[jeremyrichman]

This may be an odd first post, especially considering I’ve only taken one section thus far, but I hope I’m not the only one who feels this way.

I frequently see everyone saying the whole, “if you think you passed you failed/if you think you failed you passed” thing. Personally I thought I passed and I was right. A small sample size I know, but it got me thinking a little bit.

There’s a very good reason why this thought persists in the forums. Think about it. People who think they passed and then actually do pass have no real reason to bring it up. Same goes for those who think they failed and they really do. It’s more likely for a person to talk about the result they didn’t see coming, in the same way that a person unhappy with a product is more likely to write a review.

Confidence is definitely a big factor as well. Some people are by nature overly confident, and some lack confidence altogether. It’s obvious what that leads to when relating it to post-test feelings.

And just to be clear, I completely understand that this does actually happen. I just think people drastically overestimate how common it is.

Thoughts?

FAR: 8/29/12 88
AUD: 10/1/12 79
BEC: 10/23/12 90
REG: 11/21/12

[Anonymous]

I think part of it has to do with the adjusted difficulty of the testlets based on how you do on the first one, right? I mean, if you do really well on testlet #1, then you will see more difficult questions in #2 and likely #3 where questions are weighted more heavily but you get more wrong and thus think that you failed. On the other hand, perhaps you are unable to tell a difference in the subsequent testlets, don't perform that great on the first one, get a lot of questions right which are not as heavily weighted and think you are going to pass because of that. I guess I fall into both camps. I really thought I passed audit, and I did. I really thought I failed far, but I passed. My two cents.

[Anonymous]

Here's the deal.

To be very honest with you. When I first started this journey 7 months ago… I was clueless. I started off with FAR and thought oh wow this is a breeze. I thought I ”studied” 200 hours and ”solved” 1500 MCQ.. I was a numbers bitch. Just read through the book once and felt accomplished. Clicked through MCQs without understanding them thinking everything will be okay. Smoked 3 days a week. Counted down till a trip back to college to party for a week after my exam.

I wasn't prepared to pass. I didn't deserve to pass. I THOUGHT I was going to pass because it's like the first time you have sex you think you were a porn star but in reality you were terrible (don't mean to offend you if you were a porn star your first time) back to the point…

The WHOLE exam is a game of confidence. How confident are you when you place an answer?

My first time, not so much, so and so on so many questions that I earned my 70.

From then on… My signature explains it. 3/3 so far, each time I walked out pretty confident that I passed.

For me PERSONALLY I can tell by how many questions I flag, because when I don't flag I am 100% confident in my answer. For BEC if I recall correctly, I flagged 12-14. Got 80. For AUD I flagged 8-10. Got 85. FAR flagged 14-23. Got 86.

I don't use testlet difficulty as a gauge for the most part. For BEC = no change in difficulty. For AUD = I was super prepared..the questions got shorter and SEEMED easier on T2 and T3, and I see how tricky the bastards who make this exam are because had I not been confident that I was doing well, I would've tripped. As for FAR… I found the first testlet hard. Second was similar and seemed a bit harder, 3rd was the same as well. So it seemed like my BEC experience and I was pretty sure I passed because of my SIM performance too.

I don't want to jinx my predictions as I hope to 1-shot REG come November. I do plan on sharing my amazing study technique with this forum once I depart. I just want to make sure it's fail proof as it will have given me 4/4 with pretty decent scores and minimal study effort.

[mla1169]

I think based on the 2 years I've been here, and the hundreds of responses to threads I've read, that its not really drastically overestimated.

FAR- 77
AUD -49, 71, 84
REG -56,75!
BEC -75

Massachusetts CPA (non reporting) since 3/12.

[Marivy22]

I think you need to be honest with yourself….

AUD – felt confident and passed

FAR 1st time – felt horrible and failed with a stupid 74

FAR 2nd time – felt great and passed

BEC – walked out of the testing center feeling confused and passed….still not sure how

REG 1st time – felt OK and failed

REG 2nd time – not bad but with doubts and passed

Still a mistery 😉

Done 😉
Class of 2012!!!!
Lots of prayers and hard work....

[Anonymous]

Here's how I felt for each of the exams…

FAR – 1st one I took and was 99% sure I failed – passed with an 84

AUD – Felt I passed and got a 94

BEC – Had no clue how I did. Most of the COSO questions (and there were tons of them!) I had no clue about, but a lot of other people were complaining about them on here as well. Thought I got most of the calculation problems but was unsure on a lot of the theory ones – passed with a 79.

REG – this one blew my mind. I didn't think I did that great, but thought I had a chance of passing based on my experience with FAR. I looked up some of the questions I could remember when I got home, and got about 80% of those wrong. I knew my score would be lower than FAR, but I wasn't sure how much lower. Ended up with an 89?

I'm convinced that the grading is done relative to other test takers which is why it's hard to figure out how you do.

[jalban1324]

@jeremyrichman

The whole theory has held true for me. I totally agree with your analogy about bad reviews, but at the same, I base my opinion on this on my 3 exams.

AUD- super stressed out, no idea how I might have done

REG- felt very hard, did't think I answered any of the SIMS correctly

FAR- felt good, didn't mark a single question, 80% on the SIMS?

