Capp Verbal and Critical Reasoning Assessments are popular choices for employers who are seeking to recruit candidates for graduate, professional, or managerial positions. The test is unique when compared to other psychometric tests and offers employers a more comprehensive view of the applicant’s skills than other tests in these areas do.
Capp specializes in psychometric testing for businesses in a variety of industries, though the industries that use the tests most often are finance and legal fields. The reason Capp reasoning tests are so popular is because they focus on innate strengths and abilities of each candidate, which allows employers to have a better idea of what the candidate is capable of.
What Is the Capp Assessment?
Capp assessments are psychometric tests that can be administered online or as part of an assessment centre. The Capp tests are popular choices for pre-employment testing of graduates and job-seekers since the testing is adaptive and responsive to the candidates’ previous answers.
Test questions are pulled from an expansive test bank, and the company claims that there is a one-in-a-billion chance that two applicants have the same test. This means that employers have a higher confidence in the accuracy and security of the test.
Verbal Reasoning Capp’s Verbal Reasoning test assesses the applicant’s ability to use basic grammar and punctuation, reason using words, and choose appropriate vocabulary for different situations.
Critical Reasoning The critical reasoning assessment, in particular, is often used for positions in the legal sector. It assesses the candidate’s ability to think critically when provided with information that must be processed.
Situational Strengths Situational Strengths is like most other situational judgment tests in format and asks candidates to answer a series of questions based on a work-related scenario. The results are tested against an employer-determined set of strengths.
While Capp offers all of these, the verbal and critical reasoning tests are the most popular assessments Capp offers, so this article will focus mainly on preparing for those two. The details for the tests are discussed in the next section. Much of it applies to all of the Capp assessments. The specifics for preparing for the verbal and critical reasoning tests have their own section.
What Will Be on the Assessments?
Capp tests are much more challenging than other psychometric tests for a number of reasons. First, they are adaptive. As candidates correctly answer previous questions, the difficulty level of the following questions increases. It also adjusts the other way. If candidates struggled with the previous questions, the difficulty level of upcoming questions is decreased.
Another reason the tests tend to be more challenging is because Capp does not impose a time limit on the tests. This means they are able to ask more difficult questions and give more of them to those taking the exams. Time is still factored into the score, however, so candidates are not able to take as much time as they want unless they want it to affect their final results.
What are Major Differences in Capp Tests?
Capp’s tests are different from other psychometric tests out there because they test more thoroughly. Due to the lack of a formal time limit, they are able to include more on the test, and they take full advantage of that. The major differences in these two tests occur mostly in the verbal reasoning test where Capp assesses verbal dexterity, comprehension, interpretation, and adaptability in addition to the usual verbal aptitude sections other exams test.
The question format is another major difference. Rather than presenting applicants with a simple multiple-choice format, Capp also provides questions with drop-down multiple choice, rank, text field, and drag-and-drop formats.
On the verbal aptitude assessment, Capp uses free text editing where candidates type answers directly into the question, bucket sort which requires candidates to place items into the category or style of writing it best fits, drag and drop, ranking, and fill-in-the-blank questions. This allows them more freedom to understand the applicant’s knowledge of and ability to apply error checking, grammar, spelling, punctuation, vocabulary and understanding of word meanings, and many other areas of verbal aptitude.
With the critical reasoning assessment, the questions are all drop-down menu style and focus on inference, recognition of assumptions, deduction, interpretation, and evaluation of arguments. The test questions are presented as passages of information with a set of statements in the drop-down menu. Candidates then choose the appropriate response.
How to Prepare for Capp Verbal and Critical Reasoning Tests
Capp tests are far more extensive exams than most online psychometric aptitude tests, so your preparation for them should be more extensive as well. The practice you do needs to be specific to the Capp format as well because they test differently than other assessment companies do.
Test Prep Guidelines
As such, when choosing practice exams and preparation packages, try to make sure they are specific to the Capp battery of assessments. Otherwise, they may not be similar enough to help you.
Furthermore, the Capp critical reasoning tests are fundamental parts of the recruitment process particularly in UK positions for top graduate and managerial jobs. Chances are high that you will need to take Capp assessments if you live in the UK, and it does affect job placement greatly, so you should prepare extensively for this test if you are located in the UK.
When preparing, keep in mind that the tested areas are broader than most similar tests. You need to know more. Both the verbal and the critical reasoning tests will require you to read large passages of information and understand them in order to answer the questions. Question formats are also more expansive than many other tests. This means that you really need to spend time honing skill areas that you might not otherwise think about, particularly for the verbal reasoning test.
Preparing for the Verbal Reasoning Test
Brushing up on your knowledge of grammar, punctuation, and vocabulary is a wise decision as you prepare for the Capp Verbal Reasoning assessment. These areas may not be so extensively tested in other psychometric tests, but Capp includes sections that require you to understand these things.
One of the best ways you can prepare for the more unusual sections of the Capp Verbal Reasoning assessment is to do proofreading and editing. It does not need to be some big, long assignment, but find simple proofreading and editing exercises online if you can. It will help you to refresh your memory on grammar and punctuation.
Taking the time to do reading comprehension exercises and working on assignments that require recognition of different styles of verbal material or the ability to adapt material to different audiences and media may also improve your verbal reasoning test scores. This and the editing section are the main areas that are unique to Capp and may cause unprepared applicants difficulty.
Capp Tips for Achieving High Scores
Be ready to rate your confidence in your responses on the Critical Reasoning assessment. Candidates are asked to do this in addition to answering the actual question.
There is no time limit, but the time you take to complete the exams is compared to others applying for the job, so work as quickly as possible.
Have paper and pencil available.
Have a clock on hand.
Ensure a quiet workspace free of interruptions.
Don’t skip questions if you are unsure and try to avoid guessing. Always double check your answers, particularly in the free-text questions on the Verbal Reasoning test.
Be aware that you may need to take the tests a second time later in the recruitment process for result verification.
Brush up on your math skills since the lack of time limit means the numerical test is more complex.
Companies That Use Capp Tests
These are some of the many companies that use Capp assessment:
The Capp assessments may seem daunting at first. They are certainly not easy exams and are considered among the most difficult psychometric tests available in today’s market. However, they are still manageable with proper time and attention devoted to practice and preparation.
That is the key to success. Do not take the tests lightly and be aware that they will be harder than most other exams that test the same areas. Then prepare accordingly until you feel confident in yourself and your skills. Whatever you do, do not allow the difficult subject matter and the unusual format to throw you off.
It is possible to do well on these tests, and you should not feel that it is impossible for you. Capp and other companies provide free online resources to help you to get ready for the assessments. If you take full advantage of these resources, you should be able to ace your Capp Verbal and Critical Reasoning tests.
