Best way to review logical reasoning? pls help

legallybrunette5

Hi everyone,

So, I've been studying for the past month and a half or so and I can't seem to get logical reasoning down. I always, and I mean always, get only 50% of the questions right. The best I have ever done is a -10. I always go back and review what I got wrong, why I got it wrong, and watch every video explanation to the questions I got wrong. Usually it's due to reading errors, rushing, or just overthinking the answer choices. The last time I got 12/26 correct and had a complete mental breakdown. Took a break for one day and did a section just now and got -13.

Anyone have any advice out there if you just can't seem to have any sort of breakthrough on logical reasoning? I feel so demotivated, sad, and almost like giving up. I've read half of Ellen Cassidy's Loophole book and it did help at the start but it feels like nothing sunk in. I'm taking the November test and I'm absolutely panicking.

virgocass

This is what worked for me, but everyone is different! I studied for ~2 years and started doing the below only a few months ago and it helped an insane amount.

The best studying technique for LR I used was doing untimed sections with a word document up and for every question do this:

1. Type of question

Conclusion:

Premise:

Prephrase/Thoughts:

Answer Choice Picked:

Reasoning/Why the other answers are wrong: (go through a-e and say why they're wrong and why the one you think is right is correc)

Don't do a blind review then go through Jy's explanations for each of the ones you got wrong and figure out WHY your reasoning for the answer choice you picked was wrong.

The whole thing is really time consuming but it helps a lot to figure out why you got things wrong and fix the reasoning behind it.

Cant Get Right

Identify the problems and workshop solutions. It seems like you've identified the problem already:

@legallybrunette5 said: Usually it's due to reading errors, rushing, or just overthinking the answer choices.

Solutions? I'd recommend: Stop rushing (which will also eliminate a majority of reading errors) and stop overthinking answer choices.

That will not fix everything, but you should improve. From there, identify different problems and workshop new solutions. From there repeat until at target score. As you advance, the problems become more subtle and increasingly difficult to identify. The solutions also become far more challenging to implement successfully and consistently. But the basic process is always the same. If you know your most immediate and consequential problems, you know your next moves.

I'd also reemphasize the importance of blind review. If you're reviewing the answers you got wrong, you aren't blind reviewing because when you're blind reviewing you don't know which answers you got wrong. I really like the template @virgocass includes above. (All I'd change is to avoid prephrasing, but I won't get into that, and it's probably fine for your current range.) But if you can't write out an explanation for your reasoning, you don't understand it. And don't go to the video explanations until you've given it your best effort. JY won't be there on test day, so you've got to tough it out and grow into your own authority.