SAT

The Reading Test of the SAT contains one section of 52 questions and a time limit of 65 minutes.[27] All questions are multiple-choice and based on reading passages. Tables, graphs, and charts may accompany some passages, but no math is required to correctly answer the corresponding questions. There are five passages (up to two of which may be a pair of smaller passages) on the Reading Test and 10-11 questions per passage or passage pair. SAT Reading passages draw from three main fields: history, social studies, and science. Each SAT Reading Test always includes: one passage from U.S. or world literature; one passage from either a U.S. founding document or a related text; one passage about economics, psychology, sociology, or another social science; and, two science passages. Answers to all of the questions are based only on the content stated in or implied by the passage or passage pair.[28]

The Writing and Language Test of the SAT is made up of one section with 44 multiple-choice questions and a time limit of 35 minutes.[27] As with the Reading Test, all questions are based on reading passages which may be accompanied by tables, graphs, and charts. The test taker will be asked to read the passages, suggest corrections or improvements for the contents underlined. Reading passages on this test range in content from topic arguments to nonfiction narratives in a variety of subjects. The skills being evaluated include: increasing the clarity of argument; improving word choice; improving analysis of topics in social studies and science; changing sentence or word structure to increase organizational quality and impact of writing; and, fixing or improving sentence structure, word usage, and punctuation.[29]

An example of an SAT "grid-in" math question and the correctly gridded answer.

The mathematics portion of the SAT is divided into two sections: Math Test – Calculator and Math Test – No Calculator. In total, the SAT math test is 80 minutes long and includes 58 questions: 45 multiple choice questions and 13 grid-in questions.[30] The multiple choice questions have four possible answers; the grid-in questions are free response and require the test taker to provide an answer.

• The Math Test – No Calculator section has 20 questions (15 multiple choice and 5 grid-in) and lasts 25 minutes.
• The Math Test – Calculator section has 38 questions (30 multiple choice and 8 grid-in) and lasts 55 minutes.

Several scores are provided to the test taker for the math test. A subscore (on a scale of 1 to 15) is reported for each of three categories of math content: "Heart of Algebra" (linear equations, systems of linear equations, and linear functions), "Problem Solving and Data Analysis" (statistics, modeling, and problem-solving skills), and "Passport to Advanced Math" (non-linear expressions, radicals, exponentials and other topics that form the basis of more advanced math). A test score for the math test is reported on a scale of 10 to 40, with an increment of 0.5, and a section score (equal to the test score multiplied by 20) is reported on a scale of 200 to 800.[31][32][33]

All scientific and most graphing calculators, including Computer Algebra System (CAS) calculators, are permitted on the SAT Math – Calculator section only. All four-function calculators are allowed as well; however, these devices are not recommended. All mobile phone and smartphone calculators, calculators with typewriter-like (QWERTY) keyboards, laptops and other portable computers, and calculators capable of accessing the Internet are not permitted.[34]

Research was conducted by the College Board to study the effect of calculator use on SAT I: Reasoning Test math scores. The study found that performance on the math section was associated with the extent of calculator use: those using calculators on about one third to one half of the items averaged higher scores than those using calculators more or less frequently. However, the effect was "more likely to have been the result of able students using calculators differently than less able students rather than calculator use per se."[35] There is some evidence that the frequent use of a calculator in school outside of the testing situation has a positive effect on test performance compared to those who do not use calculators in school.[36]

Most of the questions on the SAT, except for the optional essay and the grid-in math responses, are multiple choice; all multiple-choice questions have four answer choices, one of which is correct. Thirteen of the questions on the math portion of the SAT (about 22% of all the math questions) are not multiple choice.[37] They instead require the test taker to bubble in a number in a four-column grid.

All questions on each section of the SAT are weighted equally. For each correct answer, one raw point is added.[38] No points are deducted for incorrect answers. The final score is derived from the raw score; the precise conversion chart varies between test administrations.

The SAT is offered seven times a year in the United States: in August, October, November, December, March, May, and June. For international students SAT is offered four times a year: in October, December, March and May. The test is typically offered on the first Saturday of the month for the October, November, December, May, and June administrations.[39][40] The test was taken by 2,198,460 high school graduates in the class of 2020.[2]

Candidates wishing to take the test may register online at the College Board's website or by mail at least three weeks before the test date.

The SAT costs US$49.50 (£39.50, €43.50) (US$64.50 with the optional essay), plus additional fees of over US$45 if testing outside the United States as of 2019.[8] The College Board makes fee waivers available for low income students. Additional fees apply for late registration, standby testing, registration changes, scores by telephone, and extra score reports (beyond the four provided for free).

Students with verifiable disabilities, including physical and learning disabilities, are eligible to take the SAT with accommodations. The standard time increase for students requiring additional time due to learning disabilities or physical handicaps is time + 50%; time + 100% is also offered.

