@businessgoose It would largely depend on what you think is actually holding you back on official tests, but what helped me more than anything was practicing speed early on in LR, that way I had more time for harder questions. My first official test I essentially ran out of time on the first section (had to guess on ~3 questions), which had never happened to me during any PT. I started focusing on speed, limiting the time I spent on questions, and revisiting flagged ones at the end of the section rather than letting uncertainty become a time sink.

I also macrodosed creatine on test day lol, and I took like 5 whole minutes of box breathing to calm myself down before starting. Not sure how much those two things helped, but who knows.

My first ever diagnostic was a 168, I studied for ~2 months, got a 176 on at least one PT... and got a 168 on test day. It happens. On the actual test day, I effectively ran out of time on at least one section, which had never happened to me with a PT. The higher stakes I can only imagine made me treat each question as more important than I would on PTs, slowing me down. On the very first section (an LR) I had 3 or 4 questions I had to make "educated" guesses in ~15 to 30 seconds on. Worse yet, these were the hardest questions, including lengthy parallel flaw ones.

Something I would highly recommend is focusing on speed. I started doing this with LR especially, trying to spend basically as little time as possible on the earlier questions. That doesn't mean I "rushed" them, but as soon as I knew I had gotten the answer, I moved on -- no double checking, no second guessing, no checking for traps. Just check it and move on. If you aren't sure of the answer after exhausting a reasonably short period of time (on these early questions), I'd recommend that you pick your best bet, flag it, and move on.

This strategy frees up your time for the harder questions later in the section. The second time I took the LSAT (this August), I had ~75% of time remaining by half way through, but by the end of the section I had maybe 2 to 5 minutes remaining, not nearly 25% leftover, since I had used a lot of that extra time for the hardest questions I encountered. This extra 2 to 5 minutes was intentional rather than accidental. With my early approach, I was fortunate if I had any extra time left on sections, but I had not intentionally designed my pacing to guarantee it. With my second approach, I guaranteed I would have LOTS of extra time by half way, and then I would strategically use up that extra time as needed. I put hard limits on how much time I would spend on any individual question before forcing myself to pick the best, flag it, and move on. At the end of the section I would use those 2 to 5 minutes to review the flagged questions (and I usually would not change those unless something overwhelmingly convinced me to do so).

Also, winning this extra time with speed is something that I found greatly reduced my stress, both on PTs and the actual test day, which overall is a bonus in terms of focus and accuracy.

This early-speed timing strategy applies pretty much exclusively to LR. For RC, you can't do this, since the passages don't necessarily get more difficult as you go. For RC, the passage length and difficulty of comprehension can maybe act as rough guides of how much time you should allot to reading it before forcing yourself to move onto the questions. As for the questions on RC, my best advice would be don't overthink things, flag the ones you're unsure of (but pick the best option, always), and then move on. Best case, you have time left over to review the flagged ones.

If you think about the alternative case, if you don't have time left over to review the flagged ones, then that means wasting extra time on the question would have deprived you of needed time for future questions. So in virtually any situation you should not let a question act as a time sink, since you'll either (A). need the time you'd have wasted, OR (B). if you don't need the time you'd have spent, then you'll get it back at the end of the section and can revisit.

This timing approach is the single biggest thing I changed in terms of my test-day strategy, beyond just studying the logical stuff itself. I got an 8pt improvement second time around.

@Isabella! I spent a lot of time on the live sessions, mainly LR since that's the easiest to improve. RC is definitely still my weaker of the two. I found that even working through problems that felt incredibly intuitive forced me to identify the logical structures better than I otherwise would have. I was going largely off feel before. Being able to definitively identify conclusions, premises, and even graphing out problems just for the sake of practice (even if I wouldn't on an actual PT or test day), are all things that helped me build confidence.

@MichaelWright Thanks!

Hi Michael, I just wanted to say the conversation we had on another thread a while back was very productive. I acutely remember one or two questions on test day that I would have been very confused about had I not looked more into those question types (parallel flaw/ reasoning). I was able to score a 176 this time around.

