Test: Shape Completion - UCAT MCQ

The correct answer is C – The top triangle must be flipped horizontally (as in C and D). The top half should contain a circle, not an oval (reflecting the rounding of the square, not a rectangle).

Pattern: The shapes in the top and bottom halves swap positions. The shape from the top half is flipped horizontally, whilst the shape from the bottom half is flipped vertically (or rotated 180 degrees) and rounded off.

Method: Focus on the obvious point of similarity, namely that the triangle in the top half of Box 1 appears upside-down in the bottom half of Box 2. This makes it easier to deal with the bottom half of Box 1, which correspondingly gets moved into the top half of Box 2, only that it gets flipped vertically, and rounded off.

The correct answer is A – We seek a square inside a rectangle, as in A, B and C. However, the bottom rectangle should look identical because it will be flipped horizontally. This means A must be the correct answer, revealing that the pattern is for colours to switch between white and black.

Pattern: The top shape ends up inside a larger version of the bottom shape, which is inverted. The question alone does not make it clear whether the shapes swap colours with each other or merely swap between white and black – however, we can tell this from the available answers.

Method: Concentrate on Shape first – clearly, the top shape ends up inside the bottom shape, although, as is explained above, you cannot tell without the answer options what the rule on Colour is.

The correct answer is C – The answer must have only white pentagons and only white triangles – only C satisfies this (along with the other conditions of the pattern.

Pattern: The top shape elongates horizontally, staying in position and containing copies of the two shapes in the bottom half. Meanwhile, one of the shapes in the bottom half contains a vertically-elongated version of the top shape. Finally, the shape from the bottom half changes colour between white and black, whilst the shape from the top half retains its colour.

Method: Confusing as the pattern seems, the best we can do is to focus on what is inside Box 1 and where it ends up in Box 2. A rounded shape appears twice in Box 2, and only once in Box 1, and so we can infer that the shape in the top half gets stretched horizontally, whilst a vertically-elongated version (or better, a horizontally-compressed version) of the top shape appears in the bottom half of Box 2. Focussing then on the identical shapes in the bottom half, they evidently change colour, and appear internally in Box 2’s top half and externally in Box 2’s bottom half.

The correct answer is D – The outer black square will become the innermost shape, followed by the white circle, black circle and grey square.

Pattern: Every shape moves outwards one position, the outermost shape coming into the innermost spot.

Method: Concentrate on the outermost shape in Box 1, the grey heart, which ends up innermost in Box 2. This is the key to identifying this very characteristic Type 3 Question pattern.

The correct answer is D – There should be no white circle, as it is the second-innermost in the original. This immediately eliminates every option but the answer.

Pattern: The second-innermost shape is removed, and then every shape moves one position inwards, the innermost shape taking up the outermost position.

Method: The relative simplicity of Box 2 should encourage you to notice that one shape from Box 1 will be lost. The innermost shape, the white heart, becomes outermost, indicating a classic inward shift. Then, all that remains is to identify the loss of the grey diamond, i.e. the second-innermost shape.

The correct answer is D – B has the wrong combination of shapes. C has the wrong pattern in the rightmost shape. A is wrong because the shape should not be rotated, only the internal pattern, which happens to be plain white.

Pattern: The shapes rotate in an anticlockwise direction. The patterns rotate in a clockwise direction. The pattern that occupies the topmost position originally (and rightmost subsequently) is rotated clockwise slightly.

Method: Ignore Box 3, as the transformation is designed to be more confusing than in the example case. Focussing on the simplest characteristics should help here, namely the overall shapes – we have a triangle, square and circle, and these evidently move in anticlockwise rotation. The diagonal patterning suggests that the visual pattern is likely to be involved rather than the number of subdivisions. The cross moves clockwise, as do the other two patterns, only that the diagonal lines are either reflected or rotated – you must defer to the answer options.

The correct answer is A – A is the only option with appropriate colouration – B and D have reflected the colour arrangement vertically, not horizontally.

Pattern: The shape arrangement is reflected vertically; the colour pattern is reflected horizontally. Imagine 2 lines of symmetry, then focus on the colour and shapes individually to see how this works. This is a particularly hard question, so don’t be disheartened! You’re doing amazingly. 

