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New GMAT Section: Integrated Reasoning

The Next Generation GMAT Coming in 2012

Thinking ahead about taking the GMAT in a couple of years? If you end up taking the test after June 2012, you’ll have a whole new section to grapple with: Integrated Reasoning.

According to GMAC, Integrated Reasoning is “designed to measure people’s ability to evaluate information from multiple sources... [and] will provide business schools with a window into how prospective students respond to the kinds of complex challenges they will encounter as managers in today’s information-rich business environment.”

The addition to the test comes as the result of numerous surveys taken by business school faculty members during the past four years. Integrative Reasoning is designed to capitalize on innovations in technology, as well as reflect today’s changing business school classroom. Test-takers will have to analyze information from myriad sources (graphs, charts, spreadsheets, etc.), as well as draw conclusions about and identify relationships between various data points and sources. Check out this video for a demo of an Integrated Reasoning question:

For those worried about having to take an even longer test than before, don’t despair! Integrated Reasoning will be 30 minutes long and will replace one of the AWA essays, which means the GMAT will remain the same length (3.5 hours). Test-takers will receive a separate score for the Integrated Reasoning section. The Verbal and the Math sections of the test will remain unchanged, and will still be scored on a scale from 200-800.

Integrated Reasoning Sample Question

The following table and graph show data on a group of 2009 Clean Air Choice Vehicles. Choose the statements that are false based only on the information given.

Click to enlarge:

1. Of the models with Gasoline Engine Type, the model with the greatest ratio of City MPG to Highway MPG is also the model with the greatest difference between Highway MPG and City MPG.
2. The minimum City MPG for a Toyota make is less than the maximum City MPG for a Volkswagen make.
3. A model chosen at random from those models with a Highway MPG greater than 30 miles per gallon has a 50% chance of being a Toyota.
4. The median carbon footprint for all models is greater than the mode carbon footprint for all models.
5. The standard deviation of the Highway MPG values for all BMW models is lower than the standard deviation of the Highway MPG values for all Toyota models.

Answer: Statements 1 and 4 are FALSE; Statements 2, 3, and 5 are TRUE.

Practice GMAT questions from other parts of the test: Data Sufficiency, Problem Solving, Critical Reasoning, Sentence Correction, Reading Comprehension

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