Abstract Reasoning Practice Questions for SEAL (ACER HAST): 12 Examples with Answers
Abstract Reasoning Practice Questions for SEAL (ACER HAST): 12 Examples with Answers
If your target SEAL school tests through ACER's Higher Ability Selection Test (HAST) rather than EduTest, there's one section that catches almost every family off guard: abstract reasoning. It doesn't appear in EduTest's SEAL paper at all, so students who've only prepared using EduTest-style materials are often seeing this question format for the first time on exam day.
Below are 12 practice questions across the main abstract reasoning formats, with the answer and reasoning behind each explained.
For the full breakdown of how HAST differs from EduTest, see our companion guide.
→ See: ACER HAST vs EduTest: Which SEAL Test Format Does Your School Use?
What Abstract Reasoning Actually Tests
Unlike verbal or numerical reasoning, abstract reasoning has no words and no numbers. It presents a sequence, set, or grid of shapes, patterns, or symbols and asks the student to identify the rule governing them — then apply it to find the missing piece, the next item, or the odd one out.
There's nothing to "know" going in. It's purely visual-logical pattern recognition, which is exactly why it feels unfamiliar to students who haven't specifically practised it — the skill doesn't overlap with reading, vocabulary, or curriculum maths the way EduTest's other sections do.
Shape Sequences
Identify the rule and determine what comes next in the sequence.
1. A sequence of squares grows one dot in each corner at a time: 0 dots, 1 dot, 2 dots, 3 dots — how many dots on the next square? Answer: 4 dots. The rule adds one dot per step, moving around the corners in order.
2. A triangle rotates 90° clockwise at each step. If it starts pointing up, where does it point after 3 steps? Answer: Pointing left. Three 90° clockwise turns from "up" moves through right, down, to left.
3. A shape alternates between growing larger and smaller at each step, while also alternating between black and white. What does the 5th shape in the sequence look like, if the 1st is a small black circle? Answer: A small black circle. The pattern repeats every 4 steps (small-black, large-black, small-white, large-white), so the 5th shape matches the 1st.
Matrices (3×3 Grids)
Find the missing piece that completes the pattern in a 3×3 grid, where each row and column follows a consistent rule.
4. Each row of a grid shows a shape with an increasing number of sides (triangle, square, pentagon) and each column shows the same shape shaded a different way (plain, striped, dotted). What goes in the bottom-right cell if the pattern is consistent? Answer: A dotted pentagon. The bottom row should be pentagons (following the row rule) and the right column should be dotted (following the column rule).
5. In a 3×3 grid, each row's shapes combine (overlay) to form the shape shown in a separate reference. If two shapes in a row are a circle and a square, and the answer combines them into an overlapping circle-and-square, what determines the third shape in that row? Answer: Whichever shape, when overlaid with the other two, produces the exact combined image shown. Matrix questions like this test whether a student can mentally combine or subtract shapes, not just spot a repeating pattern.
Odd One Out (Shapes)
Identify which shape doesn't share the same rule as the others.
6. Four shapes are shown, three with exactly 4 sides and internal symmetry (a square, a rectangle, a rhombus), and one irregular quadrilateral with no symmetry. Which is the odd one out? Answer: The irregular quadrilateral. The others all have at least one line of symmetry; the irregular shape has none.
7. Five patterns are shown: four have an even number of dots inside them (2, 4, 6, 8), and one has an odd number (5). Which is the odd one out? Answer: The pattern with 5 dots. The others all follow an even-number rule.
8. Four figures are rotations of the same base shape; one is a mirror image (reflection) rather than a rotation. Which is the odd one out? Answer: The mirror-image figure. Rotating a shape never produces a mirror image — reflections and rotations are different transformations, and this trips up students who assume any "flipped-looking" shape is just rotated further.
Analogies (Shape-Based)
Find the shape that completes the second pair using the same relationship as the first.
9. A small triangle is to a large triangle as a small circle is to ___ Answer: A large circle. The relationship is small-to-large of the same shape.
10. A shape with 3 sides shaded black is to a shape with 3 sides shaded white as a shape with 5 sides shaded black is to ___ Answer: A shape with 5 sides shaded white. The relationship is colour inversion, independent of the number of sides.
11. A square inside a circle is to a circle inside a square as a triangle inside a circle is to ___ Answer: A circle inside a triangle. The relationship is swapping which shape is inside and which is outside.
12. Two overlapping circles forming a small shared region is to two overlapping circles forming a large shared region as two overlapping squares with a small shared region is to ___ Answer: Two overlapping squares with a large shared region. The relationship is the degree of overlap increasing, independent of which shape is used.
How to Practise This Properly
Because abstract reasoning is unfamiliar to most students at first, the highest-value early practice is simply exposure to variety — working through many different pattern types so the underlying transformations (rotation, reflection, colour inversion, growth, overlap) become recognisable quickly, rather than each one feeling like a brand new puzzle.
A few principles that help:
- Always check rotation vs reflection separately. These are the two transformations students confuse most often, and confirming which one applies is often the fastest way to eliminate wrong answers.
- Look at rows and columns independently in matrix questions, then combine the rules. Trying to solve the whole grid at once is slower and more error-prone than isolating the row rule, then the column rule.
- Practise under time pressure once the formats feel familiar. Like verbal and numerical reasoning, the exam rewards speed as much as accuracy — spotting the transformation in a few seconds, not a few minutes.
→ See: How Long Does It Take to Improve Verbal and Numerical Reasoning Scores?
Frequently Asked Questions
Does EduTest's SEAL paper include abstract reasoning at all? No — EduTest's five-section SEAL format uses verbal reasoning, numerical reasoning, reading comprehension, mathematics, and writing. Abstract reasoning is specific to ACER's HAST. Confirm which provider your target school uses before deciding what to practise.
Is abstract reasoning harder than verbal reasoning? Not inherently — they test different kinds of pattern recognition. Students with strong visual-spatial thinking often find abstract reasoning more intuitive than word-based verbal reasoning, and vice versa.
Can prior maths ability help with abstract reasoning? Not directly — there's no arithmetic involved. Some overlap exists with spatial reasoning skills, but abstract reasoning is closer to visual puzzle-solving than to any curriculum subject.
How many abstract reasoning questions are typically in the HAST exam? The exact count varies by administration, but expect a meaningful, timed section — treat it with the same seriousness as any other section rather than assuming it's a minor add-on.
Where can I find more questions like these? PassPrep's free ACER HAST-format SEAL practice test includes a full timed abstract reasoning section with instant results, so you can see exactly how your child performs before exam day.