The following chart summarizes the original percentiles used for the version of the SAT administered in March 2005 through January 2016. These percentiles used students in the graduating class of 2006 as the comparison group.[44][45]

The version of the SAT administered before April 1995 had a very high ceiling. In any given year, only seven of the million test-takers scored above 1580. A score above 1580 was equivalent to the 99.9995 percentile.[47]

In 2015 the average score for the Class of 2015 was 1490 out of a maximum 2400. That was down 7 points from the previous class's mark and was the lowest composite score of the past decade.[15]

Pioneered by Stanley Kaplan in 1946 with a 64-hour course,[52] SAT preparation has become a highly lucrative field.[53] Many companies and organizations offer test preparation in the form of books, classes, online courses, and tutoring.[54] The test preparation industry began almost simultaneously with the introduction of university entrance exams in the U.S. and flourished from the start.[55]

Nevertheless, the College Board maintains that the SAT is essentially uncoachable and research by the College Board and the National Association of College Admission Counseling suggests that tutoring courses result in an average increase of about 20 points on the math section and 10 points on the verbal section.[56] An early meta-analysis (from 1983) found similar results and noted "the size of the coaching effect estimated from the matched or randomized studies (10 points) seems too small to be practically important."[57] Statisticians Ben Domingue and Derek C. Briggs examined data from the Education Longitudinal Survey of 2002 and found that the effects of coaching were only statistically significant for mathematics; moreover, coaching had a greater effect on certain students than others, especially those who have taken rigorous courses and those of high socioeconomic status.[58] A 2012 systematic literature review estimated a coaching effect of 23 and 32 points for the math and verbal tests, respectively.[55] A 2016 meta-analysis estimated the effect size to be 0.09 and 0.16 for the verbal and math sections respectively, although there was a large degree of heterogeneity.[59]

The College Board announced a partnership with the non-profit organization Khan Academy to offer free test-preparation materials starting in the 2015–16 academic year to help level the playing field for students from low-income families.[17][15]

In 2009, education researchers Richard C. Atkinson and Saul Geiser argued that high school GPA is better than the SAT at predicting college grades regardless of high school type or quality.[60] However, a 2020 report released by the University of California academic senate found that the SAT was better than high school GPA at predicting first year GPA, and just as good as high school GPA at predicting undergraduate GPA, first year retention, and graduation. This predictive validity was found to hold across demographic groups.[61] A series of College Board reports similar predictive validity across demographic groups.[62][63]

Psychometricians Thomas R. Coyle and David R. Pillow showed in 2008 that the SAT predicts college GPA even after removing the general factor of intelligence (g), with which it is highly correlated.[64] A 2012 study from the University of Minnesota using multi-institutional data set revealed that even after controlling for socioeconomic status and high-school GPA, SAT scores were still as capable of predicting freshman GPA among university or college students.[65]

A longitudinal study published in 2005 by educational psychologists Jonathan Wai, David Lubinski, and Camilla Benbow suggests that among the intellectually precocious (the top 1%), those with higher scores in the mathematics section of the SAT at the age of 12 were more likely to earn a PhD in the STEM fields, to have a publication, to register a patent, to secure university tenure.[66][67]

Like other standardized tests like the ACT or the GRE, the SAT is a traditional method for assessing the academic aptitude of students who have had vastly different educational experiences and as such is focused on the common materials that the students could reasonably be expected to have encountered throughout the course of study. As such the mathematics section contains no materials above the precalculus level, for instance. Psychologist Raymond Cattell referred to this as testing for "historical" rather than "current" crystalized intelligence.[68]

Frey and Detterman (2004) investigated associations of SAT scores with intelligence test scores. Using an estimate of general mental ability, or g, based on the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery, they found SAT scores to be highly correlated with g (r=.82 in their sample, .857 when adjusted for non-linearity) in their sample taken from a 1979 national probability survey. Additionally, they investigated the correlation between SAT results, using the revised and recentered form of the test, and scores on the Raven's Advanced Progressive Matrices, a test of fluid intelligence (reasoning), this time using a non-random sample. They found that the correlation of SAT results with scores on the Raven's Advanced Progressive Matrices was .483, they estimated that this correlation would have been about 0.72 were it not for the restriction of ability range in the sample. They also noted that there appeared to be a ceiling effect on the Raven's scores which may have suppressed the correlation.[69] Beaujean and colleagues (2006) have reached similar conclusions to those reached by Frey and Detterman.[70]

Psychometrician Linda Gottfredson noted that the SAT is effective at identifying intellectually gifted college-bound students.[71]

In 2010, physicists Stephen Hsu and James Schombert of the University of Oregon examined five years of student records at their school and discovered that the academic standing of students majoring in mathematics or physics (but not biology, English, sociology, or history) was strongly dependent on SAT mathematics scores. Students with an SAT mathematics scores below 600 were highly unlikely to excel as a mathematics or physics major. Nevertheless, they found no such patterns between the SAT verbal, or combined SAT verbal and mathematics and the other aforementioned subjects.[72][67]

