On my first gmat CAT test I scored a 44 on verbal, putting me in the 97th percentile.

On my second CAT test I scored a 36 on verbal, putting me in the 81st percentile.

I was very confused when I saw this, then I realized a big discrepancy and I hope someone can explain to me why this happened.

On my first test, I had 7 300-500 level questions, 9 500-600, 11 600-700, and 15 700-800.

On my second, I had 1 300-500 level, 4 500-600, 9 600-700, and 28 700-800.

Am I missing a big strategy here? Why were there so many more difficult questions on my second?

Where did those questions fall? What was the pattern of right and wrong answers? Did you have any timing problems on the second test? Did you have any big strings of wrong answers?

Your final score is not an average of your performance throughout the section - it's just wherever you "end up" at the end (because the test has been calculating your score after every question as you go).

It's perfectly possible (and I see this all the time) to be performing very well but, say, mess up your timing and then have your score drop at the end. In fact, if you were doing *really* well, that would lead you to get a ton of really hard Qs, and that could have been the thing that messed up your timing by the end of the section!

On the first test, you had a bunch of 300-500 questions - did you have an early bad streak, and then get yourself out of the hole and finish strongly? It's not great, of course, to have a bad streak anywhere, but if you have to have a bad streak somewhere, it's better for it to happen in the early or middle portion. If it happens at the end, then you drop and the test is over before you can do anything to fix the drop.

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Stacey Koprince
Instructor
Director of Online Community
ManhattanGMAT