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Apply the chapter's decision routine and identify the specific flaw in the nearest competitor. Complete the four written drills in the lesson before this practice set. Question numbers follow the shuffled order; Guide question labels match the lesson references.
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The drill
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Question 5
Guide question 3.05
Foundation
During a cataloging project, librarians found handwritten corrections in several copies of a nineteenth-century botany manual. The corrections were once dismissed as individual readers' mistakes. Comparing the copies, however, revealed that the same corrections appeared in the same places, often in different handwriting. The librarians now suspect that instructors circulated a shared list of revisions. The annotations may therefore preserve evidence of how the manual was taught rather than simply how isolated readers reacted to it.
Which choice best states the main idea of the text?
Correct choice: Patterns in annotations suggest that a botany manual was revised through a shared teaching practice.
B captures the passage's shift from treating the annotations as isolated errors to considering them evidence of a shared instructional practice. Its 'suggest' preserves the tentative nature of the librarians' interpretation.
A: Cataloging is the setting for the discovery, but the passage does not say alterations made cataloging difficult. It focuses on what the repeated corrections may reveal.
C: The librarians suspect instructors circulated revisions, but no instructors are identified. This turns a proposed explanation into a completed identification.
D: The passage does not judge the botanical accuracy of either source or compare handwritten and printed information generally.
If you missed it: Write a one-line account of what changed between the beginning and end of the passage, then test whether the answer preserves that change.
Strategy in use: The repeated corrections and final interpretation matter more than the manual's date or academic subject.
To document a neighborhood festival, an oral historian interviewed performers, organizers, and nearby shopkeepers. Performers were asked about how they learned their routines, while organizers described changes in the event's route. Shopkeepers discussed how the festival affected their businesses. The historian compared the three groups' accounts but used only the organizers' interviews to reconstruct the sequence of route changes, since those interviews consistently specified when each change occurred.
According to the text, why did the historian use only the organizers' interviews to reconstruct the sequence of route changes?
Why this answer
Retrieve the right group's detail | Review lesson 3.1
Correct choice: The organizers' accounts consistently identified the timing of the changes.
The final clause directly gives the reason: the organizers' interviews consistently specified when each change occurred. D restates that explanation without importing a claim about experience or disagreement.
A: The passage gives no comparison of how long members of each group had participated. Relevant dates in their accounts, not seniority, explain the selection.
B: Business effects were the shopkeepers' topic. This choice transfers a detail from one group to another and does not explain how a sequence was reconstructed.
C: No disagreement between performers and shopkeepers is reported. The stated reason is the timing information in the organizers' accounts.
If you missed it: Match each group to its stated contribution before choosing an answer that names one group.
Strategy in use: For a detail question, return to the sentence that directly answers the requested why; do not reconstruct the whole study from memory.
A workshop marked its ceramic bowls with a distinctive blue stamp from 1910 through 1916. Researchers recently found the same stamp on storage jars made in 1907. Workshop records indicate that the stamp was introduced for jars in 1905 and extended to bowls only in 1910. Therefore, although the stamp alone cannot establish that an unidentified ceramic object was made in or after 1910, ______
Which choice most logically completes the text?
Why this answer
Distinguish necessary evidence from sufficient evidence | Review lesson 3.1
Correct choice: identifying a stamped object as one of the workshop's bowls could support that conclusion.
The new evidence changes what the stamp implies for ceramic objects in general, but the records still place its introduction on bowls in 1910. A correctly makes the object's type the extra information needed to support the narrower dating conclusion.
B: The stamp began appearing on jars earlier, but the passage does not say jar stamping stopped when bowl stamping began. A stamped jar need not predate 1910.
C: This overgeneralizes the revision. The stamp's dating value depends on the type of object; the bowl evidence remains useful.
D: The passage explains when a stamp began appearing, not whether every later bowl bore one. Absence of the stamp does not establish an early date.
If you missed it: Ask what additional condition makes the conclusion valid, and distinguish evidence from its absence.
Strategy in use: The decisive distinction is bowls versus all ceramic objects. Keep the dates attached to the correct object type.
