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Verbal Ability & Reasoning

Verbal ability and reasoning accounts for half of the verbal section

A typical 50 marks section of verbal comprises Verbal ability and reasoning section and the Reading Comprehension section. Verbal ability accounts for about 25 to 30 marks questions in the verbal section and the reamining 20 to 25 marks questions are Reading comprehension questions.

In CAT 2004 there were 0.5, 1 and 2 marks questions in the verbal section and in CAT 2005 there were 1 mark and 2 marks questions in the verbal section. CAT 2006 and CAT 2007 had 25 questions in the Verbal Ability section with each question carrying 4 marks. Of these 12 to 15 questions were Reading Comprehension question and the remaining questions were Verbal Reasoning questions.

The questions that typically appear in the verbal section can be classified in one of the following types

1. Vocabulary Based

   Questions based on testing one's vocabulary could be plain vanilla "synonym - antonym" questions as it appeared in CAT 2001, CAT 2002. Alternatively, the questions on vocabulary may appear as fill in the blank with the appropriate word as it appeared in the 0.5 marks section of CAT 2004 or as part of the 2 marks section in CAT 2005.
   
   There have been interesting variations to this question as in CAT 2001 and CAT 2002 where a simple word was given. Four alternate usages for the word was given and four different shades of meaning for the word was given. One had to match the usage with the appropriate meaning. A sample of such a question is given if you follow the link at the bottom of the page.
   
   However, please note that the emphasis on vocabulary has been on the decline and the need to memorize meanings of words such as "pleonasm" or "pterodactyl" is not essential to crack such questions in CAT.
   
   

2. English Usage / Grammar

   Sentence correction or Grammar based questions appear in different flavours in the CAT verbal section. It could be questions where you are asked to spot the section of a sentence that is gramatically incorrect or it could be questions where a part of a sentence in underlined and you are provided with four or five alternative choices. You have to select the choice that0 corrects the error in the underlined part.
   
   More recently in CAT 2005, questions on grammar appeared with a twist. A set of 4 sentences were given and you had to find out how many out of the 4 sentences were gramatically correct.
   
   A good understanding of the basics of English grammar coupled with adequate exercises on the different types of common errors that appear in CAT will help you sail through these kinds of questions.
   
   

3. Verbal Reasoning

   These questions could take multiple forms. The most common one is that of rearranging sentences of a paragraph. It could also include paraphrasing what has been said in a paragraph. In some CAT papers questions similar to the ones that appear in the Critical Reasoning section of GMAT have been tested.
   
   CAT 2006 witnessed the comeback of Fact Inference Judgement questions. These questions which were a standard feature in CAT in the early 90s made a comeback in 2006. You will be given 3 or 4 sentences and will be asked to select which of the statements is a fact, which a judgement and which an inference.

Click Here for a sample verbal test paper.