ITBP Head Constable Education and Stress Counsellor Question Paper 2026

The full paper is 100 questions in 2 hours. The subject split is on the syllabus page. This sitting is 24 questions in 28 minutes 48 seconds, which is the same 72 seconds a question. Fourteen of them are psychology. The other ten are two each from English, Hindi, general awareness and arithmetic, so the short sections are not forgotten.

There is no official previous paper to copy. What follows is the revision that makes the practice worth more than a lucky score.

How to use these 24 questions

Sit once without notes. Then read the explanation even on the questions you got right. The qualifying mark on the real paper is 35 out of 100 for UR, EWS and ex-servicemen, and 33 for SC, ST and OBC (NCL). That looks low until you remember that 60 of the marks are psychology and a vague memory of "Freud said something" does not pick the right option.

Because there is no negative marking, leave nothing blank on the real paper. On this practice, still try to know the answer. A habit of ticking at random hides the topics you have not revised.

Five answers candidates mix up

Reinforcement and punishment. If the behaviour becomes more common, the consequence was reinforcement, even when the consequence was the removal of something unpleasant. That removal is negative reinforcement. Punishment makes the behaviour less common. The word "negative" is not a synonym for punishment. A jawan who parades on time because the extra duty stops is being negatively reinforced. A jawan who is given extra duty so that he will stop being late is being punished. The direction of the behaviour is the test.

Prejudice and discrimination. Prejudice is the attitude, held before you know the person. Discrimination is what you do. A stereotype is the over-simple picture of the group that feeds the attitude. A question that says "he refused to sit with them" is discrimination. A question that says "he believes they are all lazy" is prejudice. Both can be true of the same person, and the option still has one best label.

Empathy and sympathy. Empathy is seeing the situation as the client sees it. Sympathy is feeling sorry. Rogers built person-centred counselling on empathy, genuineness and unconditional positive regard. Advice is allowed later. It is a poor opening. If the option says the counsellor should tell the client what to do in the first minute, it is the wrong option.

Hallucination and delusion. A hallucination is a sensation without a source: a voice, a figure, a smell. A delusion is a belief that stays even when the evidence is against it. "They are watching me through the radio" can be a delusion. "I hear them commenting on every step I take" is a hallucination. Both appear in schizophrenia teaching. The counsellor refers. A supportive talk does not replace a medical examination, and the paper knows that.

Alarm, resistance, exhaustion. That order is Selye, on prolonged stress. Denial, anger, bargaining is a description of grief, not of the general adaptation syndrome. Id, ego and superego are Freud's structure of personality. If the question says "the body's response to ongoing stress", walk past the grief options.

Two more that decide Hindi and English marks in passing. परामर्श is advice, not punishment. "Counsel" is advise, not measure. Spelling of psychology keeps the p. These are 10-mark sections. Missing them while you chase a rare disorder is a bad trade.

For the arithmetic, write the ten percent first. Fifteen percent of 240 is 24 plus 12. The average of three numbers is their sum divided by how many there are, not the middle number unless they are evenly spaced and you have checked. Simple interest uses principal times rate times years, divided by 100, and the principal is not added unless the question asks for the amount.

Article 21A is the education article, ages 6 to 14. ITBP's raising in 1962 is a fair general-awareness item for a person applying to that force. Neither replaces the psychology block.

When you have done the set, go back to the syllabus headings that produced a wrong answer: general psychology, personality and groups, psychopathology, counselling, or human resources. Revise that heading only, for one evening, and repeat the questions you missed. A second full reading of a textbook, with the same hole still in it, does not move the 35-mark line.

A thirty-minute revision if the test is soon

If you have one evening, use it in the order of the marks.

Fifteen minutes on psychopathology and counselling, because they are 15 marks each. Write five lines from memory: the difference between a delusion and a hallucination, the three stages of Selye's general adaptation syndrome, two signs that a person may be at risk of suicide, what empathy is, and the moment confidentiality stops. If you cannot write them, you are not ready for 30 marks, and rereading a highlighted chapter without writing will not fix that tonight.

Ten minutes on the 10-mark personality block. List six defence mechanisms with one example each, then one sentence on prejudice versus discrimination, then one sentence on groupthink. Say them aloud. The paper is bilingual. If you will read the psychology questions in Hindi, practise मानसिक रोग, विभ्रम, भ्रांति, पूर्वाग्रह and भेदभाव so the Hindi stem does not slow you down. विभ्रम, also called मतिभ्रम, is the usual word for a hallucination. भ्रांति is the usual word for a delusion. भ्रम is the usual word for an illusion, a real stimulus that is misread. Use the pair your own textbook used. Swapping hallucination and delusion in either language drops a psychopathology item.

Five minutes on human resources. Job analysis, then recruitment, then selection, then training, then appraisal. That order is the job, and it is a 10-mark block that candidates skip because it feels less like psychology. Maslow's first step is food and sleep, not self-actualisation. Herzberg, if you have time for one extra name, splits hygiene factors from motivators.

The last five minutes are the 40 marks that are not psychology. One synonym, one Hindi meaning, one Article, one percentage. Article 21A, ages 6 to 14. ITBP raised on 24 October 1962. Fifteen percent by splitting into ten and five. Spelling of psychology. परामर्श means सलाह. Then start the clock on the questions below and do not open the notes.

After you submit, the explanations are part of the revision. A right answer chosen for a muddy reason will not survive a differently worded stem next week. Write the muddy ones in a list of ten and redo only that list after two days.

What a 35-mark paper looks like if psychology is weak

Thirty-five marks is the unreserved qualifying line. Here is one way to miss it, and one way to clear it, using only the split the notice prints.

Miss: you take 8 in English, 8 in Hindi, 6 in general awareness and 6 in aptitude. That is 28. You now need 7 more from 60 psychology marks, which is possible, and it is also where candidates discover they cannot tell a hallucination from a delusion. If psychology gives you only 5, you sit on 33 and you are out of the unreserved list. SC, ST and OBC (NCL) qualify at 33, so the same paper can be a pass or a fail depending on the category. Do not plan to "make it up in English". English is capped at 10.

Clear: you take 6, 6, 5 and 5 on the short sections. That is 22. You need 13 from psychology to reach 35, which is under a quarter of that block. A candidate who has actually revised psychopathology and counselling, 30 marks together, can get those 13 without being brilliant. The risk is the candidate who revised only the first chapter of a degree book, intelligence and learning, and never opened disorders or the counselling relationship. That first chapter is 10 marks in the notice, not 60.

So the practice below is weighted the way the paper is weighted. If you score 8 out of 14 on the psychology items and miss the arithmetic, you are closer to this exam than a candidate who scores full marks on arithmetic and cannot say what reinforcement does. Use the result that way. The clock is 28 minutes 48 seconds. Start it only after the thirty-minute revision above, not instead of it.

Practice

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