Visitors in a museum sometimes overlook short labels beside large exhibits. A designer hypothesizes that moving a label into the path visitors naturally follow would increase the likelihood that visitors read it, even if the label's wording and type size remained unchanged. To investigate this hypothesis, the museum plans to compare visitor behavior under different label arrangements.
Which finding, if true, would most directly support the designer's hypothesis?
Why this answer
Select evidence that isolates an explanation | Review lesson 3.2
Correct choice: More visitors read a label when it was moved into their usual walking path, while its wording and type size were kept the same.
The hypothesis concerns a change in position with wording and type size held constant. C supplies that comparison and the predicted increase in reading, so it bears directly on the proposed explanation.
A: This concerns comprehensibility after changing wording, not whether position increases reading when wording stays the same.
B: Viewing exhibits is not the measured behavior in the hypothesis. The finding does not connect label position to label reading.
D: The result follows changes in type size and lighting, while the hypothesized position change is not tested. It cannot directly support the proposed effect of position.
If you missed it: State the variable being changed, the outcome being measured, and the conditions meant to stay constant before comparing findings.
Strategy in use: The strongest answer mirrors the hypothesis's specific comparison; it need not mention every possible influence on museum behavior.
Researchers compared two methods for detecting defects in fabric. Their report listed false alarms as a rate per 100 defect-free samples, allowing direct comparisons across the tested sample groups. A manager claimed that Method Q produced fewer false alarms than Method P for every fabric thickness tested. Which data challenge the manager's claim?
False alarms per 100 defect-free samples
Fabric thickness (millimeters)
Method P
Method Q
0.4
12
8
0.8
9
6
1.2
4
5
Which choice most effectively uses data from the table to answer the question?
Why this answer
Test a comparative claim using normalized data | Review lesson 3.2
Correct choice: At 1.2 millimeters, Method Q produced 5 false alarms per 100 defect-free samples, compared with 4 for Method P.
The manager claims Q has fewer false alarms at every tested thickness. The 1.2-millimeter row contradicts that claim: Q has 5 per 100 and P has 4 per 100. A gives the decisive counterexample with the correct units and denominator.
B: These figures are accurate, but they show Q outperforming P at 0.4 millimeters. They support that part of the manager's claim rather than challenge it.
C: This correctly describes a change within Q. The claim compares Q with P at each thickness; Q's improvement does not establish that it remains better than P.
D: The two ratios are correct, but both show Q with the lower rate. Neither addresses the row where the claimed comparison fails.
If you missed it: Underline the comparison word and the quantifier. For a claim about every condition, inspect whether any row reverses the stated comparison.
Strategy in use: You can settle the claim with the final row. Averaging rates across thicknesses would answer a different question.
A materials researcher proposes that a new woven sleeve protects glass containers from impacts because its fibers slide against one another, dispersing force. Another researcher suggests that the sleeve works simply because it adds thickness around the glass. To distinguish the explanations, the researchers compare ordinary sleeves with equally thick sleeves whose fibers have been bonded together so that they cannot slide.
Which finding, if true, would most directly support the first researcher's explanation over the second researcher's explanation?
Why this answer
Distinguish a proposed mechanism from a similar outcome | Review lesson 3.2
Correct choice: Containers with ordinary sleeves were less likely to break than containers with equally thick bonded sleeves under the same impact conditions.
D holds thickness and impact conditions constant while comparing sleeves that permit fiber sliding with sleeves that do not. The better protection from ordinary sleeves supports a contribution from sliding beyond the benefit of thickness alone.
A: Both explanations can accommodate some protection from either sleeve. This result does not distinguish fiber movement from added thickness.
B: This finding links greater thickness with better protection and does not isolate sliding. It could fit the second explanation.
C: Ease of attachment does not measure impact protection or show how force is dispersed. It does not distinguish the proposed protective mechanisms.
If you missed it: When asked to favor one explanation over another, look for a result on which the explanations make different predictions.
Strategy in use: The question asks which finding most directly supports one account; the choice need not prove that no other material property could ever matter.
