Verbal reasoning is understanding and reasoning using concepts framed in words. It aims at evaluating ability to think constructively, rather than at simple fluency or vocabulary recognition. It is basically something related to words, letters and numbers.

Verbal reasoning intelligence tests

Verbal reasoning tests of intelligence provide an assessment of an individual's ability to think, reason and solve problems in different ways.

Verbal reasoning tests are often used as entrance examinations by schools, colleges and universities to select the most able applicants. They are also used by a growing number of employers as part of the selection/recruitment process.

Criticism of verbal reasoning tests

Some have criticised verbal reasoning tests due to their lack of precision - many questions arguably having more than one answer. For example, a question which asks:

"When will Joe Bloggs retire?"

may expect the testee to respond with the answer "Joe Bloggs will retire at 65" based on the following two sentences (taken from a preceding paragraph - the format of most verbal reasoning tests):

"Joe Bloggs currently works as a civil servant" and "Those in the civil service generally retire at 65"

However, though the two sentences make it probable that Joe Bloggs will retire at 65, it is still a logical possibility that he will continue to work beyond this point, or that he will retire early and live off savings. Additionally, a number of questions ask testees to decide what the central focus of the preceding paragraph is, however the options provided often afford more than one arguable response. As such, critics suggest that standard IQ tests; or numerical reasoning tests, are preferable due to their precision .

Reasonable suspicion is a legal standard standard of proof in United States law that is less than probable cause, the legal standard for arrests and warrants, but more than an "inchoate and unparticularized suspicion or 'hunch' "; it must be based on "specific and articulable facts", "taken together with rational inferences from those facts". Police may briefly detain a person if they have reasonable suspicion that the person has been, is, or is about to be engaged in criminal activity; such a detention is known as a Terry stop. If police additionally have reasonable suspicion that a person so detained may be armed, they may "frisk" the person for weapons, but not for contraband like drugs. Reasonable suspicion is evaluated using the "reasonable person" or "reasonable officer" standard, in which said person in the same circumstances could reasonably believe a person has been, is, or is about to be engaged in criminal activity; it depends upon the totality of circumstances, and can result from a combination of particular facts, even if each is individually innocuous.

Precedent

In Terry v. Ohio, theU.S. Supreme Court ruled that a person can be stopped and briefly detained by a police officer based on a reasonable suspicion of involvement in a crime. If the officer additionally has reasonable suspicion that the person is armed, the officer may perform a search of the person's outer garments for weapons. Such a detention does not violate the Fourth Amendment prohibition on unreasonable searches and seizure, though it must be brief. Reasonable suspicion does not provide grounds for arrest; however, an arrest can be made if facts discovered during the detention provide probable cause that the suspect has committed a crime.

In Hiibel v. Sixth Judicial District Court of Nevadathe Court further established that a state may require, by law, that a personidentify himself or herself to an officer during a stop; some states (e.g., Colorado) require that a person detained provide additional information, but as of November 2010, the validity of such additional obligations has not come before the Supreme Court.

Other uses

Schools

New Jersey v. T. L. O.set the precedent that probable cause is not necessary to search a student; reasonable suspicion is enough to search a student's belongings. Overly intrusive searches, like abody cavity search, require probable cause.

Government workplaces

A few years after T.L.O., the Supreme Court held in O'Connor v. Ortegathat while government employees do have Fourth Amendment rights in the workplace, administrative investigations by supervisors of alleged work-related misconduct where no criminal offenses are suspected likewise only require reasonable suspicion to justify a search.

Border Security, Customs, and Immigration

Although U.S. Customs can do routine suspicionless searches of people and effects crossing the border (including passing through airport customs), non-routine searches, like slashing the spare tire of a car, require reasonable suspicion. United States v. Flores-Montano. Anything even more intrusive, like compelled surgery of a suspectedballoon swallower, requires probable cause. United States v. Montoya De Hernandez.

Examples

Courts have ruled (Terry v. Ohio, ) that a stop on reasonable suspicion may be appropriate in the following cases: when a person possesses many unusual items which would be useful in a crime like a wire hanger and is looking into car windows at 2am, when a person matches a description of a suspect given by another police officer over department radio, or when a person runs away at the sight of police officers who are at common law right of inquiry (founded suspicion). However, reasonable suspicion may not apply merely because a person refuses to answer questions, declines to allow a voluntary search, or is of a suspected race or ethnicity. At reasonable suspicion, you may be detained by a police officer (court officer on court grounds) for a short period of time and police can use force to detain you. If it is a violent crime (robbery, rape, gun run), the courts have recognized that an officer's safety is paramount and have allowed for a "frisk" of the outermost garment from head to toe and for an officer to stop an individual at gun point if necessary. For a non-violent crime (shoplifting for example) an officer may frisk while at reasonable suspicion if he noticed a bulge in the waistband area, for example, but can frisk in that area only. In the city of New York, once a person is released in a reasonable suspicion stop, a "stop, question and frisk report" is filled out and filed in the command that the stop occurs.