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Application Guide 2024:
UCAT
UCAT Verbal Reasoning 2024
Medicine Admissions Expert
Introduction
Traditionally, the lowest-scoring section of the UCAT, this section requires you to quickly read the text and logically answer questions. Despite the time pressure, plan and practice lots of UCAT verbal reasoning questions to boost your score.
Practising UCAT Verbal Reasoning questions and working with our UCAT Tutors will help you learn the best verbal reasoning strategies.
👉🏻 Read more: The Ultimate UCAT Guide 2024
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What Is UCAT Verbal Reasoning?
The UKCAT Verbal Reasoning section is the first section of the UCAT exam - making it paramount that you go in with confidence to help gain a good UCAT score. We will outline how to score well in this section, with tips and tricks written by our most experienced UCAT tutors to help boost your score.
The UKCAT Verbal Reasoning subtest assesses your ability to read and think carefully about the information presented in passages. To score well you must determine whether specific conclusions can be drawn from the information presented.
You are not expected to use prior knowledge to answer the questions. Here, you have 22 minutes (including 1 minute for instructions) to answer 44 questions. These UCAT Verbal Reasoning questions are split into 11 passages, with each passage having 4 questions. You will receive 1 mark for each question that you answer correctly.
👉🏼 Read more: UCAT Study Planner for 2024
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Why Include UCAT Verbal Reasoning?
Doctors and dentists need excellent verbal reasoning skills in dealing with patients and complex clinical situations. Understanding and reading the situation and then communicating clearly what needs to be said to both healthcare professionals and patients in a simple manner is critical.
UCAT Verbal Reasoning Questions are designed in a manner that will allow you to demonstrate your skills in handling complex information presented amongst large swathes of information. This is a skill that you will continue developing at medical school.
Medical practitioners must be able to interpret research papers and publications and try to integrate this into their clinical practice. This requires excellent UCAT verbal reasoning techniques.
👉🏻 Read more: Top Tips For UCAT Verbal Reasoning
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UCAT Verbal Reasoning Timing
21 minutes (with 1 minute of instructions not included within this time). In terms of the time you have per verbal reasoning question, you have 29 seconds per question to answer the 44 questions.
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Maximum UCAT Verbal Reasoning Score
Maximum UCAT Verbal Reasoning Score: 900
Minimum UCAT Verbal Reasoning Score: 300
Remember to contact our UCAT Tutors to find out more about how we can boost this score.
👉🏻 Read more: UCAT Dental Schools - UCAT Cut Off Scores
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Average UCAT Verbal Reasoning Score
The average UKCAT verbal reasoning score over the last five years is 573.
2015 Verbal Reasoning UCAT Average Score: 577
2016 Verbal Reasoning UCAT Average Score: 573
2017 Verbal Reasoning UCAT Average Score: 570
2018 Verbal Reasoning UCAT Average Score: 567
2019 Verbal Reasoning UCAT Average Score: 565
2020 Verbal Reasoning UCAT Average Score: 570
2021 Verbal Reasoning UCAT Average Score: 573
This is the lowest average score for any UCAT section. This is likely because as well as being the first section it is the hardest to manage time in. This is why you must ensure that you practice lots of questions.
Contact one of our UCAT Tutors for more information.
👉🏻 Read more: Where To Apply With A Low UCAT Score (2024)
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UCAT Verbal Reasoning Question Types
The UCAT Verbal Reasoning Questions contains eleven passages, each of which has four questions. Some of these questions assess critical reasoning skills, where candidates must draw inferences and conclusions from the passage. Each passage of text must be read carefully.
The questions will contain a stem which may be an incomplete statement or a question, which will have four answer options to choose from. The candidate is required to pick the most suitable response, only one response may be picked.
There are two UCAT verbal reasoning questions:
TYPE 1 Verbal Reasoning Questions - A passage followed by True/False/Can't Tell.
TYPE 2 Verbal Reasoning Questions - A text followed by picking from statements. You need to determine a general summary of the passage to answer the question
Since 2013 - the overall trend has been to have more type two verbal reasoning questions. We recommend practising both types of questions to help ensure that you are best prepared for the Verbal Reasoning UKCAT exam. Both question types are multiple-choice, which is helpful if you are running out of time.