The restoration team expected the mural's original colors to be difficult to identify because smoke had darkened most of its surface. Yet the pigment beneath a recently removed frame was remarkably ______: protected from the smoke, it retained the bright blues and greens that had largely disappeared elsewhere.
Which choice completes the text with the most logical and precise word or phrase?
Why this answer
Read a contrast to predict meaning | Review lesson 3.3
Correct choice: vivid
The text contrasts smoke-darkened areas with a protected area that retained bright colors. Vivid means intensely or brightly colored here and directly captures the stated contrast.
A: Uniform means consistent or alike throughout. The passage describes brightness and identifies multiple colors; it does not establish uniformity under the frame.
C: Fragile concerns how easily something is damaged. Protection from smoke explains preserved color, but the passage gives no evidence of physical weakness.
D: The preserved colors differ from the mural's darkened areas, but unusual does not precisely express the brightness explicitly described after the colon.
If you missed it: Use the explanation after the blank to predict a plain meaning, then choose the option that states that meaning most precisely.
Strategy in use: The phrase 'retained the bright blues and greens' does more work than the broad topic of art restoration.
A newly digitized set of shipping logs reveals that the port handled more coastal trade in the 1760s than earlier historians estimated. The logs, however, record cargo weightsrather than the prices merchants received. Historian Elias Orr therefore cautions that the discovery does not by itself establish a comparable upward revision of estimated trade revenue, even though it supports a revision of the estimated volume of goods handled.
Which choice best describes the function of the bold sentence in the text as a whole?
Why this answer
Separate a qualification from a rejection | Review lesson 3.3
Correct choice: It identifies a limit on the information in the logs that helps explain a caution about interpreting their significance.
The bold sentence distinguishes cargo weights from prices. That limitation explains Orr's warning that an upward revision of estimated trade volume does not by itself justify a comparable revision of estimated revenue. C captures the sentence's role in qualifying the implication of the discovery.
A: The passage explicitly says the logs support revising the volume estimate. The limitation concerns a different outcome, revenue, rather than the logs' reliability for measuring volume.
B: The passage reports earlier estimates of trade volume, not an earlier belief that revenue increased. The sentence supports Orr's present caution.
D: The sentence describes the same logs. No second source or contradiction between sources is introduced.
If you missed it: Label the neighboring claims and ask exactly which inference the target sentence allows or limits.
Strategy in use: The close distinction is volume versus revenue. Preserve both outcomes while describing the sentence's function.
Conservators examining a wooden screen noticed that its carved panels had weathered unevenly. They initially attributed the variation to differences in the wood. After removing a later layer of varnish, however, they discovered traces of hinges on panels that had appeared fixed in place. The screen's original arrangement apparently allowed some panels to fold inward, shielding portions of the wood from light. Its changing configuration thus offered an explanation for the uneven weathering.
Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?
Why this answer
Map the sequence of an explanation | Review lesson 3.3
Correct choice: An observation is presented, an initial explanation is noted, and a discovery leads to a different explanation.
The sequence is uneven weathering, an initial wood-difference explanation, discovery of hinges, and an explanation based on folding panels. A accurately describes both the order and the shift in interpretation.
B: Removing varnish is part of the investigation, but the passage does not compare methods or recommend one for preserving appearance.
C: The discovery leads away from the initial explanation rather than confirming it. No implications for other objects are discussed.
D: The passage describes a developing investigation, not a disagreement among named or separate groups of specialists, and it favors the configuration explanation.
If you missed it: Write three or four role labels in sequence, then check every clause of the proposed structure against them.
Strategy in use: A structure answer can start correctly and fail later. Verify the final action, not only the opening description.
A translation of a poem should preserve the pattern of repeated images even when doing so requires departures from the original meter. Readers may otherwise miss connections among distant lines. Rhythm matters, but sacrificing a recurring image solely to keep the same beat can remove part of the poem's argument.
