know more after Thursday.

 

[rdhd]

Panic is your worst enemy here. I had to take a 2-part exam to be a professional geologist. I passed both the first time...but, I wasn't worried. If I failed, I could take it again. Most that failed the first time, passed the second time....they knew what to expect then. Just chill, you know what you know, give 'em hell. Good luck!

 

[Mitchell]

Thanks., rdhd. I agree with what you said, and my dad told me the same thing you just did.