@nicaves I waited quite a while doing literally no prep hoping to get off some waitlists haha. I only decided to retake the test a few months ago. Maybe 5 or 6 months in between? I was not studying during that time.

I ended up getting a 7sage subscription around June, and grinded it. That being said, personally I'm very much ADHD-brained, and I'm most productive in huge bursts, so my strategy of doing one month of intensive, obsessive studying might not be the best advice for most people.

Also, the first time I took it, it was the January LSAT. I did my applications late because I didn't even decide I wanted to pursue law school until November. I didn't retake it until now because it was already so late in the cycle and I don't think score preview could be used multiple times back then, so it was a risk.

That being said, if I was consistently getting much higher PTs and still had time in the cycle, I almost definitely would have retaken it, especially if score preview was an option. You still have plenty of time this cycle and can always just score preview it, so it really comes down to whether you think you'd realistically see an improvement or are just gambling for better variance. I will say that this time around I had much greater confidence in my answers. Even though I was able to get a 176 PT prior to my 168 in January, I had nowhere near the confidence or speed I had this time around. So yeah, the extra studying definitely helped.

This same thing happened to me the first time around just due to the stress of it all, I took it again and just got an 8 point improvement and a 176 which aligned more closely with my PTs. Don't let this discourage you guys. Second time is much easier. More familiarity, less on the line (since you already have at least one score locked), etc.

176 also. LFG!!!!

@MichaelWright I have taken your advice. I went out, I sought, and I found. Here's a question explanation you uploaded:

https://7sage.com/u/usr_031pYcW6gzTmeSsl25hpeG/question/PT155.S2.Q22

As for the expected reply of "well actually there is not quantifier swap, because it says EVERY snowstorm has relatively more crashes, the quantifier isn't 'relatively'!! it's 'whenever'!!" Okay yeah cool, I concede that. But now explain "Yet in general."

"The phrase 'in general' means usually, for the most part, or considering something as a whole rather than focusing on small details or exceptions. It describes a broad pattern that is true most of the time."

So, "in general" is not an "every" statement. "No pet would" is an every statement. That is a clear as day logical strength gap. Not maybe. Definitely. Indisputably.

From Oxford Learner's Dictionary. "usually; mainly." That is a far cry from "No X would" or "Every X would."

I don't think I'm doing myself a disservice. I think I'm going off what I have been told by 7sage instructors, including you. If that was wrong, I'm happy to accept that. But don't act like "oh yeah I'm totally consistent in my principles." That's evidently not the case.

In PT155.S2.Q22 you wrote that the correct answer's claims must match the logical strength of the stimulus, and you gave the example yourself: two all claims with a some conclusion is wrong. Straight up. Not "weigh it against the flaw." Not "usually." Straight up WRONG.

I didn't pull the standard I applied here out of nowhere. I got it from you (and other instructors), stated as an absolute, with zero special exception for Parallel Flaw. In fact, your own explanation names Parallel Flaw explicitly. I applied it exactly as written and it cost me the question. So if your answer is that the flaw matters more, then say plainly that the PT155 explanation was overstated and needs a correction, because that's what "the flaw matters more" implies. Either the standard is correct and B is invalid based on the gap between "in general" and "no pet would," or it doesn't hold and the explanation students are currently studying (e.g. the PT155 question) from needs serious fixing.

Also, my ability to critique a question as invalid need not coexist with my getting that question wrong, nor does it mean I'm incapable of identifying the correct AC among the five choices. That's a totally separate question. I can dive deeper and dismiss a question as rule-breaking. Those are not mutually exclusive. The real takeaway here is that the absolute, unambiguous, "Straight up" standard I have been taught is wrong, or the LSAC is wrong. It's one of the two, not neither. And if the answer is "it's mostly right but with some caveats" then it was never actually a "Straight up" standard and shouldn't have been written as one.

When have we literally ever been allowed to swap every-->generally on parallel questions? Literally when has that EVER been tolerable? LSAC is just throwing rules out of the window now to manufacture a curve. Hundreds of other parallel question: "This is not parallel because it doesn't talk about every, it is talking about general." This parallel question: "Oh that rule we enforce everywhere else? Lmao yeah we are throwing that out the window to manufacture a curve."

