Accuracy of Practice CATs

[clarka85]

Hello,

Sorry if this answer is contained in a previous post - didn't want to search through the several hundred topics posted - but does anyone know the general accuracy of the score on the practice CATs to the actual GMAT?

Obviously I understand there's likely to be some variation, but I'm curious how likely the score I just pulled on the practice test is to align with the score I'd get on the actual GMAT.

(As a caveat, I used the official timing for each section of the test, although I did break the test up over two nights because I thought trying to complete it at 1 am on 5 hours of sleep wouldn't reflect my best effort :-)

Thanks,
Adam

[RonPurewal]

Hello,

Sorry if this answer is contained in a previous post - didn't want to search through the several hundred topics posted - but does anyone know the general accuracy of the score on the practice CATs to the actual GMAT?

Obviously I understand there's likely to be some variation, but I'm curious how likely the score I just pulled on the practice test is to align with the score I'd get on the actual GMAT.

(As a caveat, I used the official timing for each section of the test, although I did break the test up over two nights because I thought trying to complete it at 1 am on 5 hours of sleep wouldn't reflect my best effort :-)

Thanks,
Adam

there's usually pretty high fidelity.
there is a little more variation on the extremes of the curve, i.e., scores that are well over 700 or below 400. in mid-range, though, we've found that students' scores on our test match up pretty closely with their scores on the real thing.

when you get closer to the test date, you should take the official GMATPrep tests, which will also yield scores that should correspond pretty closely to your eventual official scores.

--

re: sleep

how many hours of sleep do you usually get when you STUDY for the test?

if you get N hours of sleep on the average day when you study, you should also get N hours of sleep on test day.

there's a well-known principle called "state-dependent learning": if you take a test under conditions similar to those under which you routinely study, you'll generally have better recall.
among other things, this means that, if you normally sleep 5 hours a day, then you should take the test on 5 hours of sleep.
if you are normally somewhat sleep-deprived, then, ironically, a "good night's sleep" can have seriously detrimental effects on your testing performance.