Two years of trial forms, then one national date
The 1928 date is the first administration. The AAMC notice reported in January 1931 describes what came next: after two years of experimental work, a committee had a form that correlated well with success in the medical course. At a meeting in Denver the association voted to recommend it to member schools as an additional criterion, not a replacement for grades.
The rules were simple. Every institution with students applying to medicine would give it on the same day, once a year, and each medical school would get its applicants' scores plus a distribution chart.
Frederick G. Novy, chair of the executive committee, said the committee had “not deemed it wise to make the tests a requirement,” though taking it would help anyone hoping to apply elsewhere.
Admit 7 in 15. How many still drop out?
Each dot is an applicant: test score across, later performance in medical school up. Schools take the top 47% by score (7,000 of 15,000); anyone below the red line drops out, which is 20% of applicants. Change how well the test predicts performance and see what happens to the dropout rate among those admitted.
Six to eight subtests per form, drawn from seven kinds
Questions were true-false and multiple choice. No source we found gives the order or timing of any one form, and the score scale changed from form to form. The AAMC's own history, quoted second-hand, gives a single norm-referenced total running from 0 to 385.
The memory-heavy design was criticised at the time for predicting only the first two, lecture-and-recall years of medical school.
Study the bench for 10 seconds
Visual memory is one of the documented subtest kinds: the taker looks at a picture, it is taken away, and questions follow. Here the picture is a bench of glassware, followed by four questions from memory.
The medical test was one of a set: Moss's group also tested teachers, salesmen and social intelligence
Pick a spine. The three people behind the series are below it.
0–385, 200–800, 1–15, 3–45, 472–528
Sources cited on this page
- [1]The Michigan Daily (18 January 1931), p. 2: report on the AAMC aptitude tests to be given 13 February 1931.Bentley Library textUsed for: Hero figures, test date, Denver vote, administration rules, Novy quote.
- [2]McGaghie, W. C. (2002). Assessing readiness for medical education: evolution of the Medical College Admission Test. JAMA, 288(9), 1085–1090.PubMedUsed for: 5–50% attrition range, 6–8 subtests and their focus, later phases.
- [3]Smedley, B. D., Stith Butler, A., & Bristow, L. R. (Eds.) (2004). In the Nation's Compelling Interest, ch. “Reconceptualizing admissions policies and practices.” National Academies Press.NCBI BookshelfUsed for: First administration 1928; 20% → 7% dropout alongside other reforms.
- [4]Wikipedia. Medical College Admission Test (history and format sections).en.wikipedia.orgUsed for: Seven subtest topics, contemporary criticism, 1946–2015 formats and score scales.
- [5]Wikipedia. Fred August Moss (citing GWU records, Columbia alumni register, AAMC reports).en.wikipedia.orgUsed for: Moss biography, Hunt and Omwake as co-builders, 1925 objective exams.
- [6]National Museum of American History. Psychological Test, Teaching Aptitude Test (Moss, Hunt & Wallace).si.eduUsed for: Five parts of the teaching test; Hunt's dates.
- [7]Cornell University Library, Rare and Manuscript Collections: test collection box 48 (Moss: Social Intelligence Test 1931–1955; Teaching Aptitude Test Form 1, 1927; Test for Ability to Sell Form 1, 1929).archives.library.cornell.eduUsed for: GWU series titles and dates.
- [8]Wikipedia. Thelma Hunt.en.wikipedia.orgUsed for: Center for Psychological Service, later aptitude tests.
- [9]Student Doctor Network forum (2008), quoting the AAMC's former online MCAT history.forums.studentdoctor.netUsed for: 0–385 score range only; second-hand, flagged in text.
What changed in this revision
Moss's committee reports in the AAMC journal (1932, 1936, 1939, 1941) exist but were not read for this revision. The 1931 newspaper page was read in full. MCAT is a registered mark of the AAMC.
- CORRECTED“More than half of US medical students failing to finish.” Sources give 5–50% by school; the AAMC figure reported in 1931 was over 20% of those admitted.
- CORRECTED“Six sections” in a fixed order with memory first. Sources give 6–8 subtests per form from seven kinds, with no fixed order documented.
- REMOVED“3 hours,” “used with minor revisions,” “given at the applicant's own college,” and “~85,000 applicants a year.” None sourced. The same-day rule is now quoted from the 1931 report.
- CORRECTED1946 name: “Professional School Aptitude Test” until 1948, not “Professional Aptitude Test for Medicine.”
- ADDED1928 vs 1931 dating, the Michigan Daily account, selection simulator, GWU test series, Moss/Hunt/Omwake, score scale by era, 9 references.
- KEPTThe visual-memory reconstruction, now labelled as one documented subtest kind rather than “Section 1.”
Related historical tests
Brigham's College Board test came two years earlier and also called itself an aptitude test rather than an achievement test. Moss's medical test used the same framing. Both promised to predict success in a course of study, not grade past schooling.
The Graduate Record Office developed the 1946 MCAT under contract to the AAMC. When it merged into the new Educational Testing Service in 1948, the test took the MCAT name. The GRE page covers that office's own exam.
Law schools adopted a national admissions test twenty years after medicine, and ETS built it too. Comparing the two shows how the medical model of single-day, nationally normed screening spread.
Moss took his Columbia MA under Edward Thorndike in 1921. Thorndike's CAVD scale, from the same years, tried to measure intellect by the difficulty of tasks completed. The Moss test is an applied cousin, built to predict success in one course of study.
The American Council on Education's yearly test was the general college-freshman exam of the period. Medical schools faced the same question colleges did: whether a short paper test could forecast who would finish.
Wartime group testing showed that thousands could sit a timed, objectively scored paper on one day. The AAMC's 1931 rule of one national test date applied that logistics to medical applicants.