Tips and Tricks for Reading Comprehension in GRE
A passage by passage discussion on pitfalls, tips and tricks while solving GRE comprehensions
Comprehensions have been a difficult roadblock in most peoples journey across the GRE ocean. Here I try to make things a little easier by discussing one tricky question from one comprehension passage from the 5lb book everyday.
Day 10: 12th July, 2019
Today is the last passage in the series of comprehensions. I’ll take a short break and return soon.
Following is the passage that we will be discussing.
Going through the passage shows that the author is not really a big fan of timelines, although he never says that he thinks that they are useless.
The question is as follows:
First Option, yes indeed. Although our common sense says that there are more than 64 important events in American history, we need to find proof within the passage. Line number 20 onwards says the same thing, again and again. So the author would agree with this.
The second option says that some students ascribe importance to prominent graphic position and that is expressed by the fact that in the timeline present in the classroom, dates are present in a very prominent fashion. This implies that position is important for students, hence the author would probably agree to this option.
Third option says that timelines have some positive uses. The author mentions the same in line 3, “Despite their usefulness”
The fourth option has a red flag surreptitiously inserted. It says, timelines have no subliminal effect. That’s an extreme word right there. Also, nowhere has the author hinted that timelines are absolutely useless with no effect whatsoever. Hence this is not something that the author would agree with.
Option E says that unofficial histories have merit, this is mentioned in the passage post line 25, where the author says that the events mentioned in the timeline are not the only notable events.
Hence the 4th option is something that the author cannot agree with.
Day 9: 11th July, 2019
The passage on Picasso and Matisse.
The passage keeps on talking about how the two painters went back and forth, raising the bar with one painting and then responding with another.
This makes us somehow lose the focus on the main theme of the passage and get carried away with the description of the different paintings and how one superseded the other.
And that brings us to the trap question.
What is the primary purpose of this passage.
First option says discussing the two best painters of an epoch, but where is the ambition in that. The option itself is not sufficient to represent a purpose.
The third option is a very tempting one. Comparing selected works of two masters. Indeed the passage does that. But what purpose does that achieve? We’ll keep this as a maybe.
The fourth option is not correct as the passage never tries to prove that any of the painter was better than the other.
The fourth option says that the primary purpose of the passage is to show how Picasso taught Matisse, but that is only a small part of the passage so this option is not true.
The second option, the most innocent looking one is the most crucial one. It has a vague wording — evaluate theory and endorse a revision. Lets try and see what is the theory and what is the revision endorsed.
For that we need to ignore all the painting talk and look at the first two paragraphs.
Here the theory is that the competition between two artists can be likened to a dynamic game.
And the proposed revision is that, no, its not just a game but also a friendly dialogue(line 9), and were to each other, colleagues, teachers and in some situations, friends.
Thus, the second option, however vague it may sound, is the correct answer.
Day 8: 10th July, 2019
Have you heard about premastication? Hear it first, here.
This passage talks about premastication, a practice of chewed food by adults, being passed into the infants. Following is the question that was asked.
This is another definitive question type that comes in GRE comprehension.
The author would most likely agree to which of the following options.
Note 1: Consider each option separately, and not one dependent on the other.
The first option says that Germophobia can contribute to depriving babies of a health benefit. While we may agree with this, we need to see if there is any indication in the passage that the author would agree with the same.
The line in consideration is, While germophobic Western society eschews this practice… provides benefits to a developing baby
Here the word to note is eschews and it means “deliberately avoid using, abstain from”. Thus since people in the west avoid the practice of giving chewed food to babies, because of fear of spreading germs, the author would probably agree with the fact that Germophobia leads to missing out on a health benefit. So first option is correct.
The second option has a big red flag. The word only. Apparently premastication is done only in developing words. If there is just one mother in any developed country feeding her child chewed food, the option becomes false. So we cannot go for this option.
The third option says that saliva give more health benefits on top of digestive bacteria — and that is directly stated in the 4th line (antibodies).
Thus, options 1 and 3 are correct.
Day 7: 9th July, 2019
Today’s passage is all about redlining, a term that I had never heard of before.
The passage talks about the origin of redlining, the issues due to it, the banishment of the same and the reverse red lining.