@Allen_the_Alien Quite evidently I am adept at it. You'd think as somebody studying to become a lawyer you would be able to formulate anything resembling an argument, and yet, you have managed to respond to precisely zero of what I said.

You are flatly incorrect. If you do not know, do not speak. FYI, I got this question correct. I got it correct AND managed to realize how it is technically flawed as an MBT. My pointing out of the flaw in the question does not necessitate that I missed the question, because I did not.

And I quote, from a PowerScore instructor:

"...then attempt to see if that is possible. If the opposite of the answer choice is possible, then the answer choice does not qualify as "must be true." I hope this helps clear it up some."

https://forum.powerscore.com/viewtopic.php?t=11804

To make it as simple as I can: you're confusing two different standards. The rule that you may not import outside information dictates what can serve as a premise, which is what you're allowed to use to prove an answer true. That rule does not govern counterexamples; a counterexample asserts no premise. It asserts only that the stimulus leaves something open.

So, no, I am not assuming another law exists. I'm pointing out that the stimulus never assumes one doesn't. It is actually you that is the one adding an unstated premise here, which is that the stimulus exhausts the applicable law(s). Unlike my hypothetical, yours is REQUIRED for your answer. Anyways, yes, I understand what LSAC was going for here, but based on the passage it is simply not technically valid as an MBT. The ability to answer a question given the 5 ACs, versus whether the credited AC technically satisfies what an MBT is supposed to be, are two separate questions.

LSAC's own directions forbids assumptions that are implausible, superfluous, or incompatible with the passage. A hypothetical world containing an additional statute is not any of those.

Before you criticize other people as "not adept" at the LSAT, perhaps it would be wise of you to reflect on what you are so confidently and loudly asserting, which happens to be incorrect.

@Allen_the_Alien That is simply not how MBT works. As I said in my lengthy explanation criticizing this question (it is definitely flawed):

"MUST BE TRUE means true under every reasonable hypothetical consistent with the stimulus. The whole method is to construct scenarios and see whether the answer survives. If I can build a consistent world where the stimulus is fully true and the answer is false, the answer is not entailed. So the burden isn't on me to justify raising state or federal law; the burden is on the question to rule it out. It doesn't."

Although the correct answer can still be found by working around LSAC's horrible question design, that doesn't make the question valid as an MBT. So no it doesn't really "all work perfectly" unless we throw away the "must" out of MBT, which we unfortunately just have to do sometimes.

Yet another LSAT question that is objectively invalid as written. And yes, I got this question correct. "MUST" be true, unless there are other contributions that must also be registered. It only says that certain types must be registered, it does NOT say ONLY THOSE ones have to be registered. Question invalid. Junk. Next. Bye.

EDIT: Shutting down the two replies I know are coming.

1. "But it says THE law, so that's all of it." No. Firstly, to be clear, it says "the law of the city of Weston." A city ordinance doesn't float in a vacuum, ever. But even if it could (which it never does in the real world), state and federal law CAN still exist, consistent with the premises. "The law of the city of Weston regarding contributions to mayoral campaigns is as follows" tells you what Weston's only relevant ordinance says. It does not, and cannot, destroy the possibility of state campaign finance statute or a federal filing requirement that also demands registration with the council. Just because it's WESTON's only, does not mean it is THE only.

2. "NOO!!!! B- B- BUT!!!! BUT You can't bring in outside assumptions that aren't stated." This is plainly false, and it's completely backwards for this question type. MUST BE TRUE means true under every reasonable hypothetical consistent with the stimulus. The whole method is to construct scenarios and see whether the answer survives. If I can build a consistent world where the stimulus is fully true and the answer is false, the answer is not entailed. So the burden isn't on me to justify raising state or federal law; the burden is on the question to rule it out. It doesn't. And a municipal ordinance coexisting with higher law isn't some fringe lunatic hypothetical edge case. It's LITERALLY the default condition of every city in the country. Nothing unreasonable about it.

3. And no, "the other four are worse" does not make the question valid. MUST be true is an absolute standard, not a beauty contest. If (C) isn't entailed, it isn't entailed.