In 2015, educational psychologist Jonathan Wai of Duke University analyzed average test scores from the Army General Classification Test in 1946 (10,000 students), the Selective Service College Qualification Test in 1952 (38,420), Project Talent in the early 1970s (400,000), the Graduate Record Examination between 2002 and 2005 (over 1.2 million), and the SAT Math and Verbal in 2014 (1.6 million). Wai identified one consistent pattern: those with the highest test scores tended to pick the physical sciences and engineering as their majors while those with the lowest were more likely to choose education and agriculture. (See figure below.)[67][73]

For decades many critics have accused designers of the verbal SAT of cultural bias as an explanation for the disparity in scores between poorer and wealthier test-takers.[74] A famous example of this bias in the SAT I was the oarsman–regatta analogy question, which is no longer part of the exam.[75] The object of the question was to find the pair of terms that had the relationship most similar to the relationship between "runner" and "marathon". The correct answer was "oarsman" and "regatta". The choice of the correct answer was thought to have presupposed students' familiarity with rowing, a sport popular with the wealthy. Analogy questions were removed in 2005.

Research from the University of California system published in 2001 found that after controlling for family income and parental education, the already low ability of the SAT to measure aptitude and college readiness fell sharply while the more substantial aptitude and college readiness measuring abilities of high school GPA and the SAT II each remained undiminished (and even slightly increased). The University of California system required both the SAT and the SAT II from applicants to the UC system during the four years included in the study. They further found that, after controlling for family income and parental education, the tests known as the SAT II (renamed SAT Subject Tests in 2005) measure aptitude and college readiness 10 times higher than the SAT.[21]

On the other hand, a 2012 paper from psychologists at the University of Minnesota analyzing multi-institutional data sets suggested that the SAT maintained its ability to predict collegiate performance even after controlling for socioeconomic status (as measured by the combination of parental educational attainment and income) and high-school GPA. This means that SAT scores were not merely a proxy for measuring socioeconomic status, the researchers concluded.[65][76] Moreover, they found that the socioeconomic status distributions of the student bodies of the schools examined reflected those of their respective applicant pools.[65]

According to the College Board, in 2019, 56% of the test takers had parents with a university degree, 27% parents with no more than a high-school diploma, and about 9% who did not graduate from high school. (8% did not respond to the question.)[14]

The largest association with gender on the SAT is found in the mathematics section, where male students, on average, score higher than female students by approximately 30 points.[77] In 2013, the American College Testing Board released a report stating that boys outperformed girls on the mathematics section of the test.[78] In 2014, psychologist Stephen Ceci and his collaborators found boys did better than girls across the percentiles. For example, a girl scoring in the top 10% of her sex would only be in the top 20% among the boys.[79][80] In 2010, psychologist Jonathan Wai and his colleagues showed, by analyzing data from three decades involving 1.6 million intellectually gifted seventh graders, that in the 1980s the gender gap in the mathematics section of the SAT among students scoring in the top 0.01% was 13.5:1 in favor of boys but dropped to 3.8:1 by the 1990s.[81][80]

Some researchers point to evidence in support of greater male variability in spatial ability and mathematics. Greater male variability has been found in body weight, height, and cognitive abilities across cultures, leading to a larger number of males in the lowest and highest distributions of testing.[82] Consequently, a higher number of males are found in the upper extreme of the performance distributions of the mathematics sections of standardized tests such as the SAT, resulting in the observed gender discrepancy.[83][80] Paradoxically, this is at odds with the tendency of girls to have higher classroom scores than boys.[80]

Although aspects of testing such as stereotype are a concern, research on the predictive validity of the SAT has demonstrated that it tends to be a more accurate predictor of female GPA in university as compared to male GPA.[84]

Cognitive neuroscientists Richard Haier and Camilla Persson Benbow employed positron emission tomography (PET) scans to investigate the rate of glucose metabolism among students who have taken the SAT. They found that among men, those with higher SAT mathematics scores exhibited higher rates of glucose metabolism than with lower scores, contradicting the brain-efficiency hypothesis. This trend, however, was not found among women. Both sexes scored the same on average in their sample. According to them, this is evidence for the structural differences of the brain between the sexes.[85][86]

