Spending too much time on CR questions

Question

Hello guys,

I am currently preparing for the GMAT, I see myself consistently scoring with an accuracy over 90% on CR, spending close to 3 mins on average on each question (talking about hard questions here - 700+ level). When faced with the time constraint vis-a-vis exam conditions, I force myself to select an option in 2 mins tops. This approach reduces my accuracy to less than 60%.

I realize this could be detrimental to my overall score. I welcome any and all suggestions on this front.

Thanks for your help!

Regards
Sourav

ScottTargetTestPrep · Accepted Answer

Right now, don’t worry too much about speed. A major mistake that people make when training for CR is that they do practice questions too fast. To get Critical Reasoning questions correct, you have to see exactly what's going on in the passages and answer choices, and you likely won't learn to do so by spending a few minutes per question. At this stage of your training, you may need to spend even fifteen minutes per question, learning to see what there is to see. Here's a way to look at this process.

If you get a new job in a field in which you are not experienced, you may not be as fast as the other people working with you, but you know you have a job to do. So, what do you do? You do the job correctly, if not as quickly as those around you, and you make sure that you learn all the angles, so that you do the job well. Rushing through the job and doing it incorrectly would not make sense. Then, as you gain more experience, you learn to do the same job more quickly.

OK, so, think of Critical Reasoning questions similarly. Your job is to do what? To get through questions quickly? Not really. Your job is to get correct answers.

So first, you have to learn to get correct answers, generally at least 10 to 15 in a row consistently, and more in a row would be better. Doing so is doing your job, and if it takes you fifteen minutes per question to get correct answers consistently, then so be it. That's what it takes for you to do your job.

Then, only after you have learned to get correct answers consistently, you can work on speeding up. Get it? Working quickly but not doing your job is useless. Better to work slowly and learn to do your job well. You can be sure that with experience you will learn to speed up, and then you will still be doing your job well, i.e., getting correct answers consistently.

Feel free to reach out with further questions.

Good luck!

avigutman · Answer

Look at how you spend those 3 minutes. My guess is that you spend at least half that time on the answer choices. When you try to get it under 2 minutes, you likely spend less time at the argument level, trying to predict possible good answer choices. This will hurt your accuracy.
Instead, try to take your time at the argument level, and speed up your analysis of the answer choices. Generally, the less time you spend with the answer choices the less likely you are to fall for a trap answer. Some answer choices can be eliminated just based on the first few words - in those cases, do not finish reading the answer choice! Just eliminate and move on. 
Most people find that spending extra time on the answer choices does not increase their accuracy.
Good luck!
Avi

Hovkial · Answer

Not a direct solution to the CR issue, but useful nonetheless. 
 
Examine whether you can speed up on other sections so that you can spend more time on CR. The fact that you can correctly answer most of CR could work to your advantage if you can adjust your strategy on other sub-sections. 
 
For just CR solving in 2 minutes, you will just need to practice with that time with certain accuracy targets.

Sourav700 · Answer

Appreciate your suggestion  gmatpd .

Posted from my mobile device

EMPOWERgmatRichC · Answer

Hi Sourav700,

To start, while a typical CR should take about 2 minutes to solve, the harder CR prompts (by their very nature) will often take more time than that. As a general rule, you shouldn't spend more than 2.5 minutes on a CR - but that does NOT mean that you should try to answer every CR in 2 minutes or less. If you are putting this 'restriction' on yourself, then that might help to explain why you're not performing as well on the tougher prompts. That all having been said, your last couple of posts have been about high-level CR (which is a relatively small part of what you'll face on Test Day), so it's possible that your study time might actually be better spent on other areas.

Before I can offer you any additional advice for your studies, it would help if you could provide a bit more information on how you've been studying and your goals:

Studies:
1) How long have you studied?
2) What study materials have you used so far?
3) How have you scored on EACH of your CATs (including the Quant and Verbal Scaled Scores for EACH)?

Goals:
4) What is your goal score?
5) When are you planning to take the GMAT?
6) When are you planning to apply to Business School?
7) What Schools are you planning to apply to?

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

VerbalBot · Answer

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Spending too much time on CR questions

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