Method: Since Box 2 still contains a 4-by-4 group of circles and squares both black and white, we should try to isolate different patterns in turn. The easiest to spot is the Colour pattern, which simply gets flipped upside-down. As far as Shape/Position goes, it is best to concentrate on squares, of which there are fewer than circles. You will notice that the squares in the top-right end up in the top-left in Box 2, and that those in the bottom-left end up in the bottom-right – in other words, Position gets flipped laterally, rather than upside-down.

The correct answer is B – We expect the square, arc, crescent and heart to disappear. C has erroneously replaced the pentagon with a hexagon.

Pattern: The shapes with an even number of sides are removed.

Method: You should notice that no shapes change in any way, with respect to Size, Position, Orientation or Colour. All that happens is that some are removed. Since Box 1 and Box 3 do not have comparable positional arrangements, you should be drawn to look for a pattern that relates to an intrinsic property amongst the removed shapes. Since these are a hexagon, a rectangle and an arrowhead, your instinct should be to look for an answer option in which the even-sided shapes from Box 3 are removed (in order to confirm the pattern).

The correct answer is D – A: the three rectangles are in the wrong positions.

B: the upper-central hexagon and central have swapped positions.

C: the central shapes have swapped to opposite sides of the pentagon.

Pattern: Lateral inversion (i.e. vertical reflection).

Method: This rule is easy to spot, and harder to apply – the difficulty lies in identifying the correct answer. You should be wary of alternative reflections, rotations, and missing or moving shapes.

The correct answer is C – Two four-sided shapes should become four two-sided shapes. Only A and C contain two-sided shapes, but A only has three copies.

Pattern: The number of sides on the repeated shape swaps with the number of copies of the shape, e.g. three five-sided shapes becomes five three-sided shapes.

Method: Although this is an unusual pattern, it’s fair to say that there are only so many ways you might be able to generate Box 2 as shown from Box 1. Pentagons are very often involved in Number-based rules, and this pattern is no different.

The correct answer is C – We are looking for a black circle within a grey diamond, inside a grey triangle within a white square.

Pattern: The outer two shapes become the inner two shapes (the outer of the two still the outer, and the inner still the inner) – and the reverse for the inner pair. In other words, the square within the circle is now inside the pentagon within the triangle.

Method: As with all patterns of this type, focus on each element in turn. Every shape in Box 1 is present in Box 2 with no change to Colour or Orientation. Thus, you can predict a pattern involving only Position. Now, the white circle goes from outermost to second-innermost, whilst the grey square goes from second-outermost to innermost; tracking each shape in this way reveals that the outer and inner pairs essentially swap position.

The correct answer is C – The white pentagon will become grey – that immediately eliminates three of the four options.

Pattern: This is just a question of colour: white shapes become grey, grey shapes become black, and black shapes become white.

Method: Quite clearly, there is no change to Size, Position, Orientation, Number or Shape. All you have to focus on, therefore, is Colour. 

The correct answer is A – Top left: 1 to 2 – top right: 6 to 3

Bottom left: 3 to 6 – bottom right: 1 to 2

Pattern: Each box contains four shapes, and the shapes themselves do not stay the same – but if the number of regions in the original shape is odd, its replacement has double the number of regions. Conversely, if the number of regions in the original shape is even, its replacement has half the number of regions.

Method: You will know, by now, to suspect that the number of regions is relevant. Assuming, first, that Position is unchanged, note that four becomes two, two becomes four, three becomes six, and five becomes ten – from these data, the pattern is readily deduced.

The correct answer is D – We are looking for shapes with 2 regions in every position other than the bottom-right, where we are looking for a shape with 4 regions.

Pattern: The shape in each position gets one additional internal region. The shape itself can change.

Method: Observe that the “shapes” (even though they change) with the most internal regions in Box 1 also have the most internal regions in Box 2 – the shape in the top-right goes from two to three, whilst the shape in the bottom-left goes from one to two. All in all, it should soon become clear that the shape in each position gains one internal region. You should expect each shape to change, though there’s nothing to suggest that this must happen.

The correct answer is A – Top half: 4 and 8; bottom half: 3 and 7.

Pattern: The two shapes in the top half gain a side; those in the bottom half lose a side.

Method: We go from four white shapes in Box 1 to four white shapes in Box 2, and none of the shapes remains the same per se. Thus, it seems reasonable to ignore Size, Position, Orientation and Colour. Focussing on Number/Shape, then, the pattern should soon reveal itself.