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UCAT: Abstract Reasoning

Amand said:
The answer doesn’t specify just says Line of symmetry, This shape has both vertical and horizontal lines of symmetry, no ?
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well it has two, both along diagonals. but if it didnt specify i guess it shouldnt matter. mind sharing the whole q?
 
yeah looks like its multiple lines of symmetry in set A and one in set B. But since there aren't any shapes in set A that don't have a vertical and horizontal line of symmetry, we cant assume the test shape is in set A. That's just my interpretation given the answer. seems odd that they didnt mention that if it is the case tho.
It could just be to do with the size of the shapes too, ive seen that in a few other questions.
 
Can anyone please give me a magic tip to this section. All I hear is to “practice” and that’s how you improve. However I have completed the UCAT resources, the 1250q book and now 536 AR questions on medify, yet my average is only 650.

I try use the SCANS method but even using that, the time pressure is too much to use the acronym properly and find the pattern. My exam is next week so I’m starting to get desperate 😣
 
Foreverhopeful said:
Can anyone please give me a magic tip to this section. All I hear is to “practice” and that’s how you improve. However I have completed the UCAT resources, the 1250q book and now 536 AR questions on medify, yet my average is only 650.

I try use the SCANS method but even using that, the time pressure is too much to use the acronym properly and find the pattern. My exam is next week so I’m starting to get desperate 😣
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Gotta practice more!! Around a few weeks before my exam, I was absolutely flopping on AR (like...getting 50% lol). But I just invested more time into it and landed on a 770. By the way, 650's a good score. You just want to maintain consistency.
 
worldno8 said:
Gotta practice more!! Around a few weeks before my exam, I was absolutely flopping on AR (like...getting 50% lol). But I just invested more time into it and landed on a 770. By the way, 650's a good score. You just want to maintain consistency.
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To follow up on that, my half-arsed attitude towards everything actually paid off in the form of a pretty legitimate technique that I fall back on.
if you can't really see a rule, look for the most general definite pattern you can see. If the line in set A is vertical but horizontal in set B, then use that as a rule and burn through the questions in that stem. Flag all of those, and come back to them if you have time. Having even that basic knowledge can cut it down from A/B/Neither to just A or B/Neither.
 
Is being bad at AR going to impact my medical career severely? I scored around 20th percentile in this section when I was actually fairly above average for all the others. I just don't get the pattern stuff. I know being bad at spatial awareness/AR rules me out of ever being a surgeon but should I reconsider medicine as a whole?

Just not sure what to think of it. I failed this section of the UMAT quite miserably as well.
 
Jason990090 said:
Is being bad at AR going to impact my medical career severely? I scored around 20th percentile in this section when I was actually fairly above average for all the others. I just don't get the pattern stuff. I know being bad at spatial awareness/AR rules me out of ever being a surgeon but should I reconsider medicine as a whole?

Just not sure what to think of it. I failed this section of the UMAT quite miserably as well.
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I really wouldn't place too much weighting on your result of a small component of a 2h aptitude test that is ultimately designed to cull med and dent applicants, of which there are far more capable applicants than places available.

I don't know (but doubt) whether there are studies on the correlation between UCAT section scores and success as a doctor (however that would be measured), but medical school is where you will learn the skills you need to become an intern, and from there you'll learn the skills needed for increasing levels of seniority as a doctor. I'd wager there are a fair few surgeons out there who didn't do that well in UMAT S3 either ;)

This one small result really should mean very little to you in the scheme of things. Don't fret over it! :)
 
Crow said:
I really wouldn't place too much weighting on your result of a small component of a 2h aptitude test that is ultimately designed to cull med and dent applicants, of which there are far more capable applicants than places available.

I don't know (but doubt) whether there are studies on the correlation between UCAT section scores and success as a doctor (however that would be measured), but medical school is where you will learn the skills you need to become an intern, and from there you'll learn the skills needed for increasing levels of seniority as a doctor. I'd wager there are a fair few surgeons out there who didn't do that well in UMAT S3 either ;)

This one small result really should mean very little to you in the scheme of things. Don't fret over it! :)
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Alright thanks mate.
 
cocodreams said:
How would you approach the AR questions? I don't follow SCANS that much cause it is time consuming but I do it more instinctively. Also, what do you mean you memorised the patterns? i.e. arrangement intersections?
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Though I'm not Eliden, one strategy I used last year was to compare the two sets (A and B) to find the commonalities and differences which was then followed by the comparison of boxes within each set.
[MedStudentsOnline.com.au] UCAT: Abstract Reasoning
So in the question above, I'll generally look at both of the sets at the same time to find some sort of a trend. Here, I see a star and an arrow in both sets. Then I'll choose one box from each set and compare them. My goal will be to find the pattern by just using these 2 boxes. So lets choose the top left box of each set and straight away I can see that when the star is shaded the arrow's direction alternates between left and right. If you wanna confirm your findings you can try next 2 boxes and compare them. All in all this strategy worked wonders for me (Well I think so cause my highest score was AR: 800). Hope it helps!
 
MedDream2020 said:
Though I'm not Eliden, one strategy I used last year was to compare the two sets (A and B) to find the commonalities and differences which was then followed by the comparison of boxes within each set.
View attachment 3366
So in the question above, I'll generally look at both of the sets at the same time to find some sort of a trend. Here, I see a star and an arrow in both sets. Then I'll choose one box from each set and compare them. My goal will be to find the pattern by just using these 2 boxes. So lets choose the top left box of each set and straight away I can see that when the star is shaded the arrow's direction alternates between left and right. If you wanna confirm your findings you can try next 2 boxes and compare them. All in all this strategy worked wonders for me (Well I think so cause my highest score was AR: 800). Hope it helps!
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the black arrows are distractions in this case i assume?
 
cocodreams said:
How would you approach the AR questions? I don't follow SCANS that much cause it is time consuming but I do it more instinctively. Also, what do you mean you memorised the patterns? i.e. arrangement intersections?
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I actually did a much longer mnemonic than scans or sponcs or whatever the normal ones are. I think the one I used was CASINOS CARTS, and I have also seen Titans pads (which I didn't like so much). I am struggling remember now what casinos carts stood for because I've pushed UCAT to the furthest edges of my brain and jammed it full of med stuff! and because I have had a couple too many drinks tonight. But it may have been colour, arrangement, size, intersections, number, orientation, shape, conditional, arrows?, right angle (that one could very well be wrong), touching sides, symmetry. Something like that. I don't think it matters what mnemonic you use. But just choose one and become very systematic about your approach. Practice a lot and hopefully it becomes automatic and much faster.

Yes, it's a massive pain to do to begin with. And no I didn't do it in the actual exam. But, I wrote it down and used it in mocks enough times, over and over that it became automatic.

As far as memorised patterns, just that. I familiarised myself with every official AR question on the UCAT website and remembered what the rule was. I didn't get the same questions in the exam of course, but when you learn the type of questions they normally ask, itgets easier
 
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Fili said:
Ngl I stopped caring about the mnemonics midway through my prep and just practiced AR by scanning it quickly and looking for half a pattern which was enough given the time constraints. That seemed to work for me last year since AR was my best section.
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Yeah that is something that I do. They're a bit time consuming and I do it instinctively but I feel bad for not going in with a strategy??
 
cocodreams said:
Yeah that is something that I do. They're a bit time consuming and I do it instinctively but I feel bad for not going in with a strategy??
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Ehhh imo doing it instinctively worked for me. If you're able to push those fears aside and be confident aka put down an answer and don't overthink, you'll probably do well in AR.

That's what I did anyways.
 
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