CIE IAL · Physics · 2017 October/November

9702/41 October/November 2017

This Physics 9702 Paper 4 (A Level Structured) paper contains 12 questions worth 100 marks. The profile below reports five mark-weighted difficulty and complexity measures, and every question row repeats them. Full question text and mark scheme open in the Interactive Practice Hub.

CIE IAL 9702 P4 12 questions 100 marks Free paper

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Core finding

9702/41 October/November 2017 is a past paper for CIE IAL Physics 9702 Paper 4 (A Level Structured), with 12 questions worth 100 marks. Its mark-weighted Difficulty Measure is 0.39 on a 0.20–0.75 scale, with a Difficulty Deviation of 0.14 and a mark split of 29.0% Easy, 63.0% Medium and 8.0% Hard. Algebraic complexity averages 0.24; text density and modelling average 0.41. All five measures use 41 part-level tags, not candidate results. Every question row below repeats them and opens the Interactive Practice Hub for that question.

Difficulty & complexity profile

All five measures are mark-weighted and calculated from 41 parts carrying 100 part marks. Difficulty tags cover 41 parts, algebraic tags 41 and text-density tags 41. Tags are internal metadata, not official exam-board ratings.

Difficulty Measure 0.39 0.20–0.75 · nearer Medium

Difficulty Deviation 0.14 0 = uniform; higher = more mixed

Difficulty Ratio 29.0 / 63.0 / 8.0 % Easy / Medium / Hard

Algebraic Complexity Measure 0.24 0.20–0.75 · nearer Low

Text Density and Modelling Measure 0.41 0.20–0.75 · nearer Medium

Scale: Easy 0.20 · Medium 0.45 · Hard 0.75, and Low 0.20 · Medium 0.45 · High 0.75 for the two complexity measures. How each band is defined and how the values are calculated →

Definitions and calculation

Measure	Paper value	Formula
Difficulty Measure	0.39	Σ(d_i × w_i) / Σw_i, with d = 0.20 / 0.45 / 0.75
Difficulty Deviation	0.14	√(Σw_i(d_i − μ)² / Σw_i)
Difficulty Ratio	29.0% Easy / 63.0% Medium / 8.0% Hard	marks in band / all tagged marks
Algebraic Complexity Measure	0.24	Σ(c_i × marks_i) / Σmarks_i, with c = 0.20 / 0.45 / 0.75
Text Density and Modelling Measure	0.41	Σ(t_i × marks_i) / Σmarks_i, with t = 0.20 / 0.45 / 0.75

w_i equals the part marks, except for a Hard part worth 4 or more marks, where w_i = marks^0.75 to offset the accessible starter steps inside long structured questions.

Question list

Each measure is recalculated from the parts of that question and uses the same weights as the paper profile.

Question	Topic	Marks	Difficulty Measure	Algebraic Complexity Measure	Text Density and Modelling Measure	Practice
Q1 FRQ	11.1 Thermal equilibrium	10	0.33Medium	0.20Low	0.40Medium	Go to Practice Hub
Q2 FRQ	13.1 Simple harmonic oscillations	9	0.37Medium	0.28Low	0.42Medium	Go to Practice Hub
Q3 FRQ	8.1 Gravitational field	8	0.42Medium	0.36Medium	0.42Medium	Go to Practice Hub
Q4 FRQ	16.1 Communication channels	8	0.39Medium	0.33Medium	0.45Medium	Go to Practice Hub
Q5 FRQ	17.3 Electric forces between point charges	8	0.54Medium	0.20Low	0.42Medium	Go to Practice Hub
Q6 FRQ	18.1 Capacitors and capacitance	8	0.39Medium	0.20Low	0.45Medium	Go to Practice Hub
Q7 FRQ	21.1 The ideal operational amplifier	11	0.45Medium	0.29Low	0.45Medium	Go to Practice Hub
Q8 FRQ	22.3 Force on a moving charge	8	0.36Medium	0.20Low	0.45Medium	Go to Practice Hub
Q9 FRQ	25.6 Production and use of X-rays	7	0.45Medium	0.20Low	0.45Medium	Go to Practice Hub
Q10 FRQ	24.1 Characteristics of alternating currents	6	0.20Easy	0.20Low	0.20Low	Go to Practice Hub
Q11 FRQ	25.1 Energy of a photon	7	0.27Easy	0.20Low	0.34Medium	Go to Practice Hub
Q12 FRQ	26.4 Radioactive decay	10	0.52Medium	0.20Low	0.42Medium	Go to Practice Hub

Topics in this paper

11.1 Thermal equilibrium 11.2 Temperature scales 12.1 Specific heat capacity and specific latent heat 13.1 Simple harmonic oscillations 8.1 Gravitational field 8.3 Gravitational field of a point mass 7.2 Centripetal acceleration and centripetal force 8.2 Gravitational force between point masses 16.1 Communication channels 16.4 Relative merits of channels of communication 16.5 Attenuation 17.3 Electric forces between point charges

Paper FAQ

How are the difficulty and complexity measures calculated?: Each part is weighted by its official marks. Difficulty uses Easy 0.20, Medium 0.45 and Hard 0.75; algebraic complexity and text density and modelling use Low 0.20, Medium 0.45 and High 0.75. A Hard part worth 4 or more marks is down-weighted to marks^0.75, so the accessible starter steps inside a long structured question do not inflate the difficulty result. This paper's Difficulty Measure is 0.39 from 41 parts.
What does the Difficulty Deviation show?: It is the mark-weighted standard deviation of the part difficulty values around the paper mean. A value of 0 would mean every tagged part has the same difficulty; this paper's deviation is 0.14, so its parts are more mixed than a single-level paper.
Is the Difficulty Ratio based on question counts or marks?: It is based on official marks, not question counts. This paper's shares are 29.0% Easy, 63.0% Medium and 8.0% Hard; the three shares sum to 100% before rounding.
Are these official difficulty ratings?: No. They are derived from the platform's part-level difficulty and static-question-profile tags. They are not exam-board grade boundaries and are not calculated from candidate outcomes. Use them to compare the demand profile of papers, not to predict a grade.
Why does each question row show its own measures?: Each row recalculates the same mark-weighted formula from that question's parts. A single-part MCQ therefore shows the tag value directly, while a multi-part structured question blends the tags of its parts using the same Hard-part decay as the paper profile.