How many questions can you miss on the NBME/CBSEs?

[jack.jaret]

I know this is an obscure question and I know there is no definitive answer, but I just wanted to know what you guys THINK. I took a practice NBME that contained 184 questions.

How many questions do you think separates a 160 from a 180? Or a 180 from a 200?

Again, I know there is no data on this. But I was hoping for some solid educated guesses. Thank you!

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[Pacna]

AFAIK, these scores are really ratings. They're supposed to indicate how you compare to other test takers. This means getting a very difficult question right = matters more than getting a very easy one right.

So it's a bit of an impossible question to answer. But I know that higher ratings (260+) are divided by less #s of questions than lower ratings. *shrug*

 

[mymembernames]

Each question equals ~1.39 points

 

[jack.jaret]

Each question equals ~1.39 points

Are you being serious or facetious? Hard to read sarcasm on the internet hehe

 

[mymembernames]

Are you being serious or facetious? Hard to read sarcasm on the internet hehe

Hah, I remember reading somewhere on the internet that you can calculate your score by multiplying the number of corrects by 1.4 to get an estimate 🙂

Maybe someone else can confirm if this true or not.

 

[Ophthoseidon]

Hah, I remember reading somewhere on the internet that you can calculate your score by multiplying the number of corrects by 1.4 to get an estimate 🙂

Maybe someone else can confirm if this true or not.

That's for the offline versions for an approximate estimate. I think in the online versions it varies on which questions you get wrong because they are scaled to difficulty.

 

[Postictal Raiden]

That's for the offline versions for an approximate estimate. I think in the online versions it varies on which questions you get wrong because they are scaled to difficulty.

I think so too, but the formula provides a very close estimate. My calculated score is within 3 points of the actual score I received on the online NBME 15 test.