How many times have you sat UMAT?

Hi all,

well I have a case of serious pre-umat result jitters, I know everyone says don't stress you can't predict your results, but I'm convinced the only way I could have done worse would have been to not show up at all

Anyway without going into the long and short of it, I'm after some positive stories from people who have sat UMAT more than once... did you really get a better mark 2nd/3rd time around? And how much better?

In studying intelligence in psychology at university, it would suggest that if the test was really valid that your results shouldn't change much from year to year... I really hope this isn't the case!

I just feel like the UMAT is my major hurdle to getting into Med as I think I interview ok (age on my side for this one!)

So who's sat the UMAT more than once? Did you have an improvement? Was it significant? How many times have you sat UMAT?

Did it twice; went from 70%tile or so to 91%tile the 2nd time. First time I (practically) didn't prepare, did so the 2nd time (about 1-2 hours a day) and got a better score.

I agree, UMAT is probably the biggest hurdle for undergrads into medicine. Its a test that not many students have really done before and have a hard time preparing for it.

That is no case to say that the interview is not hard as well. Remember that of the (lets say) 300 people given an interview, only 40-50 of them will get a spot (also depending on the uni for the ratio) so that means 5/6 applicants who got a decent UMAT score, will not get an offer.

Originally Posted by charliemac1000

In studying intelligence in psychology at university, it would suggest that if the test was really valid that your results shouldn't change much from year to year

I don't think the umat is designed to assess anything that is constant (ie. Your innate personality). And I think how well you perform on the day is largely affected by how much sleep you had, whether you ran out of energy half way through, whether your nerves got the best of you and you made silly mistakes... etc. I'm only guessing here but I assume that having gone through the ordeal at least once before allows you to be in a better mind frame for the exam the next time you take it.

Originally Posted by mighty

I don't think the umat is designed to assess anything that is constant (ie. Your innate personality). And I think how well you perform on the day is largely affected by how much sleep you had, whether you ran out of energy half way through, whether your nerves got the best of you and you made silly mistakes... etc. I'm only guessing here but I assume that having gone through the ordeal at least once before allows you to be in a better mind frame for the exam the next time you take it.

This. Yes, theoretically, if the UMAT really was just testing something innate and unchanging, your score would be the same every time you sat it. However, as it's fairly obvious that most people who sit it twice end up with quite different scores both times, I'd suggest that only the very top and very bottom UMAT candidates would get pretty consistent scores, the ones in the middle are more likely to have more score variation due to the factors mighty outlined, as there are more people clumped around the 'middle', so the closer to the middle you are, the more any little variation in your day is going to affect you.

Did it twice. Went from 80th%ile to 93rd%ile, and I reckon I woulda studied for it about the same, but there's not a lot you can actually study for. Just do practice questions.

I dunno if anyone has published any studies on the internal consistancy of the UMAT?

Originally Posted by godoftoast

I dunno if anyone has published any studies on the internal consistancy of the UMAT?

How can they? If ACER won't tell anyone how UMAT is marked, and you're (technically) not supposed to be sitting it if you're not a real med/dent/other candidate, how could anyone tell if it's easier/harder each year? And even if they did let researchers sit it, 'difficulty' of questions would be pretty subjective...

Originally Posted by frootloop

How can they? If ACER won't tell anyone how UMAT is marked, and you're (technically) not supposed to be sitting it if you're not a real med/dent/other candidate, how could anyone tell if it's easier/harder each year? And even if they did let researchers sit it, 'difficulty' of questions would be pretty subjective...

Unis or tertiary admins like QTAC could simply collect the data from their records and see if people improved, decreased or stayed same in the UMAT year-to-year.

Originally Posted by godoftoast

Unis or tertiary admins like QTAC could simply collect the data from their records and see if people improved, decreased or stayed same in the UMAT year-to-year.

Problem is, that any individual variation could be (as mighty suggested) due to personal circumstances on the day, 'prep' (even though I maintain the 'prep' by itself doesn't help, rather the perception that you're 'ready for it'), rather than the test being easier/harder.
The only way to do that kind of study would be to get ACER to release the last 2-3 years worth of tests, and get like 1000 people to sit them all either back-to-back or in a non-stress environment (ie; where the marks mean nothing to their future careers).
ETA: Also, I'd suggest that the second time around, people know what they're in for, which will likely make them less stressed, so more likely to do better, systematically improving the results of the second/third timers, so the test would look 'easier' each year, unless you could somehow control for that.

Don't forget that (particularly around the mid-range percentiles) UMAT scores have a fairly narrow distribution. Therefore if you just look at the percentiles, they can make it appear as though scores fluctuate more than they really do. I'm not saying that scores don't change (hell, mine changed a fair bit between my two attempts), just that it's easy to overestimate this effect.