Mensa IQ Deductive Reasoning Puzzles Questions and Answers Flashcards

Five boxes are stacked: red is directly above blue, green is directly above red, yellow is at the bottom, and white is directly above yellow. What is the order from bottom to top?

Answer: Yellow, white, blue, red, green

Yellow is at bottom, white is above yellow, blue is below red, red is below green: Yellow→White→Blue→Red→Green.

Some musicians are athletes. All athletes are disciplined. Which must be true?

Answer: Some musicians are disciplined

Since some musicians are athletes and all athletes are disciplined, at least some musicians must be disciplined.

If A > B, B > C, and C > D, which relationship is NOT necessarily true?

Answer: D > A

D > A contradicts the chain A > B > C > D, so it is necessarily false, not just 'not necessarily true.'

A clock shows 3:15. What is the angle between the hour and minute hands?

Answer: 7.5°

At 3:15 the minute hand is at 90° and the hour hand is at 97.5° (3×30 + 15×0.5), giving a difference of 7.5°.

Only members can enter the club. Jake entered the club. What must be true?

Answer: Jake is a member

Since only members can enter and Jake entered, Jake must be a member.

Look at the series: J, F, M, A, M, J, ___. What comes next?

Answer: O

The series represents the first letters of the months: January through June, so July (J) comes next — but July is already J; the answer listed as J here is the seventh month.

Three switches control three bulbs in a room. You can flip switches then enter the room once. How many bulbs can you identify with certainty?

Answer: 3

Turn switch 1 on for a while then off, switch 2 on, leave switch 3 off; the warm-but-off bulb is switch 1, the lit bulb is switch 2, and the cold-off bulb is switch 3.