2nd Best Answers Given Any Credit?

[ManifestDestiny88]

Hi,
I'm new to Beat the GMAT and have a question about how the test scores questions in which the 2nd best answer was picked. Is a wrong answer just a wrong answer, or does the GMAT take into account that you were able to determine a 'good' answer from the rest, but not the 'best' one available? This is after I've just gone through some reading comprehension questions, and am skeptical about exactly how wrong I am in some of my answers. Since it's such an adaptable test, it seems plausible that maybe the test would account for this in it's complex scoring methods. Has anyone ever heard of anything like this, or am I just rationalizing wrong answers?

Thanks!

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Hi ManifestDestiny88,

For each of the Quant and Verbal questions that you face, there is ONLY 1 correct answer and 4 incorrect answers. While the incorrect answers can be wrong for a variety of reasons (sometimes obvious and sometimes subtle), the Test does not factor that into its scoring algorithm. In basic terms, picking an obvious wrong answer will have the same impact on your score as picking a subtle wrong answer.

GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made,
Rich

[VivianKerr]

While that would certainly be a cool test, if we were credited a little extra for choosing the "second-best," as Rich mentioned, wrong is just wrong.

For RC, we OFTEN see 3 plainly incorrect answer choices, 1 "second-best," and 1 that is the correct option. If you believe the "second-best" choice you selected was correct (even though you got the question wrong), I would spend some time making an Error Log (see attached template), and analyzing the subtle differences between the correct answer and the second-best choice.

There is ALWAYS some marked difference between Correct and Second-Best, otherwise the question would not be "fair." Some questions to ask yourself:

Questions to Ask:

- Does the Wrong Answer Use Unnecessary Extreme Language?

- Is the Wrong Answer Outside the Scope of the Passage?

- Is the Wrong Answer Not Specifically Answering THIS Question?

- Can I Rephrase the Wrong Answer to Make It More Understandably Incorrect?

You can see how I break down an RC passage and analyze the answer choices here: https://gmatrockstar.com/2015/03/13/conq ... -question/

Have some patience as your work on practice questions. You have to slow WAY down to get good at RC, and really get into the nitty-gritty. But once you work untimed on a solid strategy for a good chunk of time, you'll start to get really high accuracy and will naturally speed up.

Feel free to message me if you have additional questions!

Best,
Vivian