matthyaouw said:
If i reach the end, and there are no parts that I've missed and decided to go back to later, I'll carefully re read the questions and answers, checking for mistakes, inconsistencies, or areas where i can elaborate. I'll do that a few times, until I'm finally satisfied, and then I'll sit and worry about why on Earth I have time to spare...
I always double checked my answers and, preferably, solved the problem using a different method the second time (it's hard to forget what I did the first time and I get locked into doing the same thing, again). I'm notorious for dropping a negative sign here and there (you would think you could actually break a habit like that). Re-reading the questions is always a good idea. Misreading the question isn't a mistake I made very often, but some of the dumbest answers I ever came up with ...
By the way, that idea that you're more likely to change a correct answer to a wrong answer than vice versa
and that that is significant is a myth. You're more likely to miss a question that you changed the answer on, since it's more likely you're not very sure about that topic.
The rest is just probability. You only have one right answer and probably about 3 wrong answers. The most likely situation is to change a wrong answer to a different wrong answer. If you chose a wrong answer in the first place and change your answer, you only have a 1 in 3 chance of changing it to the right answer. If you chose the right answer (25% chance) and change it, you have a 100% chance of changing to the wrong answer.
Of course, the normal situation is that you've narrowed the choices down to two, in which case, it should be 50/50 whether you change your answer or not. If it's one of the first questions on the test, you're probably more likely to change from wrong to correct than vice versa. Now that your mind is "in the groove", your second instinct is probably better than the instinct you had while you were still trying to shake off your initial nervousness about the test, etc.
The first promotion test I had to take in the Air Force, I just went blank. There's a lot of pressure on these since it's a competitive test instead of just pass/fail. It's not the only criteria: your test scores are added to other things, like how long you've been in the military, how long you've held your current rank, how many medals you've won (getting a Purple Heart actually earns you points towards promotion, not that losing a leg is the preferred way to earn points), but you only get one chance a year and, at least your first couple of times, it's the only chance you have to make up points on the folks who've been in the military longer. I read the first question and thought "Well, I guess there's just as good of chance of putting the hardest question #1 as anywhere else; read the second "Darn, two hard ones in a row"; read the third "Hoh boy, this is a tough test"; read the fourth "Agh, I may as well accept it, no one gets promoted first time around anyway"; read the fifth "Jeez, I'm going to be that guy everybody makes fun of for scoring 19 on a 100 question multiple choice test" (I knew someone who did that, but he also once stapled his genitals to his chair, with a heavy duty upholstery stapler, no less, so we had better things to make fun of him for). Eventually, I did get in a groove (sometimes, accepting failure just removes all the pressure), so when I finished, I just covered my answer sheet with my scratch paper, started over, and did about the first 30 questions over again. I wound up changing 7 of the first 10 and 10 of the first 15 - and wound up doing good enough to be the last selectee for promotion.
