Higher hit rate in more difficult questions?

[tallaznstick]

Dear MGMAT instructors,

My 2 most recent MGMAT CATs displayed concerning trend in critical reasoning (CR) where I have a better hit rate in 700-800 level questions than in 600-700 level questions. The rates are 63% and 29% respectively. A similar trend is also developing in the sentence correction (SC) section, but not as pronounced as in the CR section. Interestingly, those two sections also happen to be my weakest sections on the test.

As background information, I have taken my first official GMAT on 4/1/2010 and scored 670 (Q49 V31 AWA5.5). I found the verbal portion of the test to be distinctively harder than GMAT Prep, OG, and MGMAT verbal questions. As a result, I started using past LSAT exams to practice logical reasoning and reading comprehension questions. However, this approach seems to be what's leading the inverted hit rate trend in CR.

Could one of the instructors share some insights in terms of how to interpret this trend and how to address it in terms of studying methods and practice materials? Thank you in advance!

[StaceyKoprince]

Often, this happens when someone spends extra time on the harder questions, trying to get them right, but then has to "save" that time from somewhere else... so you go faster on questions you think are easier, but then you also make more mistakes.

This is really bad because getting a lower-level question wrong hurts you much more than getting a higher-level question wrong. I'd rather see you get those 700+ questions all wrong, but get all or most of the 600-700 questions right.

Go check several things:
- your timing for these various questions
- why you missed the ones you missed; did you overlook something? did you misread something? or do you really not know / understand why the right answer is right and why your answer is wrong?

Also, personally, I find LSAT CR to be different enough that I don't like to use one to study for the other. (I teach both.) There are definitely some similarities among CR for both tests, but there are also some differences that can lead you to get things wrong if, for example, you're trying to use a GMAT mindset on an LSAT question (or vice versa).