A (05/23/12) 92
R (07/02/12) 77
F (08/29/12) 69 Retake 2/27/13 80
B (10/22/12) 79

[littlenumberrobot]

I just passed my first exam. And I felt different coming out of it then all the others, but because I had never passed before, I thought I would fail. Now I am actually worried that I am overconfident for my next exam having one passed, so I try not to think about it. My scores in the high 60's I “thought” I passed only because I did understand the matieral but I had not mastered it enough(not enough MCQ practiced) My low scores were because I didnt even make it through the material before testing!! No way I could have passed so I never thought I had. My 2 cents! Happy Friday all!!

CA CPA - All because of the journey listed below
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
FAR - 53('10), 8/25/12 79 PASSED!
REG - 66('11), 69('12), 12/06/12 77 PASSED!!
BEC - 58('10), 74('12), 01/05/13 77 PASSED!!!
AUD - 43('11), 66('12), 69('13), 74('13) 7/29/13 85 PASSED!!!!!

(Combinations of Roger, Yaeger, Wiley Book, Wiley TB, & NINJA Notes)

Ethics 90%

[jeremyrichman]

@cpatime I look forward to reading about this plan, even though I hope to be done around the same time as you.

@mla I get that a lot of people on here say that, but based on NASBA's twitter it's possible that a couple hundred thousand tests have been taken in the two years you're referring to. So those hundreds of responses are a very small amount, but people think it's indicative of the entire population (sorry just started studying for AUD). And like I said in the original post, people are more likely to talk about it when they fall into the category in question. I had no plans to come here and say “hey guys I thought I passed… and I did!” I only said it because I was trying to make a point. I still think it's drastically overestimated.

FAR: 8/29/12 88
AUD: 10/1/12 79
BEC: 10/23/12 90
REG: 11/21/12

[jeremyrichman]

I don't want to sound cynical here, but I think most people who respond to this will be the ones who believe the saying is true. I could be wrong, but I should have seen that coming.

@apbandj I agree with the part about how the scoring is done. That's a different topic entirely, but I think it's silly when the AICPA tries to say the scores are completely independent. I mean, don't they publicly state that the way their scoring works is by calculating the question difficulty from past results? I'm not sure they know what the definition of a curve is…

FAR: 8/29/12 88
AUD: 10/1/12 79
BEC: 10/23/12 90
REG: 11/21/12

[Keely]

From my experience reading these boards, when people think they passed then end up failing, they usually fail by a pretty big margin. Like, below 70. So, basically, they had no idea what was going on, even though they thought they did.

A lot of people who think they failed but passed (myself included w/ REG) get confused with the SIMs. They are almost impossible to figure out because most of the time, you barely know what they're asking you for! This means you have no idea what your score is going to be, so you start to feel bad and think you failed. This happened to me with REG. This was the first exam I truly felt bad about and that it was just really difficult. As you can see, I passed, but not the way I'd passed BEC and AUD.

And the most important factor is, the exam is not a %. I know damn well I didn't get 75% on the REG exam, but I got 82 points. I agree with the person above who said trust your instinct. It is usually right, especially if you have some exams under your belt, you can better gauge what the outcome is going to be.

BEC: (4/2012) 88
AUD: (5/2012) 91
REG: (8/2012) 82
FAR: (1/2013) 78 🙂

VA CPA #42010

[Anonymous]

@cpatime

Did you quit smoking all together for the exmas? I honestly dont believe that would affect a test taker as I did all through out college and still managed a mid 3 point GPA. I think it depends on if you cut study time to do that activity? what are your thoughts. This is a question i always wondered with other candidates but for obvious reasons didnt want to ask. I dont think its any worse than going out drinking a couple nights a week. Its personal preference in my opinion!

[kobebryant168]

None of you can have better experience than me about this…haha, just saying

AUD, totally felt good about it, got a 74, second time, half and half feeling after exam and ended up passing.

BEC, my worst worst exp, I had extreme confidence I would pass for the first 3 times, all failed. but on the 4th time, I had a fever on exam date, I mean 102F fever on that date, I wanted to reschedule but it was the last day of the window, so I stucked with it…Almost fainted when I was midway of 2nd testlet…I was like, F* this, I ll just move on, did 3rd testlet in 15 minutes or so, then wrote my WC quickly and left the center….expecting to reschedule for next window, holy! I passed with a fever condition

FAR, my most ridiculous one, I left out 2.5 simulations blank and passed! o wait, probably 3.5 simulations as I wasn't even able to find the answer for the research question. Felt extremely sad walking out, I asked myself how I should re-study, questioning myself did I study hard enough, how could I beat this FAR beast with those kind of simulation, I was extremely depressed and panic coz I have no clue of how to pass FAR after the exam experience. Ended up I Passed

REG, this is absolutely my nightmare now, I hardly need to flag on the MCQs because I was really confident for the last 2 exam experience, I expect myself to score 80+ for sure…but i ended up 70 and 74, and now still struggling to find a way to pass this beast. The only way for me to do is to practice more simulations. One of the guys here, forgot the name sorry, he said they will park me at 74 if I don't score comparable on sims….

The thread title draws my attention, FOR ME, it is better not to feel I will pass

[Anonymous]

REG: i was 100% sure that that i will fail this exam by 2-3 points but i scored 81.

AUD : i thought i will score between 75-79 & I scored 74. URGHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

[Anonymous]

@Jeremy You seem to be on the right track anyway so no worries, I hope you'll be around when I submit it though, it's unique in a sense.

@D21 I wish I could elaborate on the topic, but this is not the place/time to discuss smoking habits.

[jenuno01]

@cpatime, you've made a lot of ppl curious to hear about your minimal effort study technique. Why not just share it now? 🙂

Class of 2012

[Author]

Replies