If you're considering a post-graduate business school program, earning a good integrated reasoning GMAT score can give you an advantage over other applicants. Read through the following information and GMAT integrated reasoning tips to learn about the different types of questions on the test and develop study strategies that can help you do well on the exam.
Purpose
Aspiring business professionals must have advanced problem-solving skills in order to be successful. Integrated reasoning GMAT questions assess your critical thinking and problem-solving abilities by asking you to analyze various types of data and create solutions to complex problems based on your findings.
Types of Questions
Each of the 12 integrated reasoning GMAT questions evaluates one of four skills:
- Multi-source reasoning
- Table analysis
- Graphics interpretation
- Two-part analysis
To answer these questions, students will need to use their quantitative and verbal reasoning abilities to analyze, interpret, and apply data in various scenarios.
Multi-Source Reasoning
For the multi-source reasoning questions, you must analyze information and give correct responses about the data. Some questions may ask you to explain the meaning of specific information, while others might require you to discuss implications, make inferences and draw conclusions about the data.
Analyzing Sets of Data
Multi-source reasoning questions present information through written passages, charts, tables, diagrams, and graphs. Some prompts give you only one of these data sets to analyze. However, there are also questions that ask you to find correlations, differences, and anomalies across two or more of these sources.
Table Analysis
In the business world, tables and spreadsheets are common tools for tracking and displaying data. As such, the integrated reasoning GMAT section features a table analysis portion to test your data organization and interpretation skills. For these questions, you must arrange and analyze information while adhering to certain specifications.
Graphics Interpretation
Integrated reasoning GMAT questions on graphics interpretation are similar to table analysis questions. However, these prompts require you to analyze and interpret data on graphs. Information for these questions may be presented via x/y graphs, scatter plots, pie and bar charts, or statistical curve distribution.
Two-Part Analysis
Multifaceted two-part analysis questions give an in-depth evaluation of your quantitative skills, verbal skills, or both. For each of these questions, students must solve complex dilemmas by assessing trade-offs, solving mathematical equations, and finding connections between separate entities.
Scoring
Your integrated reasoning GMAT score depends on the number of questions you answer correctly. Unanswered and incorrect questions receive no credits, and there is no partial credit for incomplete responses.
Some questions in this section require more than one answer, and you may use a virtual calculator for basic computations.
Students have 30 minutes to complete this section of the exam.
Preparation
How to Study for the Integrated Reasoning GMAT Questions
Preparing for the GMAT requires a lot of studying, and Grad Prep offers GMAT integrated reasoning practice materials to help you get ready for this section. Use our integrated reasoning GMAT practice questions to sharpen your skills in all four categories. From there, you can take a few practice tests to familiarize yourself with the pacing and structure of the real exam.