Select the correct mirror image of the given figure when the mirror is placed at MN.

Correct — C. MN is the vertical line drawn to the right of the row, so the mirror stands beside the characters, not under them.

Rule: a vertical mirror reverses the order of the row and flips every character left-to-right.

Order first. K G 2 F 7 p e must come back as e p 7 F 2 G K: the K is printed farthest from MN, so it stays farthest from MN and finishes at the right-hand end.

Then the shapes. The e becomes a reversed e, the p becomes a q with its bowl swung to the left of the stem and the tail still below the line, and 7, F, 2, G and K each face the other way.

Option (c) is the row that does both: its K sits at the right opening leftwards, and its second character is a q.

Why the others are wrong

• (a)
  The second character is a b — the p turned upside-down, bowl still on the right and the stem now rising. A sideways mirror never moves a stroke from below the line to above it.
• (b)
  The p is left exactly as printed, bowl on the right of the stem. Reversing the order is only half a reflection; every glyph has to turn as well.
• (d)
  The order is never reversed — K is still leftmost. K is printed farthest from MN, so in the reflection it must stay farthest from MN, at the right-hand end.

A mirror on a vertical line does two things at once, and the options are written so that you can forget one of them.

First the order reverses: what was nearest the line stays nearest it, so the row reads back to front. Second, every character is itself flipped left-to-right.

Capitals with a vertical axis of symmetry — A, H, I, M, O, T, U, V, W, X, Y — come back unchanged. The rest do not: p becomes q, and 2, 7, F, G and K all turn round.

The character that settles most of these items is the asymmetric one, here the p.

Key facts

• A vertical mirror reverses the order of the characters and flips each one left-to-right.
• Capitals symmetric about a vertical axis (A, H, I, M, O, T, U, V, W, X, Y) are unchanged by a vertical mirror.
• Under a vertical mirror p becomes q, while a top-to-bottom flip would turn it into b.

Common traps

• Reversing the order but forgetting to flip the individual characters.
• Flipping the characters but leaving them in their printed order.
• Turning an asymmetric letter upside-down instead of sideways, which gives b where q belongs.

No directly related past PYQ was found.