TEXT 2
Translators cannot treat meter as an ornamental feature: a poem's rhythms guide attention and shape emphasis. Yet a mechanically exact reproduction of meter can be costly if it eliminates a recurring image. The translator must consider what the image contributes before deciding which formal features to preserve.
Based on the texts, both authors would most likely agree with which statement?
Why this answer
Find a genuine point of agreement | Review lesson 3.4
Correct choice: Preserving the original meter can sometimes come at the cost of losing a meaningful recurring image.
Text 1 warns that preserving the beat can remove a recurring image and part of the argument. Text 2 likewise notes the cost of eliminating such an image to reproduce meter. D states the shared concern without pretending the authors assign identical priorities in every case.
A: Text 1 explicitly argues against sacrificing recurring images solely to retain meter. Text 2 also requires considering the image's contribution rather than giving meter automatic priority.
B: Neither author makes exact meter a necessary condition for preserving meaning. Both acknowledge possible costs of reproducing it exactly.
C: Both texts treat recurring images as potentially meaningful. Neither gives the general ranking claimed in this choice.
If you missed it: Find support for the proposed shared statement in each text separately; do not infer agreement from a common topic.
Strategy in use: A limited point of agreement may be correct even when the authors emphasize different priorities.
After a reading room replaced individual desks with shared tables, recorded conversations among visitors increased. The redesign therefore appears to have encouraged collaboration. Although the records do not reveal what visitors discussed, the increase is consistent with the idea that shared tables made it easier for people to exchange useful ideas.
TEXT 2
Conversation counts alone do not distinguish collaborative exchanges from unrelated social talk. To evaluate whether the reading room's redesign encouraged collaboration, researchers would need evidence about the content or outcomes of the conversations. More talk may accompany more collaboration, but those two changes should not be treated as interchangeable.
Based on the texts, how would the author of Text 2 most likely characterize the evidence discussed in Text 1?
Why this answer
Identify the exact reach of a methodological objection | Review lesson 3.4
Correct choice: As compatible with the proposed benefit but insufficient to establish that the conversations involved collaboration
Text 2 accepts that more conversation may accompany more collaboration but stresses that counts cannot identify the conversations' content or outcomes. B preserves both parts: compatibility with the proposal and insufficiency to establish the claimed kind of interaction.
A: Text 2 identifies two possible kinds of conversation but provides no evidence that social talk increased while collaboration declined. It questions the inference, not reports an opposite result.
C: The conversation count changed. Text 2 does not claim the redesign had no effect on interaction; it challenges what the count establishes about collaboration.
D: This treats conversation and collaboration as interchangeable, precisely the inference Text 2 warns against. No necessary relationship is established.
If you missed it: Distinguish 'does not establish X' from 'establishes not X' before evaluating a response attributed to a skeptical author.
Strategy in use: The decisive evidence is the measurement's limit: it counts conversation but does not identify collaboration.
That the surviving letters contain no reference to Irena Vale's unfinished play should not, literary scholar Omar Chen argues, be taken as evidence that Vale had abandoned it. Most of the letters concern arrangements for public readings, whereas the play, unlike Vale's published poems, had not yet been offered for performance. The correspondence's practical purpose may therefore explain its silence about a project that remained private.
Which choice best describes an inference supported by the text?
Why this answer
Unpack a qualified historical inference | Review lesson 3.4
Correct choice: The letters' lack of reference to the play may reflect the topics they addressed rather than Vale's decision to abandon the project.
The core claim is that silence about the play need not indicate abandonment. Most letters concerned public readings, and the private play had not been offered for performance. C restates the supported alternative explanation while preserving 'may.'
A: The play is described as unfinished, and no deliberate concealment is established. This contradicts one fact and invents a motive.
B: The passage contrasts the projects' public status, not their importance to Vale. A private project need not be more highly valued.
D: The passage states that the play had not been offered for performance. It gives no evidence about recipients' knowledge or Vale's future performance plans.
If you missed it: Paraphrase the first sentence's logical core, then check which later detail explains it without supplying an invented motive.
Strategy in use: Keep the two different claims separate: the evidence does not establish abandonment, and it does not establish continued work either.