SAT Verbal average scores by race or ethnicity from 1986-87 to 2004-05

SAT Math average scores by race or ethnicity from 1986-87 to 2004-05

On average, black, Hispanic, and Native American students perform on the order of one standard deviation lower on the SAT than white and Asian students.[87][88][89][90] Mathematics appears to be the more difficult part of the exam.[14] In 1996, the black-white gap in the mathematics section was 0.91 standard deviations, but by 2020, it fell to 0.79.[91] 2020 was the year in which education worldwide was disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic and indeed, the performance of students in the United States on standardized tests, such as the SAT, suffered. Asians, however, were the exception.[92] According to the College Board, in 2020, while 83% of Asian students met the benchmark of college readiness in reading and writing and 80% in mathematics, only 44% and 21% of black students did those respective categories. Among whites, 79% met the benchmark for reading and writing and 59% did mathematics. For Hispanics and Latinos, the numbers were 53% and 30%, respectively. (See figure below.)[91]

Some researchers believe that the difference in scores is closely related to the overall achievement gap in American society between students of different racial groups. This gap may be explainable in part by the fact that students of disadvantaged racial groups tend to go to schools that provide lower educational quality. This view is supported by evidence that the black-white gap is higher in cities and neighborhoods that are more racially segregated.[93] Other research cites poorer minority proficiency in key coursework relevant to the SAT (English and math), as well as peer pressure against students who try to focus on their schoolwork ("acting white").[94] Cultural issues are also evident among black students in wealthier households, with high achieving parents. John Ogbu, a Nigerian-American professor of anthropology, concluded that instead of looking to their parents as role models, black youth chose other models like rappers and did not make an effort to be good students.[95]

One set of studies has reported differential item functioning, namely, that some test questions function differently based on the racial group of the test taker, reflecting differences in ability to understand certain test questions or to acquire the knowledge required to answer them between groups. In 2003, Freedle published data showing that black students have had a slight advantage on the verbal questions that are labeled as difficult on the SAT, whereas white and Asian students tended to have a slight advantage on questions labeled as easy. Freedle argued that these findings suggest that "easy" test items use vocabulary that is easier to understand for white middle class students than for minorities, who often use a different language in the home environment, whereas the difficult items use complex language learned only through lectures and textbooks, giving both student groups equal opportunities to acquiring it.[96][97][98] The study was severely criticized by the ETS board, but the findings were replicated in a subsequent study by Santelices and Wilson in 2010.[99][100]

There is no evidence that SAT scores systematically underestimate future performance of minority students. However, the predictive validity of the SAT has been shown to depend on the dominant ethnic and racial composition of the college.[101] Some studies have also shown that African-American students under-perform in college relative to their white peers with the same SAT scores; researchers have argued that this is likely because white students tend to benefit from social advantages outside of the educational environment (for example, high parental involvement in their education, inclusion in campus academic activities, positive bias from same-race teachers and peers) which result in better grades.[102]

Christopher Jencks concludes that as a group, African Americans have been harmed by the introduction of standardized entrance exams such as the SAT. This, according to him, is not because the tests themselves are flawed, but because of labeling bias and selection bias; the tests measure the skills that African Americans are less likely to develop in their socialization, rather than the skills they are more likely to develop. Furthermore, standardized entrance exams are often labeled as tests of general ability, rather than of certain aspects of ability. Thus, a situation is produced in which African-American ability is consistently underestimated within the education and workplace environments, contributing in turn to selection bias against them which exacerbates underachievement.[102]

By analyzing data from the National Center for Education Statistics, economists Ember Smith and Richard Reeves of the Brookings Institution deduced that the number of students taking the SAT increased at a rate faster than population and high-school graduation growth rates between 2000 and 2020. The increase was especially pronounced among Hispanics and Latinos. Even among whites whose number of high-school graduates was shrinking, the number of SAT takers rose.[91] In 2015, for example, 1.7 million students took the SAT,[13] but in 2019, a record-breaking 2.2 million students took the exam, compared to 2.1 million in 2018, another record-breaking year.[14] The rise in the number of students taking the SAT was due in part to many school districts offering to administer the SAT during school days often at no further costs to the students.[14]

Psychologists Jean Twenge, W. Keith Campbell, and Ryne A. Sherman analyzed vocabulary test scores on the U.S. General Social Survey (${\displaystyle n=29,912}$) and found that after correcting for education, the use of sophisticated vocabulary has declined between the mid-1970s and the mid-2010s across all levels of education, from below high school to graduate school. However, they cautioned against the use of SAT verbal scores to track the decline for while the College Board reported that SAT verbal scores had been decreasing, these scores were an imperfect measure of the vocabulary level of the nation as a whole because the test-taking demographic has changed and because more students took the SAT in the 2010s than in the 1970s, meaning there were more with limited ability who took it.[16]

Certain high IQ societies, like Mensa, the Prometheus Society and the Triple Nine Society, use scores from certain years as one of their admission tests. For instance, the Triple Nine Society accepts scores (verbal and math combined) of 1450 or greater on SAT tests taken before April 1995, and scores of at least 1520 on tests taken between April 1995 and February 2005.[103]

