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Skylar March 29, 2020

@NK848, thanks for your question.

In general, we do not recommend reading the question before the passage. Following this, you would not know that the question was asking about a specific person's point until you had already read the points made by both people.

Even if you are not following this technique, I would recommend reading the entire passage. Skipping any part of the passage creates logical gaps and will invite the risk of answering the question incorrectly. Moreover, reading both points of view will set up a foundation and orient you to any disagreements. Many questions like this require an understanding of the entirety of the exchange, so I would recommend reading both points of view just in case. The risk of inaccuracy that you run by only reading one is more harmful than the time required to read both.

Does that make sense? Please let us know if you have any other questions and best of luck with your studies!

NK848 April 11, 2020

Thank you for the explanation. I have built a habit of reading the question first, as the book I was using prior to starting this course taught to do so. I didn't realize till now, when i am almost done with the course, that Lsatmax teaches the other way. Could you expand a little more on why you think I shouldn't read the questions first? I want to correct my habit if that is necessary.

Ravi April 12, 2020

NK848, happy to explain! Let me preface this by saying that there are definitely people who score very high on the test who read the question before the stimulus. That said, all of us at LSATMax strongly believe that reading the stimulus before the question is the superior approach. Here's why:

1) You're doing the same thing on all LR questions.

On LR, you're always looking for the conclusion, premise or premises, relationship between the conclusion and premises, and flaws in the argument. Then, you think about how you could either exploit those flaws or patch them up. If you are doing this on every question, then whatever the test asks you to do is trivial, as you already have a strong understanding of the whole argument and will be able to do whatever they ask.

2) Reading the stimulus first keeps you in the present moment, whereas reading the question stem first can distract you from understanding the argument

When you read the stimulus first, you are solely focused on understanding the argument to the best of your ability and identifying flaws in it. When you read the question stem first, you're more likely to be focused on looking for whatever the stem is asking you for. While at face value that sounds good, you can run into problems when what you're looking for hinges on having a really solid understanding of the argument.

3) Sometimes people forget the stem as they're reading the stimulus, which wastes time

It's not uncommon to hear people who read the stem first say that they often have to re-read it after reading the stimulus. This wastes previous time on the test and is FAR less likely to happen if you read the stimulus before the question stem.

4) Reading the stimulus first makes making predictions easier

When you have a strong understanding of the argument, you're more likely to see its flaws and be able to predict what the correct answer choice will be after you read the question stem. This makes going eliminating wrong answer choices and identifying the correct answer choice much easier.

Hope this helps. Let us know if you have any other questions!

NK848 April 15, 2020

Thank you very much. You convinced me! I think it goes a long way as a reading skill, not just for a test prep!