How to Take (and Hopefully Pass) a Multiple Choice Exam


Keith Condon, Ph.D.

Department of Biological Sciences, FIU


"It is an old maxim of mine that when you have excluded the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth"
        - Sherlock Holmes (A. Conan Doyle)
        - The Adventure of the Beryl Coronet

        During the course of your undergraduate career, you will probably be presented with a fair number of exams using the multiple choice format, particularly in large enrollment classes such as General Biology, General Chemistry, etc. In addition, this format is used on many post-graduate entrance exams such as the GRE, LSAT, MCAT, etc. It is therefore in your interest to learn how to take such exams. Merely knowing (i.e., memorizing) the material is not enough, as often what the questions are testing is your ability to reason using newly acquired knowledge. Don't forget, the reason you are going to college and the reason your future employer is going to pay you the big bucks, is not only for the knowledge you will have acquired but for the ability to apply that knowledge (i.e., to reason and think!). If the answer to all problems were to be found in a book, then you could simply go to work for Big Blue (IBM) straight out of high school and look up answers/solutions in "the book" as the problems presented themselves. Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately (for college professors anyway), many if not most of the problems you will face in your career do not appear in text book form, and it is your ability to recognize and solve problems (or at least suggest solutions) that will be your marketable skill, regardless of the field you enter. Remember, while books, computers, pre-med majors and other abiotic entities have a nearly unlimited capacity to store knowledge, only you have the ability to create and use it.

        Returning to multiple choice exams, the good news is that the correct answer is always provided. Indeed, as long as the correct answers are randomly distributed among the possible disclaimers (i.e., a, b, c, d, or e; assuming a 5-choice exam), Then simply filling in "a" to every answer will guarantee you 20% correct without even attending lecture or cracking a book. Unfortunately, even with the most generous curve, a 20% correct mark will rarely yield a passing grade (even at FIU, the "Harvard of West Dade"). However, by using your ability to reason, you can significantly increase the probability of finding the correct answer, even if your knowledge of the material is less than perfect. This is because information is often contained within the structure of the question which will permit you to eliminate some disclaimers, thus increasing the probability of finding the correct answer. In the next sections some examples of this are illustrated. Also, in multiple choice exams information provided in one question can often be applied to answer another. The key to success is to come to the exam prepared with a knowledge of the material and to use the exam and your reasoning skills to determine the correct answers.

        Answering a multiple-choice question is a 3 step process. The first step is to determine how the disclaimers (the alternative answers a-e) are to be evaluated: true or false, yes or no, etc. For example, if the question reads "Which of the following statements concerning the economy of Dolphin Spit, Florida is true?" , then you will evaluate each disclaimer as being either true or false. The second step is to evaluate each disclaimer and decide whether it is true (T), false (F) or unknown (?). It is important that you evaluate all the disclaimers, and not stop when the first one that appears to answer the question is encountered. This is because 1) you may have incorrectly evaluated the disclaimer (see below), and 2) often multiple disclaimers are the correct answer to the question (also see below). The third step is to use the decisions (T, F, ?), to answer the question. Let's look at a simple example.

Question: A cube (a geometric solid with sides of equal length) lying on a desk is a solid color. Which of the following statements concerning the cube is true?

               (decision)
     a)     The cube has a total of 6 surfaces     
T
     b)      The cube is polka-dotted.     
F
     c)      The cube is not polka-dotted.     
T
     d)      a and b      
T + F
     e)      a and c *     
T + T

        The question asks which of the disclaimers is true. The next step is to evaluate each of the disclaimers as being true or false. We know by definition that a cube has 6 sides so disclaimer a is true. The question tells us the cube is a solid color so we know disclaimer b must be false (an object can't be simultaneously a solid color and polka-dotted). Similarly, disclaimer c is true since the question tells us the cube is a solid color. Disclaimer d contains both a true (a) and false (b) answer. Disclaimer e contains 2 true answers. Examining the decisions, we find disclaimer (e) is the best answer since it correctly identifies which of the disclaimers is true, which is what the question asks. Note that the question does NOT ask "Which one of the following statements is true" which clearly states that only one of the disclaimers can be true, rather the question asks "Which of the following statements is true?" which allows the possibility that more than one of the disclaimers is true. Again, read and understand the question!

        Disclaimer (a) while true is not the correct answer since it implies that disclaimer (c) is false, which is incorrect. Conversely, disclaimer (c) is incorrect for the same reason, it implies that disclaimer (a) is false. If the question asks which of the disclaimers is true and two (or more) of the disclaimers appear to be true, then there must be a third disclaimer which correctly identifies that there are multiple true answers. However, if there is not a choice involving multiple answers, then you have incorrectly identified one of the disclaimers as true, when it is in fact false. Students will often say they chose a or c as the correct answer rather than e (a and c) because they felt that either a was "truer" than c or c was "truer" than a. Folks, this ain't love; a disclaimer is either true or false, and there are no degrees of "trueness" in a multiple choice exam.