Junk. Next. Bye.

@agp5334814 I'd just like to start by saying that anybody pretending A is required is demonstrably and objectively wrong under the required assumption standard. There is a lot of post hoc mental gymnastics cope of trying to act like LSAC is infallible. They aren't. This is a clear cut example of that. The question should have been struck.

BUT, E is worse than A. And it's pretty clear to see why, because E is actually just a stronger form of A:

No treatment is a form of treatment, and differs from the treatment needed for CE. We know CE has some "actual" treatment because the question says "if not correctly treated from its onset" -- strongly implying the treatment of CE is not "do nothing"

Stronger assumptions are harder to make required than weak assumptions. Since A encompasses E, it must be more fundamental than E. Therefore, E cannot be required if A is not required, and even though the "necessity" of A is still junk, it's the only possibility we have left that makes any sort of sense.

@kyle673 A is not required for the argument. You are correct. There is a lot of cope and mental gymnastics of trying to defend it. It's a strengthener, it is NOT required. The question is invalid as written, but I still think we can arrive at A despite the fact this question should have been slashed from the LSAT. It sadly wasn't slashed, and unfortunately this garbage example of a question has polluted test prep sites like this.

@jxxbaek The question is invalid as written. You are absolutely correct in your urgency reasoning. However, I don't think E is any better, and is in fact worse. A is somewhat closer to "required" than E.

A is weaker/more encompassing than E, and thus, is closer to "required." In fact, E is just a specific form of A, if we take "no special treatment" as a form of treatment, then E is essentially saying "they differ in terms of treatment."

It's really obnoxious seeing tutors and instructors try to defend this question. It's post hoc rationalization retrofitted onto a dogwater question that is easily and objectively shown to be invalid. Can we still answer it despite it being crap? Yes. Does that mean it isn't crap? No.

This question is objectively invalid. I got it right btw, so no, I'm not just mad. It's just flat out invalid according to the required assumption standard, and it's not particularly close. I'm not really debating this, I'm just stating it. It is a fact. As a strengthen AC, it would be fine. The argument is that the conflation of CE with OMS causes CE to be particularly dangerous at high altitudes. So let's try the negation test on A: "The treatment for ordinary mountain sickness differs from the treatment for cerebral edema." becomes "The treatment does not differ." Okay. Does the treatment being the same make it not especially dangerous due to conflation? Resoundingly: NO. It does NOT.

Let's consider a real world example:

Does conflation of arterial hemorrhaging with venous bleeding, both requiring a tourniquet, but varying wildly in rate of blood loss, pose no danger due to that conflation? After all, the treatment is the same.

So when I apply the tourniquet to the one an hour later because I think it can wait, I must also be able to wait an hour for the arterial hemorrhaging from the femoral artery. After all, the treatments are the same.

This example illustrates how hilariously wrong A is as a matter of "required" assumption. It strengthens, of course, but by no means is it required. The treatments can be identical while the worse condition remains especially dangerous due to being conflated with a less urgent condition. And this isn't speculation. I mean, literally dozens if not hundreds of real world conditions fit this pattern. Identical treatment, different timelines, conflation being extremely dangerous due to reasons beyond differing treatment.

The only (disingenuous) defense of the question as somehow being valid relies on a tortured definition of "treatment" that somehow includes the urgency of the treatment as part of the treatment itself. I reject that outright. Nobody uses the word treatment in that way. And even if we use that tortured definition I'm skeptical that it would mean the conflation isn't dangerous. I mean, what is "treatment"??? Even if we include urgency in that "treatment," conflation can still be deadly. Consider someone with a bee allergy and someone who needs an epipen for an unrelated reason. The treatment is not just similar, it is identical: same drug, same dose, same delivery. If those two conditions were conflated, would the treatment being the same mean the conflation isn't dangerous? NO. BECAUSE THE BEE ALLERGY PERSON HAS TO AVOID BEES. Is "avoid bees" treatment in any sense of the word? Uhh yeah no I don't think so. So even granting a tortured definition of treatment that includes urgency, the bee case is STILL an example where A isn't strictly necessary for the argument.

