AAMC #3 Verbal Easier??

[CaribbeanBlue]

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I have searched for other threads about this, but I don't really agree with most of the other threads.

The general consensus is that AAMC #3 is like a "JOKE" compared to the real MCAT... I can see how this is sort of believed in the sciences, but I wouldn't go so far as to call it a joke, although it was slightly less harsh with its questions.

The verbal, I agree, has slightly shorter passages than the real MCAT (by about a paragraph or two short paragraphs), but am I the only SDNer that seriously didn't find some of the questions to be just as hard if not harder than EK and most AAMC's?? I am referring to the Confuscious passage questions and the Artistic one's passages mostly in this case, as the other passage's questions seemed straightforward. These two passages had questions that I had to seriously reread and go back to the passage excessively and still couldn't agree upon a correct answer.

Also, the scale seemed pretty generous as to why most people would find AAMC 3's verbal "easier"... I got a 9 from getting 26/40, which seems overly generous... and I doubt the people that took this exam lacked the reading skills that premed's have today so why is this exam considered easier??

 

[PanRoasted]

I have searched for other threads about this, but I don't really agree with most of the other threads.

The general consensus is that AAMC #3 is like a "JOKE" compared to the real MCAT... I can see how this is sort of believed in the sciences, but I wouldn't go so far as to call it a joke, although it was slightly less harsh with its questions.

The verbal, I agree, has slightly shorter passages than the real MCAT (by about a paragraph or two short paragraphs), but am I the only SDNer that seriously didn't find some of the questions to be just as hard if not harder than EK and most AAMC's?? I am referring to the Confuscious passage questions and the Artistic one's passages mostly in this case, as the other passage's questions seemed straightforward. These two passages had questions that I had to seriously reread and go back to the passage excessively and still couldn't agree upon a correct answer.

Also, the scale seemed pretty generous as to why most people would find AAMC 3's verbal "easier"... I got a 9 from getting 26/40, which seems overly generous... and I doubt the people that took this exam lacked the reading skills that premed's have today so why is this exam considered easier??

It's mostly a myth perpetuated by pre-meds who hear by word of mouth that AAMC 3 is easy and then convince themselves it's the truth when they eventually take all the AAMC FLs. The sciences are a little less harsh, yes, but most people who take AAMC 3 after taking other AAMC FLs don't report drastically or even significantly higher scores (on the contrary, most people I've read about who do FL 3 later seem to score poorly on it). My personal experience is that FL 3 is comparable to all FLs from 4-7. Caveat: I haven't done 8-11 though, and there seems to be a consensus on FL 10/11 being the most difficult.

I have a suspicion that some people even tell others that AAMC 3 is a "joke" compared to the rest of the AAMC FLs just to belittle the accomplishments of those that receive high scores on FL 3 taken as a diagnostic. That could be going a little too far, though.

 

[OCDOCDOCD]

I've taken 3-10 so far (will take 11 next week) and I'd have to agree that AAMC 3 was not significantly easier than the other exams. As for the VR in particular, I'd say AAMC 3 had the hardest VR out of all of them, mainly because of the Confucius and TV passages. In fact, the Confucius passage has so far remained the hardest VR passage I've seen and I've done all of EK, most of TPRH, the VR self-assessment, and all but AAMC 11.

Like OP, I don't get why people act as if AAMC 3 is so easy that any score you get on it is unreliable. Same goes for 4 and 5 as well. I didn't really notice the difficulty spike that people claim lies between AAMC 5 and 7, nor did I really notice any difficulty spike between AAMC 9 and 10 (actually I think the PS was harder in 10 but that was it). All the tests seem to be in line with each other.

 

[salim271]

AAMC 3 VR is on par with the rest, if not tougher. The sciences were easier than 10/11, but I felt they were also on par with 4-9 for the most part. AAMC 3 is most certainly not a joke or easy test imo.