So, for some background. I took the June test and did well but not the score I was looking for. I was planning on taking the test yesterday and the realized I wasn't done with my 7Sage course and wanted to be more consistent because I don't want to take it more than twice. I am curious if this has happened to anyone else. I seem to score higher on older tests (in the PT mid 50s and 60s). I know friends felt that yesterday's test was harder than the June test. Do we think maybe the LSAT test themselves are actually getting more difficult over time? I felt like I did much better on those older tests. I did score around the same when I took the June test again after the fact. I don't know though...thoughts anyone??
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There are, however, things I think LSAC is doing to maintain reliable differentiation between scorers, though I could be way off as to why some of these new trends have been surfacing. I'm referring primarily to the abstract/funky logic games paired with sissified games that are easy only if you know you're stuff. The hard games are hard no matter how much prep you've had, whereas hard games in the past seemed easier to prepare for. LR seems to focus more now on subtle necessary assumptions, resolve/reconcile, most strongly supported, complete the passage, and pseudo-sufficient assumptions, whereas older tests seem in my mind to have focused more on sufficient assumptions, and must be true questions, both of which are simple to those who have mastered them, given their heavy and neat conditional logic.
This is all, of course, my opinion. But I think I can comfortably claim that the newer tests are not objectively harder, they're just different in subtle though eventually tangible ways. And by the way, I initially sucked at the newest tests and stunk at taking them. Now, I would much rather have a newer test to an old one.
The 70's drop seems to kick in pretty quickly, by 72 at least. It's not like there's a dramatic shift or anything, it's just that for some reason people see a dip. There's some different subtleties within LR, but I suspect a lot of it is psychological. I imagine that once we get into the 80's, the 70's drop will no longer be a thing and everyone will talk about how when you hit the 80's, scores tend to drop.
What I'm getting at is that every test is different in its own way. If a test is truly "harder" the curve will reflect that. The only test that I think the curve didn't compensate for difficulty was 72, that test was really really difficult.
I think that every question type does kind of use similar reasoning techniques though, so I wouldn't necessarily abandon that line of comparison. Every argument draws from the same, finite pool of reasoning techniques; and in that way, every question type does overlap. The questions merely distinguish what your exact task is: It does not change the logic.