Analytical Reasoning: Diagram the Conditions
Analytical Reasoning presents logic games-ordering, grouping, selection and mapping-plus short deductive arguments. You are tested on what must follow from the stated conditions, not on prior knowledge.
Draw the constraints
- Ordering: draw numbered slots. Translate 'A immediately before B' into a block AB; translate 'A somewhere before B' into A < B.
- Grouping: use a two-column in/out table. Record 'if X then Y' as a conditional and write its contrapositive.
- Begin with the most restrictive condition; place forced items before testing alternatives.
- For 'must be true', eliminate any option that can be false in one valid arrangement. For 'could be true', find one valid arrangement that makes the option true.
Worked example
Five books-P, Q, R, S, T-stand left to right in positions 1–5. P is somewhere left of Q; R is immediately right of S; T is not at either end; Q is third. Which must be true? (A) P is second (B) R is fourth (C) T is second (D) S is fifth.
Q is position 3, so P is at 1 or 2. T can only be at 2 or 4. If T were at 4, then S and R would need two adjacent remaining positions; the only adjacent pair left is 1–2, forcing S = 1, R = 2 and leaving P = 5-impossible because P must be left of Q. Therefore T = 2, P = 1, and S = 4, R = 5. The full order is P, T, Q, S, R. Answer: C.
Traps that cost marks
Reading 'immediately' into a mere 'before'; reversing 'R is right of S'; forgetting 'not at either end'; testing answer choices before deriving the arrangement; confusing 'must' with 'could'.