Verbal Curved Down?

[K1N6]

Hey guys,

Had a quick concern about the verbal curve. I've looked around at other threads and it seems it's been fairly well established that to get at least a 10 you'd have to score ~75% of questions correctly.

It seems from my perspective that this is a curve down as 75% of correct questions would correlate to around an 11-12, but instead its closer to a 10/15 (which would correlate to around 66% correct.

So what exactly am I missing here?

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[Mad Jack]

The whole test is scaled.

 

[K1N6]

Hey, thanks for the reply!

Could you elaborate a bit please?

 

[Mad Jack]

It isn't based on the percentage of questions you get right, it's based on the percent you get right versus an average person, with average being an 8. 10 is above average. Raw score doesn't matter, only a normalized score versus other exam takers.

https://www.aamc.org/students/download/85332/data/combined08.pdf

To give you an idea of the percentile you need to be in to get a given score.

 

[K1N6]

Got it, thanks so much!

 

[popopopop]

It isn't based on the percentage of questions you get right, it's based on the percent you get right versus an average person, with average being an 8. 10 is above average. Raw score doesn't matter, only a normalized score versus other exam takers.

https://www.aamc.org/students/download/85332/data/combined08.pdf

To give you an idea of the percentile you need to be in to get a given score.

I thought this is a misconception and that AAMC already made a scale for the test before any test takers take them. That's why we have a scale for the AAMC practice exams and how to score them. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

 

[Mad Jack]

I thought this is a misconception and that AAMC already made a scale for the test before any test takers take them. That's why we have a scale for the AAMC practice exams and how to score them. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

Normalized means that it is scaled based on the results of past tests, not the performance of current test takers on the current test. Individual tests are not scaled based upon the performance of test takers of the individual exam. Basically, it's kind of complicated algorithmic stuff that ensures that on every given exam, the same number of people will achieve each set score, more or less.

 

[efle]

Also note that the Verbal section has the least forgiving scale, such that a 95th percentile score in Verbal earns you an 11 while a 95th percentile in Bio or Phys earns you a 12.