Prepping for the GRE, le sigh
So, yesterday I bought a GRE prep book. Started studying this morning. Reading through the beginning I laughed out loud when I came across this paragraph:
“[while taking the GRE] You will see a fourth, unidentified, experiment section on your GRE. This section will either be Math or Verbal and will look exactly like the real Math or Verbal section… but it won’t count towards your score. ETS (Educational Testing Services) uses this experimental section to test GRE questions for use on future exams. This means that part of your test fee pays for the privilege of serving as a research subject for ETS.” (my italics)
Gee, thanks.
This one also caught my eye:
“Lesson One: The GRE definitely does NOT measure your intelligence, nor does it measure how well you will do in graduate school. The sooner you accept this, the better off you’ll be. Despite what ETS says or admissions officers think, the GRE is less a measure of your intelligence than it is a measure of your ability to take the GRE.” (my italics)
Huh?
I can entertain the argument that doing well on the GRE demonstrates one’s acumen in recognizing patterns and “cracking” systems, but I’m having a hard time understanding why it’s required for graduate programs in the social sciences, especially anthropology. Wasn’t Clifford Geertz onto something when he claimed that “turning culture into folklore and collecting it, turning it into traits and counting it, turning it into institutions and classifying it, turning it into structures and toying with it” (i.e. over-systematizing it) are all escapes from the reality of what being an ethnographer is all about. Namely, accepting the facts that “cultural analysis is intrinsically incomplete” and that anthropology (interpretive anthropology, at least) is more about the refinement of debate than the perfection of consensus. And furthermore that, in addition to it being intrinsically incomplete, cultural analysis is “not an experimental science in search of law but an interpretive one in search of meaning.”
It seems to me that by spending multiple months studying intensly for a test that doesn’t measure my intelligence nor predict with any validity how well I will do in graduate school I am only reinforcing the overly systematic thinking that, from Geertz’s point of view, has stifled cultural analysis and by extension the discipline of anthropology.
Oh, well. I’m still gonna study for the damn thing. It’s actually mildly enjoyable, in a strange, masochistic kind of way.
Hi, Adam.
Sounds like the authors of the prep book had a particular slant! To paraphrase — “You won’t get through the GRE by being smart, you’ll have to use our clever techniques…”
Any standardized test that requires reason and logic has to be testing intelligence to some degree.
I’m not sure whether you saw Susanne Jaeggi and Martin Buschkuehl’s study on Improving Fluid Intelligence by Training Working Memory (PNAS April 2008) — the team recorded increases in mental agility (fluid intelligence) of more than 40% after 19 days of focused training with a progressive dual n-back training method. Now that’s test prep with a higher purpose.
martin
Hey martin,
Thanks for pointing that out. I’ll have to take a look.
Who were their participants? Did they attempt to see if their measures were valid cross-culturally? If I understand fluid intelligence (g) correctly, and if I also understand how cognitive psychologists understand it, it should be applicable cross-culturally, right?
Bleh. I had the sudden realization the other day that I’m going to have to start studying for this thing if I’m going to grad school…I thought I was done with math forever, dangit!
I also read the thing about the extra math or verbal section – I forget what it is, but there’s a way you can tell which section is the experimental one if your extra section happens to be the Verbal one, I think because of the way the sections are ordered. Seems like it would defeat the purpose if you knew which one to spend your time on. And even more convoluted that there is standardized testing being conducted to contribute to further standardized testing that “is less a measure of your intelligence” than it is your capability to take the test. Brilliant.
I feel for you, man. I just finished my thesis and defend next week. Dr. Strate is my overlord!!
I have a perspective on the GRE and its purpose. It’s a natural deterrent to the uncommitted. If you aren’t able to commit to the energy and stress of going through the GRE process (keyword: process) you probably don’t belong in grad school. Your score is almost an afterthought, however a bad score will screw you over.
The way to think of it is, it’s information you can learn, memorize, and keep in your short term memory and then expel like bad sushi when it’s all over. I was okay with my score, although I know I can do better, but I don’t think about it anymore at all. Thesis finished. PhD apps next.
Good to hear the perspective of a grad student. Helps post-undergrad neophytes like myself get a grip! So far studying hasn’t been so bad, not as bad as I thought it would be. It’s actually kind of enjoyable learning a bunch of new words for concepts, feelings, and things I didn’t know before… kinda makes me feel more connected to the world around me.
I say that now, but then again I haven’t made it to the math section yet ::gulp::