👉🏻 Read more: UCAT Preparation 2024 - The Ultimate Guide
👉🏻 Read more: UCAT Reflective Revision - the most important UCAT Tip
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UCAT Verbal Reasoning Question Example:
Passage 1
In the 21st Century, many people aged over 65 are perfectly capable of working and are likely to live longer than individuals did in previous times. If people work after the age of 65, there is more chance that they will be financially self-sufficient when they retire.
Compulsory retirement ages have long been banned in the USA, and we should get rid of them in the UK, also. Following their footsteps would similarly be good for individuals and our country. We should ignore those employers who complain that they would be unable to get rid of older and inefficient employees.
After all, those who are incompetent to do a job can be dismissed on the grounds of merit, rather than of age. Dismissing candidates based on age also raises discrimination issues, opening a metaphorical can of worms in regards to unfair dismissal.
Which of the following expresses the main conclusion of the above argument?
1. It is unfair to keep people working after age 65
2. People who are incompetent to do a job can be dismissed.
3. Raising the retirement age would be good for the country.
4. The UK should abolish compulsory retirement ages.
5. Those who work beyond the age of 65 can be financially self-sufficient.
ANSWER: 4
In this question, you are searching for the main conclusion of the above paragraph. This means there will be more than one valid point, but your task is to detect the highest-ranking conclusion.
Answer 1 is wrong; the passage encourages more people over the age of 65 to continue working, so it is a direct contradiction.
Answer 2 is true according to the passage, but it is not the overall topic - the overall topic is in regards to the age of retirement, so this answer is not the main conclusion.
Answer 3 is incorrect - the passage says that removing the compulsory retirement age is good for the country, not simply raising it.
Answer 4 is the main conclusion of the paragraph as it discusses the UK and the suggestion that it should abolish compulsory retirement.
Answer 5 is also correct but it is not a conclusion in itself; it provides evidence and support for the main conclusion, which is Answer 4.
👉🏻 Read more: UCAT Revision Timetable - how to create one
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How To Boost Your Verbal Reasoning Score
We recommend learning strategies to overcome time constraints, as it has the lowest average score of any section in the UCAT. There are many tricks to help you skim the question and not have to read entire chunks of text.
Some candidates prefer to read the passage first, which is a good technique but sometimes it can be time-consuming. On our UCAT courses, we teach both of these methods.
By increasing the amount of ucat verbal reasoning practice that you undertake, you will be able to speed up and develop your verbal reasoning techniques during your practice tests and practice from question banks.
👉🏻 Read more: BMAT Cancelled - Replaced With The UCAT In 2024
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UCAT Verbal Reasoning Tips in 2024
Here we have collated some of our senior UCAT tutors' most strategic UKCAT Verbal Reasoning test tips that we teach on our UCAT Courses and in our 1-1 UCAT Tutoring.
UCAT Verbal Reasoning strategies and tips in 2024
Do not draw on existing knowledge in verbal reasoning to answer the question, assume that you are unfamiliar with the content.
On the official UCAT website, you will find free verbal reasoning practice tests that you can do to boost your score.
Make sure that you concentrate from the start - it is the first section of the UKCAT and traditionally has the lowest average scores amongst candidates. Make sure that you use these tips for verbal reasoning in the UCAT to boost your score.
Practice speed reading skills during your preparation by reading articles for the UCAT verbal reasoning test in the newspapers, and see whether you can extract the key facts quickly. This is a time-pressured section where there is not a lot of time to read the question, with a very tight time limit.
Think about how you will time yourself during this section. Try and work out a strategy whereby you might allocate a certain amount of time to each passage, which will help prevent you from getting bogged down and running out of time in the UCAT test.
Pay attention to the wording in UCAT questions. This will usually provide a hint towards the answer.
The UCAT Verbal Reasoning section is not based on your ability to understand the English language (regardless of your mother tongue).
In type 1 questions it is often easy to first work out if the statement is true or false before considering cannot say.
Consider contacting our UCAT tutors and joining our UCAT course for more information.
Do not get bogged down by UCAT verbal reasoning questions that are incomprehensible - this typically means it is a trick question - the best thing to do is move on and come back if time allows!
For more ukcat verbal reasoning tips contact our UCAT experts.
👉🏻 Read more: Top Tips For UCAT Verbal Reasoning
👉🏻 Read more: Top Tips For UCAT Abstract Reasoning
👉🏻 Read more: Top Tips For UCAT Quantitative Reasoning
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