The SAT is sometimes given to students at age 12 or 13 by organizations such as the Study of Mathematically Precocious Youth (SMPY), Johns Hopkins Center for Talented Youth, and the Duke University Talent Identification Program (TIP) to select, study, and mentor students of exceptional ability, that is, those in the top one percent.[86] Among SMPY participants, those within the top quartile, as indicated by the SAT composite score (mathematics and verbal), were markedly more likely to have a doctoral degree, to have at least one publication in STEM, to earn income in the 95th percentile, to have at least one literary publication, or to register at least one patent than those in the bottom quartile. Duke TIP participants generally picked career tracks in STEM should they be stronger in mathematics, as indicated by SAT mathematics scores, or the humanities if they possessed greater verbal ability, as indicated by SAT verbal scores. For comparison, the bottom SMPY quartile is five times more likely than the average American to have a patent. Meanwhile, as of 2016, the shares doctorates among SMPY participants was 44% and Duke TIP 37%, compared to two percent among the general U.S. population.[104]

In 2002, New York Times columnist Richard Rothstein argued that the U.S. math averages on the SAT and ACT continued their decade-long rise over national verbal averages on the tests while the averages verbal portions on the same tests were floundering.[105]

In the 1960s and 1970s there was a movement to drop achievement scores. After a period of time, the countries, states and provinces that reintroduced them agreed that academic standards had dropped, students had studied less, and had taken their studying less seriously. They reintroduced the tests after studies and research concluded that the high-stakes tests produced benefits that outweighed the costs.[106]

In a 2001 speech to the American Council on Education, Richard C. Atkinson, the president of the University of California, urged dropping the SAT as a college admissions requirement:

Anyone involved in education should be concerned about how overemphasis on the SAT is distorting educational priorities and practices, how the test is perceived by many as unfair, and how it can have a devastating impact on the self-esteem and aspirations of young students. There is widespread agreement that overemphasis on the SAT harms American education.[107]

During the 2010s, over 1,230 American universities and colleges opted to stop requiring the SAT and the ACT for admissions, according to FairTest, an activist group opposing standardized entrance exams. Most, however, were small colleges, with the notable exceptions of the University of California system and the University of Chicago.[108] Also on the list are institutions catering to niche students, such as religious colleges, arts music conservatories, or nursing schools, and the majority of institutions in the Northeastern United States.[12] On one hand, making the SAT and the ACT optional for admissions enables schools to attract a larger pool of applicants of a variety of socioeconomic backgrounds. One the other hand, grade inflation is a genuine problem and letters of recommendation are not a good indicator of collegiate performance.[11] In addition, not requiring standardized test scores means that schools will have to formulate a new methodology for admissions or to develop their own entrance exams.[108]

In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, over 400 institutions decided to waive the requirement of the SAT or the ACT for admissions because it was challenging both to administer and to take these tests, resulting in many cancellations. Some schools chose to make them optional on a temporary basis only, either for just one year, as in the case of Princeton University, or three, like the College of William & Mary. Others dropped the requirement completely. This did not stop highly ambitious students from taking them, however.[13]

For many parents and college-bound teenagers, the process of "holistic admissions" is rather vague and uncertain, as schools try to access characteristics not easily discerned via a number, hence the growth in the number of test takers attempting to make themselves more competitive even if this parallels an increase in the number of schools declaring it optional.[13]

In 2005, MIT Writing Director Pavan Sreekireddy plotted essay length versus essay score on the new SAT from released essays and found a high correlation between them. After studying over 50 graded essays, he found that longer essays consistently produced higher scores. In fact, he argues that by simply gauging the length of an essay without reading it, the given score of an essay could likely be determined correctly over 90% of the time. He also discovered that several of these essays were full of factual errors; the College Board does not claim to grade for factual accuracy.

Perelman, along with the National Council of Teachers of English, also criticized the 25-minute writing section of the test for damaging standards of writing teaching in the classroom. They say that writing teachers training their students for the SAT will not focus on revision, depth, accuracy, but will instead produce long, formulaic, and wordy pieces.[109] "You're getting teachers to train students to be bad writers", concluded Perelman.[110]

On June 17, 1901, the first exams of the College Board were administered to 973 students across 67 locations in the United States, and two in Europe. Although those taking the test came from a variety of backgrounds, approximately one third were from New York, New Jersey, or Pennsylvania. The majority of those taking the test were from private schools, academies, or endowed schools. About 60% of those taking the test applied to Columbia University. The test contained sections on English, French, German, Latin, Greek, history, geography, political science, biology, mathematics, chemistry, and physics. The test was not multiple choice, but instead was evaluated based on essay responses as "excellent", "good", "doubtful", "poor" or "very poor".[121]

