Example:When Robert Boyle investigated gases, he found the relationship
between pressure and volume to be _________
Before you even look at the options, you should know what the answer is. Find that
option, and then quickly confirm to yourself that the others are indeed wrong.
- Never say never. Words like “never” and “always” are absolute qualifiers. If these words
are in one of the choices, it is rarely the correct choice.
Example:Which of the following is true about a real gas?
a. There are never any interactions between the particles.
b. The particles present always have negligible volumes.
If you can think of any situation where the statements in (a) and (b) are untrue, then
you have discovered distracters and can eliminate these as valid choices.
- Easy is as easy does. It’s exam day and you’re all geared up to set this very difficult test on
its ear. Question number one looks like a no-brainer. Of course! The answer is 7, choice c.
Rather than smiling at the satisfaction that you knew the answer, you doubt yourself.
Could it be that easy? Sometimes they are just that easy.
- Sometimes, a blind squirrel finds an acorn. Should you guess? If you have absolutelyno
clue which choice is correct, guessing is a poor strategy. With five choices, your chance
of getting the question wrong is 80%, and every wrong answer costs you 1/4 of a point.
In this case, leave it blank with no penalty. Guessing becomes a much better gamble if
you can eliminate even one obviously incorrect response. If you can narrow the choices
down to three possibilities by eliminating obvious wrong answers, you might just find
that acorn.
- Draw it, nail it. Many questions are easy to answer if you do a quick sketch in the mar-
gins of your test book. Hey, you paid for that test book; you might as well use it.
Example:The rate of the reverse reaction will be slower than the rate of the
forward reaction if the relative energies of the reactants and products are:
Reactant Product
a. High Equal to the reactants
b. Low Equal to the reactants
c. High Higher than the reactants
d. Low Higher than the reactants
e. High Lower than the reactants
These types of question are particularly difficult, because the answer requires two ingre-
dients. The graph speaks for itself.
- Come back, Lassie, come back!Pace yourself. If you do not immediately know the answer
to a question—skip it. You can come back to it later. You have approximately
72 seconds per question. You can get a good grade on the test even if you do not
finish all the questions. If you spend too much time on a question you may get it
correct; however, if you had gone on you might get several questions correct in
the same amount of time. The more questions you read, the more likely you are to
find the ones for which you know the answers. You can help yourself on this timing by
practice.
How to Approach Each Question Type 35
