Best Items on the Mega Test

excerpted from a letter to me by Grady Towers

When the Mega Test was published in the April 1985 issue of Omni magazine, more than 3,000 people took the test. I was fortunate to receive a person x item score matrix from Dr. Hoeflin [available at this site -- DTM]. From these scores, I was able to select out the 12 best items able to discriminate at the one-in-a-million level. Nine are mathematical reasoning items, and only three are Verbal-educational items. Note the similarity to the SAT and GRE. [This table appears to be arranged by Mega Test problem numbering, not by factor loading -- DTM]

Item number 32 is not only the best item in the mathematical category, it is the very best item on the whole test at the super-high level.

Dr. Hoeflin's favorite item is number 36 because it is the most difficult. But difficult and best are not the same things.

* This looks "mathematical," but this is where factor analysis shows it belongs.

Return to the Uncommonly Difficult I.Q. Tests page.