Three original CASPer practice scenarios are written out below, each followed by a weak answer, a strong answer and a short account of what separates them. Every scenario here was written for this page. Nothing on the real test is reproduced, because Acuity Insights does not publish live content and no honest source has it. Use the page in one direction only: read the scenario, set a five-minute clock, write your full answer, and only then read the two versions. Read them first and you will train recognition, which is not the skill the test is scoring.

Scenario one: the mislabelled tray

You work part time at a pharmacy counter. A colleague of two years, who trained you, fills a weekly blister pack and labels it for the wrong patient. You catch it before it leaves the counter. She thanks you, fixes it, and asks you not to mention it to the pharmacy manager, because she is three weeks from a performance review.

A weak answer. “Patient safety must always come first, so I would tell my colleague that I have to report the error to the manager. Medication errors can cause serious harm and reporting them is part of professional responsibility. I would reassure her that reporting is not about blame but about preventing future errors.”

A strong answer. “I would tell her I am going to raise it, and I would say so to her face before I did it, because the thing that would actually damage a two-year working relationship is her finding out from the manager. Then I would say why, in terms she can test: the error was caught by luck, not by a system, and the next one might be filled on a shift I am not on. I would also say the part that is true about her position, which is that a single near miss three weeks before a review is a brutal piece of timing and I am not pretending otherwise. If the pharmacy has an incident process, I would ask her to file it herself and offer to sit with her while she does, because a self-reported near miss and a colleague’s report land very differently in a review, and I would rather she got the better version. If she refused, I would still raise it, and she would know that before I left the shift. What I would not do is characterise her as careless, because I do not know whether this was fatigue, an interruption or a habit, and the manager is better placed to find out than I am.”

What separates them. The weak answer has the right conclusion and no work behind it. It leads with a slogan, it reports without telling her, and it reassures her about blame while doing the thing she asked it not to. The strong answer keeps the same conclusion and adds everything the weak one is missing: it warns her first, gives a testable reason, concedes the true part of her position, offers her the better route to the same outcome, states what happens if she refuses, and declines to diagnose a cause it cannot know. Same decision. Four times the reasoning.

Scenario two: the roommate who stopped going to class

Your roommate’s father died six weeks ago. Since the funeral he has stopped attending class, sleeps through the day, and has told you twice that he is “handling it”. This morning you saw an email on his open laptop from his faculty about being withdrawn from a course for non-attendance.

A weak answer. “I would sit my roommate down and explain that he needs to seek help from counselling services, because grief can develop into depression and he is at risk of failing his year. I would offer to go with him to the appointment and would check in on him daily to make sure he is coping.”

A strong answer. “The first thing I would deal with is that I read something I was not meant to read. I would tell him I saw it, on his open laptop, rather than steering a conversation towards it and pretending I did not know, because if he finds out later that I knew and managed him, I lose the only thing that makes me useful here. Then I would ask an open question and be quiet. He has told me twice that he is handling it, which might mean he is, in his own way, or might mean he does not want to be a project. I do not know which yet, and the difference changes everything I do next. What I would say about the email is narrow and factual: there is a deadline in it, and deadlines with faculties are usually more negotiable than they read, especially with a bereavement. I would offer to help with one concrete thing, drafting a reply or finding out who handles academic consideration, rather than offering to reorganise his life. If he said no, I would leave it and come back, because six weeks is not long and my timeline is not his. The one thing that would make me act without his agreement is if he said or did something that told me he was not safe, and then I would call the university’s crisis line or take him to hospital, and I would tell him that is what I was doing.”

What separates them. The weak answer is kind and it is also a plan made entirely without the other person. It diagnoses him, prescribes counselling, and commits to daily check-ins he never asked for. It also quietly uses information it obtained by reading his screen. The strong answer opens with the uncomfortable disclosure, asks instead of concluding, distinguishes two readings of “handling it” and says why the difference matters, narrows the offer to one concrete thing, accepts a refusal without abandoning him, and names the single condition under which it would override him. Notice that it does less. That is usually the strong answer.

Scenario three: the project credit

Your four-person course project is presented by one member to a panel of faculty. During the presentation he describes the analysis as “what I built”, when in fact you built it and he formatted the slides. Afterwards, a professor congratulates him on the analysis in front of all four of you. Nobody says anything.

A weak answer. “I would speak to my teammate privately after the presentation and explain that taking credit for someone else’s work is unfair and damages trust. If he did not acknowledge his mistake I would raise it with the course instructor, since the grade should reflect each member’s actual contribution.”

A strong answer. “In the moment, in front of the professor, I would say one sentence and no more than one: that the analysis was mine and I was glad it landed. Not because scoring a point matters, but because the record gets set in the room where the claim was made, and a correction delivered three days later by email sounds like a grievance no matter how it is worded. Then I would let it go for the rest of the conversation. Afterwards I would talk to him, and I would open by asking rather than accusing, because presenting under pressure makes people say ‘I’ about work the group did and that is different from deciding to take my work. His answer tells me what this is. If it was a slip, I would say what it cost me anyway, that the professor now believes something false about both of us, and ask him to correct it, which is a small ask and a real test. If he refused, or if it turns out he meant it, then I would go to the instructor, and I would tell him I was going. I would not ask the instructor to adjust his grade. I would ask her to know who did what, because that is the part I actually need and the rest is hers to decide.”

What separates them. The weak answer defers everything to a private conversation and then to an authority, and it asks for a grade change, which reframes a question of honesty as a request for advantage. The strong answer acts once, immediately, proportionately and in public, then de-escalates. It tests intent before assigning it. It makes a small concrete ask before escalating, warns before escalating, and when it does escalate it asks for the truth to be known rather than for a penalty. It also admits that in-the-moment corrections are awkward and does it anyway, which is closer to what professional courage actually looks like than a private word three days later.

What all three have in common

Read the strong answers again and you will see the same skeleton under all three, which is the point of having a method at all. Each one validates something specifically true about the other person before deciding anything. Each one listens, or says how it would find out, before it concludes. Each one weighs the actual rules and the costs on both sides. Each one commits to an action and then stays present afterwards rather than deciding and walking away. Those are levels one, two, five and six of the method I teach. The three levels I have not named here are the ones that most reliably move an answer from competent to top quartile, and they are taught inside the CASPer programs.

Key numbers

  • Three original scenarios on this page, each with a weak answer, a strong answer and the reasoning.
  • No real test content, here or anywhere legitimate. Acuity does not publish live scenarios.
  • One different human rater scores each scenario on the real test.
  • Acuity states there is no single correct answer, so treat these as worked reasoning, not templates.
  • Write your own timed answer first, then compare. That order is the whole exercise.

The Starter Success Package includes a full bank of video and word-based scenarios with the method applied to each.

Related: how to answer an ethical dilemma in CASPer and common CASPer mistakes.

Last reviewed 17 September 2026. Written by Arvin Ardakani, final-year medical student, 4th quartile on CASPer four times.