Academic and Quantitative Literacy (AQL)
What the section is really testing
AQL does not test memorised formulas. It tests whether you can read an unfamiliar text, table or graph and use the information in it to reach a defensible conclusion. Every answer you need is in the stimulus; your job is to locate it, interpret it correctly and resist the distractors.
Concepts you must command
- Reading for structure: separating the main claim from supporting detail, spotting the author's purpose, tone and unstated assumption, and distinguishing a legitimate inference from a restatement of the text.
- Data display: axes, units, scales, legends and labels on tables, bar charts, line graphs and pie charts. Ask what the baseline is and what one unit of height means.
- Proportional reasoning: ratio, rate, direct and inverse proportion, density and speed, scaling up recipes or costs, unit conversion.
- Percentages: percentage of, percentage change, percentage points, reverse percentages (finding the original amount after a mark-up).
- Averages and spread: mean, median, mode and range, and what each one conceals.
- Evidence and argument: sample size, representativeness, correlation versus causation, generalisation from a small or biased group.
Traps that appear repeatedly
Options that reuse the passage's vocabulary but answer a different question; mixing up percentages and percentage points; comparing figures reported in different units (per 100 versus per 1 000); graphs whose vertical axis starts above zero, making a small change look dramatic; assuming causation from a correlation; averaging two group averages without weighting by group size; and over-calculating when an estimate would settle the question.
Rule of thumb
Percentage change = (new − old) ÷ old × 100. A rate rising from 20% to 25% is a 5 percentage point rise but a 5 ÷ 20 = 25% relative increase in the rate. Always identify which one the question asks for before you look at the options.