The first administration of the SAT occurred on June 23, 1926, when it was known as the Scholastic Aptitude Test.[122][123] This test, prepared by a committee headed by Princeton psychologist Carl Campbell Brigham, had sections of definitions, arithmetic, classification, artificial language, antonyms, number series, analogies, logical inference, and paragraph reading. It was administered to over 8,000 students at over 300 test centers. Men composed 60% of the test-takers. Slightly over a quarter of males and females applied to Yale University and Smith College.[123] The test was paced rather quickly, test-takers being given only a little over 90 minutes to answer 315 questions.[122] The raw score of each participating student was converted to a score scale with a mean of 500 and a standard deviation of 100. This scale was effectively equivalent to a 200 to 800 scale, although students could score more than 800 and less than 200.[116]

In 1928, the number of sections on the SAT was reduced to seven, and the time limit was increased to slightly under two hours. In 1929, the number of sections was again reduced, this time to six. These changes were designed in part to give test-takers more time per question. For these two years, all of the sections tested verbal ability: math was eliminated entirely from the SAT.[122]

In 1930 the SAT was first split into the verbal and math sections, a structure that would continue through 2004. The verbal section of the 1930 test covered a more narrow range of content than its predecessors, examining only antonyms, double definitions (somewhat similar to sentence completions), and paragraph reading. In 1936, analogies were re-added. Between 1936 and 1946, students had between 80 and 115 minutes to answer 250 verbal questions (over a third of which were on antonyms). The mathematics test introduced in 1930 contained 100 free response questions to be answered in 80 minutes and focused primarily on speed. From 1936 to 1941, like the 1928 and 1929 tests, the mathematics section was eliminated entirely. When the mathematics portion of the test was re-added in 1942, it consisted of multiple-choice questions.[122]

Until 1941, the scores on all SATs had been scaled to a mean of 500 with a standard deviation of 100. Although one test-taker could be compared to another for a given test date, comparisons from one year to another could not be made. For example, a score of 500 achieved on an SAT taken in one year could reflect a different ability level than a score of 500 achieved in another year. By 1940, it had become clear that setting the mean SAT score to 500 every year was unfair to those students who happened to take the SAT with a group of higher average ability.[124]

In order to make cross-year score comparisons possible, in April 1941 the SAT verbal section was scaled to a mean of 500, and a standard deviation of 100, and the June 1941 SAT verbal section was equated (linked) to the April 1941 test. All SAT verbal sections after 1941 were equated to previous tests so that the same scores on different SATs would be comparable. Similarly, in June 1942 the SAT math section was equated to the April 1942 math section, which itself was linked to the 1942 SAT verbal section, and all SAT math sections after 1942 would be equated to previous tests. From this point forward, SAT mean scores could change over time, depending on the average ability of the group taking the test compared to the roughly 10,600 students taking the SAT in April 1941. The 1941 and 1942 score scales would remain in use until 1995. [124] [125]

Paragraph reading was eliminated from the verbal portion of the SAT in 1946, and replaced with reading comprehension, and "double definition" questions were replaced with sentence completions. Between 1946 and 1957, students were given 90 to 100 minutes to complete 107 to 170 verbal questions. Starting in 1958, time limits became more stable, and for 17 years, until 1975, students had 75 minutes to answer 90 questions. In 1959, questions on data sufficiency were introduced to the mathematics section and then replaced with quantitative comparisons in 1974. In 1974, both verbal and math sections were reduced from 75 minutes to 60 minutes each, with changes in test composition compensating for the decreased time.[122]

From 1926 to 1941, scores on the SAT were scaled to make 500 the mean score on each section. In 1941 and 1942, SAT scores were standardized via test equating, and as a consequence, average verbal and math scores could vary from that time forward.[124] In 1952, mean verbal and math scores were 476 and 494, respectively, and scores were generally stable in the 1950s and early 1960s. However, starting in the mid-1960s and continuing until the early 1980s, SAT scores declined: the average verbal score dropped by about 50 points, and the average math score fell by about 30 points. By the late 1970s, only the upper third of test takers were doing as well as the upper half of those taking the SAT in 1963. From 1961 to 1977, the number of SATs taken per year doubled, suggesting that the decline could be explained by demographic changes in the group of students taking the SAT. Commissioned by the College Board, an independent study of the decline found that most (up to about 75%) of the test decline in the 1960s could be explained by compositional changes in the group of students taking the test; however, only about 25 percent of the 1970s decrease in test scores could similarly be explained.[120] Later analyses suggested that up to 40 percent of the 1970s decline in scores could be explained by demographic changes, leaving unknown at least some of the reasons for the decline.[126]

In early 1994, substantial changes were made to the SAT.[127] Antonyms were removed from the verbal section in order to make rote memorization of vocabulary less useful. Also, the fraction of verbal questions devoted to passage-based reading material was increased from about 30% to about 50%, and the passages were chosen to be more like typical college-level reading material, compared to previous SAT reading passages. The changes for increased emphasis on analytical reading were made in response to a 1990 report issued by a commission established by the College Board. The commission recommended that the SAT should, among other things, "approximate more closely the skills used in college and high school work".[122] A mandatory essay had been considered as well for the new version of the SAT; however, criticism from minority groups, as well as a concomitant increase in the cost of the test necessary to grade the essay, led the College Board to drop it from the planned changes.[128]

