Multiple Choice, Single Answer

What does Multiple Choice, Single Answer look like?

On screen you see a passage above a single question, followed by radio-button options, you can select only one. There is no separate countdown for this item: the whole Reading section runs on one shared clock, so pacing is something you manage yourself, see Pacing & Time Control for exactly how. Both official handbooks state the rule directly: "You cannot go back to previous questions to amend your answers" (PTE Academic Test Taker Handbook, p.12; PTE Core Test Taker Handbook, p.10), so treat every choice on this task as final the moment you move on, more on navigation and locking in the earlier lesson.

How this task fits into your Reading score

Multiple Choice, Single Answer is a pure Reading item: it contributes to your Reading skill score and nothing else. Several other tasks on the exam are integrated instead, contributing to Reading alongside another skill, and the exact list differs between Academic and Core, see How PTE Reading Is Scored for exactly which tasks those are.

Every correct item adds to your Reading skill score on the 10–90 scale, which then feeds into the thresholds universities, employers and immigration authorities set. If you haven't already, check your target Reading score in Orientation & Score Targets before you decide how much practice time this task deserves relative to the others.

How is Multiple Choice, Single Answer scored?

Both exams score this task the same way: it is a straight correct/incorrect item worth one point, with no partial credit and no penalty for a wrong choice. That's different from its close cousin, Multiple Choice, Multiple Answers, which subtracts a point for every wrong option you tick. Listening has its own Multiple Choice, Single Answer task, scored the same binary way but built on a recording instead of a passage.

The scoring tables are published in Pearson's PTE Academic Score Guide and PTE Core Score Guide, if you want to see the wording behind every Reading task's scoring rule in one place.

A four-step routine for single-answer questions

• Skim first, don't hunt: Read the passage once for the main idea and overall stance before you look at the question. You're building a mental map, not memorising sentences, see skimming for structure for the technique in full.
• Read the stem literally: Underline exactly what's being asked, the main idea, a specific detail, the writer's purpose, or tone. Many wrong options answer a different question than the one asked.
• Predict, then match: Form a rough answer in your own words before you read the options. An option that echoes your prediction is far more trustworthy than one that simply repeats a word from the passage.
• Eliminate before you commit: Cross out any option that contradicts the passage, introduces information that isn't there, or only partly matches. What's left is your answer, even if it doesn't sound perfectly confident, the full four elimination tests give you a repeatable version of this step.

Worked example: practise the routine

Run the four steps above on the short passage below before you look at the answer. Skim it once, read the question stem carefully, form your own one-sentence prediction, then eliminate options that don't match it.

Common traps in Multiple Choice, Single Answer

• Keyword match without meaning match, an option reuses a word from the passage but changes what it claims about it.
• Half-right options, true about the passage in general, but not what the specific question asked.
• Overreach, options that go further than the passage supports ("always", "proves", "the only reason").
• Opposite-direction options, reversing a cause, a preference or a conclusion the writer actually states.
• Off-topic detail, a fact taken directly from the passage, but one that doesn't answer the specific question asked.
• Plausible but unsupported, a statement that sounds reasonable in general but has no sentence in the passage backing it up.

Because this task gives you one clean pass/fail result per item, with no partial credit to blur whether your reasoning actually worked, it's a good place to calibrate your elimination skills before moving to harder tasks. After each practice item, note which trap caught you when you were wrong, keyword match, overreach, or a half-right option. That log is more useful than the raw score, and the same elimination habits transfer directly to Multiple Choice, Multiple Answers and to Answer Elimination & Common Traps, which covers the full trap catalogue across every Reading task type.