Importance of Critical Reasoning in CAT
This article is meant to make aspirants realize the importance of CAT critical reasoning. At the end of the article we have linked many CAT critical reasoning questions, which students must practice to improve their CAT critical reasoning skills.
Many of you might wonder as to why should you waste your time studying critical reasoning for CAT when it is not directly tested in CAT or in any other exam. Though we associate critical reasoning with GMAT and GRE, we often forget that critical reasoning type of questions are often found in CAT Reading Comprehension as well. For instance, almost 50 percent of the CAT 2018 reading comprehension questions were of critical reasoning type. There were many questions that were based on strengthening of author’s argument, weakening of author’s argument, justifying the author’s expectations and the like, not to mention the usual inference questions that most aspirants dread.
Why should you practice critical reasoning questions?
For me and for most teachers, critical reasoning is a precursor to reading comprehension. Critical reasoning helps you build the reasoning foundation that you would later use while answering the reading comprehension questions. Critical reasoning questions often involve a short passage, of not more than 150 words, followed by one or at times two questions. The questions test your ability to understand short arguments, and use your reasoning to arrive at the right answer.
The reasoning process used in reading comprehension is very similar to the reasoning process used in critical reasoning. The force of the evidence often decides the force of the argument; also, the reasoning involved in the argument brings out the persuasiveness of the argument. We weaken the argument by finding flaws in the reasoning used by the author, or by finding some weakness in the evidence presented. Likewise, we strengthen the argument by supporting the reasoning involved in the argument, or by finding additional strengths in the evidence provided by the author.
What areas of reading comprehension can you improve?
By solving critical reasoning questions, you can fine-tune your option elimination techniques. At the end, this is exactly what matters in reading comprehension.
Thus critical reasoning is the foundation of reading comprehension, and students who are struggling in reading comprehension have greater chances of improving their performance if they rigorously practice a good no of critical reasoning questions.
Critical Reasoning Practice Sets
CAT Verbal Ability (topic wise) Questions with Solutions
| Reading Compehension | Parajumbles |
| Odd One Out (Odd Sentence) | Paragraph Summary |
| Critical Reasoning | Grammar |
| Daily articles to improve Reading Comprehension |