[Conscience of a Conservative]

So if you're not penalized for the wrong answer, why take the test?

Because you're still graded on the number of correct answers. To put it simply, the change is something like this:

Old system: Score = (number of correct answers) - ((some factor) * (number of incorrect answers))

New system: Score = (number of correct answers)

[SAJ]

The formula in 1968 was (RightAs - WrongAs / 4) * PtsPerAnswer. PtsPerAnswer varied from test to test in order to bring the max score per test to 800.