Major changes were also made to the SAT mathematics section at this time, due in part to the influence of suggestions made by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. Test-takers were now permitted to use calculators on the math sections of the SAT. Also, for the first time since 1935, the SAT would now include some math questions that were not multiple choice, and would require students to supply the answers for those questions. Additionally, some of these "student-produced response" questions could have more than one correct answer. The tested mathematics content on the SAT was expanded to include concepts of slope of a line, probability, elementary statistics including median and mode, and problems involving counting.[122]

By the early 1990s, average combined SAT scores were around 900 (typically, 425 on the verbal and 475 on the math). The average scores on the 1994 modification of the SAT I were similar: 428 on the verbal and 482 on the math.[129] SAT scores for admitted applicants to highly selective colleges in the United States were typically much higher. For example, the score ranges of the middle 50% of admitted applicants to Princeton University in 1985 were 600 to 720 (verbal) and 660 to 750 (math).[130] Similarly, median scores on the modified 1994 SAT for freshmen entering Yale University in the fall of 1995 were 670 (verbal) and 720 (math).[131] For the majority of SAT takers, however, verbal and math scores were below 500: In 1992, half of the college-bound seniors taking the SAT were scoring between 340 and 500 on the verbal section and between 380 and 560 on the math section, with corresponding median scores of 420 and 470, respectively.[132]

The drop in SAT verbal scores, in particular, meant that the usefulness of the SAT score scale (200 to 800) had become degraded. At the top end of the verbal scale, significant gaps were occurring between raw scores and uncorrected scaled scores: a perfect raw score no longer corresponded to an 800, and a single omission out of 85 questions could lead to a drop of 30 or 40 points in the scaled score. Corrections to scores above 700 had been necessary to reduce the size of the gaps and to make a perfect raw score result in an 800. At the other end of the scale, about 1.5 percent of test-takers would have scored below 200 on the verbal section if that had not been the reported minimum score. Although the math score averages were closer to the center of the scale (500) than the verbal scores, the distribution of math scores was no longer well approximated by a normal distribution. These problems, among others, suggested that the original score scale and its reference group of about 10,000 students taking the SAT in 1941 needed to be replaced.[124]

Beginning with the test administered in April 1995, the SAT score scale was recentered to return the average math and verbal scores close to 500. Although only 25 students had received perfect scores of 1600 in all of 1994, 137 students taking the April test scored 1600.[133] The new scale used a reference group of about one million seniors in the class of 1990: the scale was designed so that the SAT scores of this cohort would have a mean of 500 and a standard deviation of 110. Because the new scale would not be directly comparable to the old scale, scores awarded on April 1995 and later were officially reported with an "R" (for example, "560R") to reflect the change in scale, a practice that was continued until 2001.[124] Scores awarded before April 1995 may be compared to those on the recentered scale by using official College Board tables. For example, verbal and math scores of 500 received before 1995 correspond to scores of 580 and 520, respectively, on the 1995 scale.[134]

Certain educational organizations viewed the SAT re-centering initiative as an attempt to stave off international embarrassment in regards to continuously declining test scores, even among top students. As evidence, it was presented that the number of pupils who scored above 600 on the verbal portion of the test had fallen from a peak of 112,530 in 1972 to 73,080 in 1993, a 36% backslide, despite the fact that the total number of test-takers had risen by over 500,000.[135] Other authors have argued that the evidence for a decline in student quality is mixed, citing that the reduced use of the SAT by elite colleges has decreased the number of high scorers on that test, that top scorers on the ACT have shown little change in the same period, and that the proportion of 17-year-olds scoring at the highest performance level on the NAEP long-term trend assessment has been roughly stable for decades.[136]

Since 1993, using a policy referred to as "Score Choice", students taking the SAT-II subject exams were able to choose whether or not to report the resulting scores to a college to which the student was applying. In October 2002, the College Board dropped the Score Choice option for SAT-II exams, matching the score policy for the traditional SAT tests that required students to release all scores to colleges.[137] The College Board said that, under the old score policy, many students who waited to release scores would forget to do so and miss admissions deadlines. It was also suggested that the old policy of allowing students the option of which scores to report favored students who could afford to retake the tests.[138]

