interesting discussion

[medisforme]

so i was looking at the bell curve scores for MCAT writers, and about 2% of people score around a 1 in each section. Wouldn't you basically have to try to get a score that bad (or else I guess some people have absolutely no idea what they are getting into when they go to write the exam). I guess I just can't believe that some people who want to do medicine would do that bad or not take the time to prepare for the test.

[register]

It's a curved test, so if someone gets 15 on a section, another person somewhere must get the lowest score of 1 on that section to balance it.

[Jamer]

Take into account anyone can write the MCAT. I've known people who challenged it for fun without studying to see how they'd do. In addition, there's probably people who think they did terribly in a couple passages so they just intentionally select a random answer for the rest of the test/don't even try answering at all. I'd say more people who got 1's were in either of these 2 categories than people who legitimately tried and bombed.

[PhoenixFlare500]

Maybe those people can't read very well, or English isn't even their first language. There's always gotta be somebody at the bottom of the curve.

[dan0105]

Errr, emphasis on the bell curve again. If one looked at the test on a percentage of questions right, it could be that the best person got 49/52 and the worst person got 42/52. That worst mark is still 80% but since it is a bell curve and no one did worse than them, they end up with a 1. So, it totally blows for them, but it more accurately shows that they were in fact the worst person.

 

(There's a lot more to it since the AAMC also puts in formulas and questions to compare between different versions, years, etc but that's basically it)

[Alastriss]

Errr, emphasis on the bell curve again. If one looked at the test on a percentage of questions right, it could be that the best person got 49/52 and the worst person got 42/52. That worst mark is still 80% but since it is a bell curve and no one did worse than them, they end up with a 1. So, it totally blows for them, but it more accurately shows that they were in fact the worst person.

 

(There's a lot more to it since the AAMC also puts in formulas and questions to compare between different versions, years, etc but that's basically it)

 

You are very very correct in theory but we are demanding a more practical solution, because we know that the raw score - scaled score conversions require you to have as low as around 15% on the test to get 1-2.

 

So while you are right, it never has happened that the lowest mark was 75% or 80% and I think the OP is wondering why that lower threshold is SOO low

[Tan008]

register is right. Because it is a normal distribution scale the lowest threshold will correspond to the highest hence, there are those who will get a score as low as 1 to counterbalance all those who get a score of 14-15