Mastering the Art of CARS
Critical Analysis and Reasoning Skills (CARS) is the most intimidating section of the MCAT.
It takes expert guidance and a lot of practice to master the art of CARS. Your science knowledge might earn you a few easy points in the other sections, but not in CARS. In CARS, it’s all about proper technique.
It’s also about developing a CARS mindset to prime yourself for success. Here are a few characteristics of this uniquely challenging section that you need to accept.
Mounting dissatisfaction
CARS answer choices are nuanced, and differences between them can be minimal. These aren’t science questions, where everything is either 100% right or 100% wrong. On CARS, there are a lot of grey areas. You’ll often be selecting the best answer, which may not feel like a great answer at all.
This can lead to a very dissatisfying feeling as you race against the clock to finish the section. For many questions, you’ll find yourself picking an answer choice that you’re not very confident about. It’s crucial that you not allow this feeling to drag you down. You must persevere and work through the section with confidence.
Unorthodox methods
Most students find it difficult to abandon the test-writing approaches that have brought them so much success. Yet, if you want to score high on CARS, you’ve got to do just that.
Many successful CARS techniques are counter-intuitive: ignoring the knowledge you’ve accumulated throughout your education; continuously pausing to collect your thoughts when time is your enemy; resisting the urge to reread parts of the passage to find the answer; accepting 50/50 guesses as a good outcome; looking for the “least wrong” answers on tricky questions.
These methods may be unorthodox, but they work!
Abandon perfectionism
The resolve to get every question correct is one of the key reasons that students get bogged down and run out of time on the CARS section. Passage unintelligible? Question too difficult? Answer choices indistinguishable? Don’t get stuck. Make an educated guess and move on. If you obsess over it, you’ll run out of time and kill your score.
While the CARS section is unquestionably difficult, the correct mindset plus consistent practice and expert guidance will produce a competitive CARS score.