That being said, E is worse than A. And it's pretty clear to see why, because E is actually just a stronger form of A:

No treatment is a form of treatment, and differs from the treatment needed for CE. We know CE has some "actual" treatment because the question says "if not correctly treated from its onset" -- strongly implying the treatment of CE is not "do nothing"

Stronger assumptions are harder to make required than weak assumptions. Since A encompasses E, it must be more fundamental than E. Therefore, E cannot be required if A is not required, and even though the "necessity" of A is still junk, it's the only possibility we have left that makes any sort of sense.

The LSAT thinks they're being clever with "heh stoplights isn't necessarily coinciding with slower commutes." Okay, and a real world inventory of downtown congestion would reveal that downtown congestion is often CAUSED by faster commutes leading to downtown. So they're deploying a double standard of cleverly interpreting stoplights, but then refusing to cleverly interpret congestion.

The question relies on real world knowledge to plausibly debunk C ("heh im so smart, stoplights can make it faster" -- which is NOT a REASONABLE real world assumption btw; that's niche world knowledge), but then completely disregards real world knowledge that would plausibly debunk E.

This question should be retracted. It is junk. This isn't about logic, it's about subjective interpretation and weighing of real world knowledge.

And if you're thinking "well yes maybe congestion is CAUSED by faster commutes, but we KNOW they're slower." Okay, let's run with that: we now favorably interpret E as NOT being the speedup case. Cool. Then we apply that same standard to C, and interpret it as NOT being the speedup case. So that objection rescues C just as readily as it rescues E.

And as a final point, you may try "well that's a causal direction guess!! you're guessing that downtown congestion comes FROM the speedup!" Okay cool, let's forget directions. Merely, downtown congestion is COMPATIBLE with faster average commutes, JUST LIKE stoplights are COMPATIBLE with faster average commutes. And neither C nor E requires any stretch of assumptions more than the other.

Also, reading "new stoplights" as plausibly meaning replacement etc., is wild speculation. Semantic debate over what is meant by "new" should not be a requirement for the problem. A favorable reading of "new" would absolutely resolve the paradox. Merely pointing out than an unfavorable reading of "new" would make it unfavorable is a silly standard.

EDIT:

After spending some more time analyzing this, there is precisely ONE distinction between E and C that rescues E and not C, and it has nothing to do with the explanation provided by 7sage or the tutors that think they're being clever by speculating on how stoplights may affect things or what "new" possibly means in a technical sense. Those explanations are definitively wrong for the objections I stated above. They are confabulated rationales in the absence of a proper one. It boils down to this:

The stimulus averages over "workers in downtown Gastner", so E's downtown congestion necessarily reaches them, while C's suburban roads reach them only on speculation the stimulus never resolves.

That is the ONLY coherent standard to resolve E and C. Any other standard is speculative at best and can be weaponized against both, or used to defend both.

My guess is this question was intended to be harder than it was (extreme level 5), people happened to confabulate a reason why the trap answer is wrong, ironically landing on the correct answer with faulty rationale, thus leading to high correct rate with simultaneously low understanding rates, and a 4 star rating rather than the 5 it deserves.

I think this is a super nasty question that forces you to really understand what constitutes valid LSAT reasoning. It might seem deceptively simple if you don't understand LSAT rules, then its a NIGHTMARE if you mostly understand them, and then its simple again once you really understand. My way of solving this question had nothing to do with diagrams. D seems obviously correct as a matter of argumentation. But I already know what people will object "but wait! aren't we not supposed to affirm their premises!" No, you aren't. But it's not a premise. They GRANT that it's conditional. They are saying "if the data are correct." If they had instead said "the data are correct," then the conclusion would follow, based on LSAT reasoning, given zero new assumptions. It is ONLY the word "if" that made D valid, otherwise you'd be right to reject it for a restatement of a premise / calling into question a premise.

@phi It's a classic case of "the students are able to do what we asked of them!! oh no!!! our poor normal curve!! we need to manufacture a normal curve by any means necessary!!!"

What a lovely and arbitrary normal-curve-manufacturing change that does absolutely nothing to evaluate your abilities 😍 Thank you LSAC 🙏