Hey Melissa,
Thanks for the post and welcome to the Forum! I know you're probably not feeling it at the moment, but as it turns out you're very much in luck: we get this question/concern from students all the time (conditional reasoning is tough, so no surprise there), so to help I recently wrote a really comprehensive article on exactly how contrapositives, Mistaken Negations, and Mistaken Reversals work
Give this a read when you get a chance:
http://blog.powerscore.com/lsat/how-to- ... -reasoning
I think you'll find that deconstructs the process from beginning (recognizing that conditional reasoning is present) to end (using your correctly-built diagram to make inferences and avoid mistakes), with analysis of
why negations and reversals are in fact errors along the way!
Once you've worked through that, return to some conditional reasoning drills/questions that you've been working on recently and try them again. My suspicion is that they'll make a lot more sense
Lastly, be sure to use the Search feature in this Forum (and on our blog) in the future—there's a ton of great info in both and I think you'll really benefit from browsing other threads/posts about this topic, and any others that come up in your prep! Hearing from multiple instructors is often the best way to truly grasp difficult material so be sure to snoop around when concerns arise.
Let me know! Thanks!
Jon Denning
PowerScore Test Preparation
Follow me on Twitter at
https://twitter.com/jonmdenning
My LSAT Articles:
http://blog.powerscore.com/lsat/author/jon-denning