In 2005, the test was changed again, largely in response to criticism by the University of California system.[139] In order to have the SAT more closely reflect high school curricula, certain types of questions were eliminated, including analogies from the verbal section and quantitative comparison items from the math section.[122] A new writing section, with an essay, based on the former SAT II Writing Subject Test, was added,[140] in part to increase the chances of closing the opening gap between the highest and midrange scores. Other factors included the desire to test the writing ability of each student; hence the essay. The essay section added an additional maximum 800 points to the score, which increased the new maximum score to 2400.[141] The "New SAT" was first offered on March 12, 2005, after the last administration of the "old" SAT in January 2005. The mathematics section was expanded to cover three years of high school mathematics. To emphasize the importance of reading, the verbal section's name was changed to the Critical Reading section.[122]

In March 2006, it was announced that a small percentage of the SATs taken in October 2005 had been scored incorrectly due to the test papers' being moist and not scanning properly and that some students had received erroneous scores.[142] The College Board announced they would change the scores for the students who were given a lower score than they earned, but at this point many of those students had already applied to colleges using their original scores. The College Board decided not to change the scores for the students who were given a higher score than they earned. A lawsuit was filed in 2006 on behalf of the 4,411 students who received an incorrect score on the SAT.[143] The class-action suit was settled in August 2007, when the College Board and Pearson Educational Measurement, the company that scored the SATs, announced they would pay $2.85 million into a settlement fund. Under the agreement, each student could either elect to receive $275 or submit a claim for more money if he or she felt the damage was greater.[144] A similar scoring error occurred on a secondary school admission test in 2010–2011, when the ERB (Educational Records Bureau) announced, after the admission process was over, that an error had been made in the scoring of the tests of 2010 students (17%), who had taken the Independent School Entrance Examination for admission to private secondary schools for 2011. Commenting on the effect of the error on students' school applications in The New York Times, David Clune, President of the ERB stated "It is a lesson we all learn at some point—that life isn't fair."[145]

As part of an effort to “reduce student stress and improve the test-day experience", in late 2008 the College Board announced that the Score Choice option, recently dropped for SAT subject exams, would be available for both the SAT subject tests and the SAT starting in March 2009. At the time, some college admissions officials agreed that the new policy would help to alleviate student test anxiety, while others questioned whether the change was primarily an attempt to make the SAT more competitive with the ACT, which had long had a comparable score choice policy.[146] Recognizing that some colleges would want to see the scores from all tests taken by a student, under this new policy, the College Board would encourage but not force students to follow the requirements of each college to which scores would be sent.[147] A number of highly selective colleges and universities, including Yale, the University of Pennsylvania, Cornell, and Stanford, rejected the Score Choice option at the time.[148] Since then, Cornell,[149] University of Pennsylvania,[150] and Stanford[151] have all adopted Score Choice, but Yale[152] continues to require applicants to submit all scores. Others, such as MIT and Harvard, allow students to choose which scores they submit, and use only the highest score from each section when making admission decisions. Still others, such as Oregon State University and University of Iowa, allow students to choose which scores they submit, considering only the test date with the highest combined score when making admission decisions.[153]

Beginning in the fall of 2012, test takers were required to submit a current, recognizable photo during registration. In order to be admitted to their designated test center, students were required to present their photo admission ticket—or another acceptable form of photo ID—for comparison to the one submitted by the student at the time of registration. The changes were made in response to a series of cheating incidents, primarily at high schools in Long Island, New York, in which high-scoring test takers were using fake photo IDs to take the SAT for other students.[154] In addition to the registration photo stipulation, test takers were required to identify their high school, to which their scores, as well as the submitted photos, would be sent. In the event of an investigation involving the validity of a student's test scores, their photo may be made available to institutions to which they have sent scores. Any college that is granted access to a student's photo is first required to certify that the student has been admitted to the college requesting the photo.[155]

On March 5, 2014, the College Board announced its plan to redesign the SAT in order to link the exam more closely to the work high school students encounter in the classroom.[156] The new exam was administered for the first time in March 2016.[157] Some of the major changes are: an emphasis on the use of evidence to support answers, a shift away from obscure vocabulary to words that students are more likely to encounter in college and career, a math section that is focused on fewer areas, a return to the 1600-point score scale, an optional essay, and the removal of penalty for wrong answers (rights-only scoring).[158] To combat the perceived advantage of costly test preparation courses, the College Board announced a new partnership with Khan Academy to offer free online practice problems and instructional videos.[156]

In May 2019, the College Board announced that it would calculate each SAT taker's "Adversity Score" using factors such as the proportion of students in a school district receiving free or subsidized lunch or the level of crime in that neighborhood. The higher the score, the more adversity the student faced. However, by August, this was dropped after severe backlash from the general public skeptical of how complex information can be conveyed with a single number. Instead, the College Board created a new tool called 'Landscape' to provide the same sort of details to admissions officers using government information but without calculating a score.[159]

On January 19, 2021, the College Board announced plans to discontinue the optional SAT essay following the June 2021 administration.[160][161] The College Board also announced the immediate discontinuation of SAT Subject Tests in the United States, and the elimination of Subject Tests internationally after the June 2021 administration.[161]