Reasoning and Mental Ability
What is tested
Verbal and non-verbal reasoning: number and letter series, analogies, coding-decoding, blood relations, direction sense, syllogism, seating arrangement, clock and calendar, plus mirror images, embedded figures and paper folding. Almost every question is solvable in under a minute if you choose the right method.
Working rules
- Series: check differences first, then ratios, then squares, cubes and alternating patterns.
- Coding: note the shift for each letter separately; shifts may alternate between +1 and +2.
- Blood relations: draw a small family tree and mark gender with a symbol; never solve in your head.
- Direction sense: sketch north-south and east-west axes; a left turn from north is west.
- Syllogism: draw the minimum-overlap diagram, then test the conclusion only against that; ask whether a counter-diagram can make the conclusion false.
- Seating: fix the first person and build circular arrangements clockwise or anticlockwise consistently.
Worked example
Series: 2, 6, 12, 20, 30, ? - the differences are 4, 6, 8, 10, so the next difference is 12 and the answer is 42. A quick cross-check: each term is n(n+1), i.e. 1×2, 2×3, 3×4, 4×5, 5×6, so the sixth term is 6×7 = 42.
Traps
- "Some A are B" does not imply "some B are A" only when you forget conversion rules - always draw it.
- Calendar questions: count odd days, and remember a leap year shifts the day by two.
- Mirror image flips left to right, not top to bottom.
- Blood relation questions deliberately say "my father's only son" to mean the speaker himself.