Another common pattern in abstract reasoning comes in the form of rotation. Rotation is often used in conjunction with other patterns like direction and position.
What’s a rotation?
A rotation turns a shape or line about a fixed point.
This point is called the centre of rotation.
You need three things in a rotation:
The centre of rotation could allow the shape to rotate around:
The first 3 points are more difficult rotations and usually used with 3D shapes (and in very difficult abstract reasoning exams using 2D shapes). And, your more common abstract reasoning questions focus on the last dot point – a rotation around a given point (often repeated at a set position) on the page.
A well-known rotation is the Earth. While it circles the sun (it doesn’t rotate the sun), it rotates on its own imaginary axis. 1 rotation = 1 day (24 hours).
Rotation is prevalent in many abstract reasoning questions whether by itself or with other patterns. Knowing how to detect rotation as a pattern visually will help you to answer questions more quickly.
When you have a rotation pattern, express it in words as:
Previous shape rotated n degrees, clockwise/anti-clockwise at point in x position.
To detect an abstract reasoning question with rotation, you’re looking at images/parts that have:
Essentially, you’re looking for ‘invisible’ multiple points where at each point, the shape has been rotated by a given degree.
Let’s look at rotation visually (discussed in video).
Let’s apply this area now as a pattern detection method to the following question/s.
Watch video for explanation of the following question/s:
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