SSC CGL 2024 Tier-I · 12 September 2024, Shift 3 · General Intelligence and Reasoning · Question 15 of 100

Text as printed on a candidate's response sheet for this shift; answer per SSC's tentative key as marked on that sheet. Solution last reviewed 6 September 2026.

Where this paper and its answers come from

SSC does not publish CGL question papers or a public answer key. The questions and options here are reproduced as printed on a candidate's own response sheet for this shift — the Commission's text, unchanged. Each answer is SSC's tentative key as marked on that sheet; SSC allowed challenges to it and never publishes a final key. The solutions are written by UnlockIAS.

Identify the figure from among the given options which when put in place of the question mark (?) will logically complete the series.

Answer

Why

Correct — C. Nothing rotates or reflects here. Count what is on the grid.

Rule: dots fall by 2 and letters rise by 1 at every step, so the total marks fall by 1.

Figure 1: 16 dots, 0 letters, 16 marks.
Figure 2: 14 dots, 1 letter, 15 marks.
Figure 3: 12 dots, 2 letters, 14 marks.
Figure 4: 10 dots, 3 letters, 13 marks.

The fifth figure therefore needs 8 dots, 4 letters, 12 marks. Option (c) shows two full rows of four dots above a row reading P X X P — 8 dots, 4 letters, 12 marks.

Why the others are wrong

(a)
Option (a) carries 7 dots and 11 marks. Its letter count is right, but the dot count skips past 8 and the total drops by two instead of one.
(b)
Option (b) has the right total of 12 marks but only 3 letters, so the letter run stalls at figure 4's value. Its 9 dots are odd, where every figure in the series shows an even number.
(d)
Option (d) keeps 13 marks, the same total as figure 4, so the series does not advance at all. It is the choice that still shows a fourth row, which is why it looks familiar.

Concept

Some figural series are counting puzzles wearing a picture. When every shape is identical and only the number of shapes changes, count first and look for geometry second.

Two quantities move here in opposite directions: dots shrink, letters grow. Tracking them separately turns one picture series into two short arithmetic series, and the option satisfying both is unique.

The grid stays four columns wide throughout, so a mark's row and column are not the variable — its type is.

The fifth figure drops the bottom row of the grid entirely. Option (d) is the choice that keeps a fourth row and so resembles figure 4 most closely, which is exactly what makes it the tempting wrong answer. Judge the figure on its counts, not on how much it looks like the one before it.

Key facts

The dot counts run 16, 14, 12, 10 across the four given figures — a fall of 2 each time.
Letters appear 0, 1, 2 and 3 times across those figures, so the fifth carries 4.
Total marks run 16, 15, 14, 13, so the answer must show 12.

Study next

Counting-based figural series where the shape is fixed and only quantity changesDot-grid series in which rows are progressively emptied from one cornerSeries carrying two independent counts that move in opposite directions

Common traps

Hunting for a rotation or a reflection when nothing in the figure actually turns.
Matching the answer to the shape of figure 4 rather than to the counts.

A picture series also runs at 12 Sep 2024, 16:00, Reasoning Q.13, and the paper-folding item at Reasoning Q.2 rewards the same habit — read what the figure actually shows before theorising about it.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.