        Let's take a look at a more biological example:

Which of the following statements concerning the vertebrate skeleton is true?
               (decision)
     a)     It can be made up of cartilage or bone or both      
T
     b)      It is an exoskeleton.     
F
     c)      It is an endoskeleton.     
T
     d)      a and b      
T + F
     e)      a and c *     
T + T

        Disclaimer (e) is the best answer since it correctly identifies which of the disclaimers is true, which is what the question asks. Disclaimer (a) while true is not the correct answer since it implies that disclaimer (c) is false, which is incorrect. Conversely, disclaimer (c) is incorrect for the same reason, it implies that disclaimer (a) is false. Note that in this example disclaimers b and c are mutually exclusive, they both cannot be true, therefore one of them is false and one of them is true. Once you decide which is false (in this case b), you can exclude disclaimer (d) since it requires (b) to be true. Now you have to decide if (a) is true, if so the answer is (e), if not the answer is (c). This is an example of a problem in which the disclaimers help you identify the answer by reducing the number of potentially correct disclaimers from 5 to 3 and from 3 to 1.

        In the following sections several examples of multiple choice questions are provided. The disclaimers have been omitted and what is shown is the decision made concerning each disclaimer, with T = true, F = false and ? = don't know. The correct answer is asterisked and the explanation follows:
Which of the following is true?

     a)T     a)T     a)F
     b)T     b)?     b)F
     c) F     c)T     c)F
     d)a + b (T,T) *     d)?     d)F
     e)a + c (T,F)      e)all of the above     e)? *

        The first (left) example is the same as described above. While both a and b are individually true, answer d is the best answer since it correctly identifies all the true disclaimers, which is what the question asks. In the middle example, you know that a and c are true and have no clue about the status of b and d. It doesn't matter, since a and c are both true, the answer must be e since it alone identifies a and c as being true. In the third example (right) you know disclaimers a-d are false but you don't know about e. In this case the answer must be e since the question asks which disclaimer is true and you have eliminated a-d because they are false.
Which of the following is false?

     a)T     a)F     a)T
     b)T     b)?     b)F *
     c) F *     c)F     c)?
     d)a + b (T,T) *     d)?     d)?
     e)a + c (T,F)      e)all of the above *     e)?

        In these examples, you are asked to identify the false disclaimer. In the first example (left) answer c is correct since it is the only completely false disclaimer. While e contains a false disclaimer, it is incorrect since it also contains a true disclaimer (specifically a). In the middle example, you know a and c are false, but again have no clue as to b and d. As above, it doesn't matter a fig since a and c are both false, the answer must be e since it alone identifies a and c as both being false. In the third example (right) disclaimer a is true, b is false and c-e are unknown. Since disclaimers c-e are individual disclaimers (not multiple, e.g., a + b, 2 of the above, all of the above, etc.), then answer b is correct since among the disclaimers there can only be one false statement, given the lack of a disclaimer offering multiple choices.

        The same logic can be applied to questions requiring evaluation of the disclaimers in terms of yes (Y) or no (N). For example:

Which of the following is not ...

     a)Y
     b)Y
     c)N *
     d)?
     e)Y

        Hopefully you understand by now that you can significantly improve your chances of identifying the correct answer over random chance by applying some simple reasoning. Also, look for information within the question and disclaimers which can help eliminate some of the choices.

        Three final recommendations. First, be internally consistent. If in question #20 you knew for a fact that all cows are brown, and this issue reappears in question # 32, stick to your guns and answer accordingly. Alternatively, if on #20 your were unsure all cows are brown, then you might wish to hedge your bet and answer the opposite on # 32, knowing that at least one of the answers will be correct (versus both right or both wrong: Ask yourself, do I feel lucky?).

        Second, use your question sheet as a work sheet, answering each disclaimer before deciding the final answer. Do not try to remember which disclaimer is true or false/yes or no in your head. You have a pencil already in hand, use it and write down your decision! Your question sheet should be literally dripping with lead (actually graphite) from your pencil by the end of the exam.

        Finally, once you have decided the correct answer (either a,b,c,d, or e), circle it clearly on your question sheet and then transfer the answer to the scan sheet. Check the transfer twice making sure that 1) the number of the question and answer matches and 2) the correct disclaimer matches. You would be surprised (unhappily) by the number of mechanical errors made in this process. Stay focused!


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