How Your Knowledge of Biology Will Be Tested

The SAT II Biology tests your knowledge of biology in three different ways. Knowing how your knowledge may be tested should help you better prepare yourself for the exam.

Recall Questions.

These questions test your basic knowledge of the fundamental facts and terminology of biology. A typical recall question might ask you to pick out the function of ribosomes or to name the nitrogenous base that DNA and RNA do not have in common. These questions are straightforward—they’re simply a matter of knowing your stuff. Some recall questions might be organized in sets around a figure, as in the example of the questions about the structure of the heart we described earlier.

Interpretation and Application Questions.

These questions test your ability to digest data or biological scenarios and to extrapolate answers from that understanding. These questions often necessitate that you are able to use, in tandem, your knowledge of different topics in biology. An interpretation and application question might present a scenario in which the temperature drops and then ask you to predict how this change will affect the metabolism of a lizard and a dog. To answer this question you have to realize, first, that a question about the change in metabolism due to temperature is asking about warm-blooded and cold-blooded animals. To get the question right, you must first recall that a dog is warm-blooded and a lizard cold-blooded. Then you have to understand how a lowered temperature will affect each type of animal (as temperatures decrease, the metabolism of a cold-blooded animal will slow down, while the metabolism of the warm-blooded animal will remain constant).

Laboratory Questions.

Laboratory questions describe a situation in a laboratory and often provide you with data. To answer these questions, you must be able to read and understand the data, to form hypotheses and conclusions based on the data, and to be able to identify the goals and assumptions underlying the experiment.

Basic Math and the SAT II Biology

The writers of the SAT II Biology assume that you are able to deal with basic mathematical concepts, such as ratios and proportions. They also assume that you know the metric system. You will not be allowed to use a calculator on the test, which isn’t a big deal because you won’t have to do any calculations more difficult than multiplication.

Scoring on the SAT II Biology is the same as scoring for all other SAT II tests. For every right answer, you earn one point. For every wrong answer, you lose

¹ /₄ of a point. For each question you leave blank, you earn zero points. These points combined equal your raw score. ETS converts your raw score to a scaled score using a curve tailored to the particular test you take.

For example, on an 80 question test, you could score:

• 800 if you answered 79 right and left 1 blank
• 750 if you answered 73 right, 4 wrong, and left 3 blank
• 700 if you answered 67 right, 8 wrong, and left 5 blank
• 650 if you answered 60 right, 12 wrong, and left 8 blank
• 600 if you answered 54 right, 16 wrong, and left 10 blank