The Occupational Reasoning Test is composed of several different types of verbal questions that test the candidate’s logical reasoning skills: The 2 main types are:
- Formal logic questions
- Seating arrangement questions
Both of these question types are intended to measure the candidate’s ability to (1) look at a written text and to boil down the content to its logical components and (2) to make decisions based on these comments.
These are examples of such questions:
Sample Question #1 - Seating Arrangements
FACTS: A street has 5 houses arranged from left to right (1-2-3-4-5). Each house has a unique characteristic:
One house has a gate to the front yard.
The house with the front porch is not house #4.
The leftmost house does not have a blue door.
The house with the garden is immediately to the left of the house with the wide driveway.
The house with the gate to the front yard is two houses to the right of the house with the front porch and one house to the left of the house with the garden.
CONCLUSION: House #2 has a front porch.
Which of these is true?
View Explanation
B is correct.
If the house with the gate to the front yard is two houses to the right of the house with the front porch, then the house with the gate to the front yard can only be house 3, 4 or 5.
If the house with the gate to the front yard is also one house to the left of the house with the garden, then the house with the gate to the front yard can only be house 3 or 4 and the house with the garden is house 4 or 5.
If the house with the garden is immediately to the left of the house with the wide driveway, then the house with the garden must be house 4.
Therefore, the house with the gate to the front yard is house 3 and the house with the wide driveway is house 5. If the leftmost house does not have the blue door, then house 2 must have the blue door which means it does not have the front porch. House 1 has the front porch.
You probably noticed this question is loaded with information that is difficult to follow. This is the main challenge in sitting arrangement questions, making them difficult to make sense of in the short amount of time you have. Here are a few tips to help reveal the correct answer:
- Try to jot down written information in chart form. Use letters to mark each of the persons listed in the question: A for Abe, B for Billy, and so on. Substitute underlines ( ) _ ) to mark unknowns.
- Next, list the relevant information for each item. In this example, it would be useful to jot down a list of the houses and associate each of them with what is known about it - House 1 - (does not have a blue door), House 3 (does not have a front porch), etc. once all the information is organized, making the correct decision is a lot easier.
- Note: The text you’re provided will contain both direct information about the seating (in the form of statements like ‘Abe is sitting next to Billy’) as well as indirect information, which can be implied by the text. You must make sure you note all the information in the text in your chart so that you have everything in place to resolve the question.
Here are two more occupational reasoning questions, examining formal logic:
Formal Logic questions like these often contain a large amount of information in a way that may be confusing or misleading. there are several ways to deal with this issue:
- Sketching out the information in a graphic form (you will be allowed to use scratch paper to do so).
- Considering ALL the information presented to you when examining possible scenarios, and their effect on the conclusion.
- Start with known facts- like in the question above, you might be presented with statements that begin with "if...". As these may have no influence on the conclusion, try starting with more informative facts first (like "Jim was not traded after the game").