The questions are straightforward, however this one was a little challenging.
Note the word inferred in the question. This tells us that the options may not be directly found in the passage, however they can be hinted at from the lines within the passage.
The first options says that redlining was stopped after the Fair Housing Act, however the passage contradicts the same in line number 9 saying that “redlining may have continued in less explicit ways…”
The second option says that redlining continues today but in a less obvious form. This is true and the passage provides evidence in line 11, “Even today…”
The third option is a tricky one. It says that access to mortgage and high property values are related. Although there is no mention of high property values, it is said in line 4 that as there was no access to mortgages, the residents suffered from low property values. Thus it can be “inferred” that if there was access to mortgage, the residents might have enjoyed high property values. So this option is correct. I know, I keep saying that we need to find infallible evidence within the passage in support of the options. However, in this case as the question is talking about inferring, we can take some liberties and justify this option.
The question is where do you draw the line of drawing inferences. I believe that this totally depends on the question type. Once you get the hang of this, you will be unstoppable at RC
Anyways, enough for today, the correct options are II and III.
Day 6: 8th July, 2019
Back after the weekend, today’s passage is on Mozart and one of his compositions.
The passage mostly speaks about how the conservative audience of Vienna accepted the opera.
We’ll discuss two questions today, the first one is as follows:
When we get a question with a part of a sentence and we are asked to find its use, the first thing that we need to do, is read the full sentence that the phrase is a part of.
In this case, the phrase comes from the sentence “The opera mixed traditions of moralism with those of comedy, a practice hitherto unknown among the composers work — creating a production that was not well liked by conservative Viennese.”
Option A which tells us that this phrase explains the lackluster reception among a particular group of people, may actually make sense. The phrase actually does tell us that this quaint mixing of morality and comedy, was not well received. And the particular group of people mentioned in the passage are the conservatives of the Viennese population. So option A has high chances.
The phrase talks about the theme of the opera, not the plot of the same. So option B is out.
Option C is the opposite of what is really happening.
There is no argument present in the passage supporting the theme of Don Giovanni. So the word argument is a bland giveaway that the option D is wrong.
Once again the giveaway word here is assertion. What has been asserted before? There is no such statement in the passage before the line. So option E is not the correct one.
Hence, option A is correct.
The other question
When it comes to the response of the Viennese audience, we get two lines that speak about the reaction of the Viennese audience viz. line number 7 and line number 9.
Line#7: “were ambivalent at best” — meaning that they did not really like the composition, the best they could do was having mixed feelings about it. It is important to understand this as we will see very soon.
Line #9: “that was not well liked by conservative Viennese audience” — only solidifies our previous understanding that the conservative Viennese audience did not like the opera.
Now let us look at the options
Option A says something that is an extrapolation. There is no line in the passage that says that the people preferred purely moralistic works. These kinds of strong words(purely) are indications that this option is not right.
Option B says that their response was unequivocally positive, which is an outright contradiction.
Option C speaks about their ignorance about the fact that Mozart was attempting to mix musical styles. This is nowhere mentioned in the passage. The mixing of musical styles was something new to the people of Vienna but to say that the audience was unaware about this mixture is totally alien to the passage.
Option D speaks about offense, once again there is no evidence that the people took offense in the theme of the composition. To not like something is different from taking offense at the same thing. So this option also contains a strong word(offense) that has never been hinted at in the passage.
Option E says that, it would be a generous statement to say that the reaction to Don Giovanni was a mixed one. Now this is something that we can agree to. As can be seen from line 7 and line 9, the people of Vienna did not like the composition, the best they could do was to have mixed feelings about it
So option E is correct.
Day 5: 5th July, 2019
Todays passage is an easy one(maybe because its a Friday)
It has only one question.
If you read the paragraph, it becomes evident that Kincaid is blaming the colonial rule for many of the evils prevalent in Antigua now.
The last two lines support the first option. Kincaid says that the good British people stayed home so the British government is not corrupt. This may not agree with our common sense, but thats what the passage says, so first option seems viable.
The second option is an extrapolation and though its tempting, nowhere is the passage talking about the entire British empire — it is only talking about Antigua. You may agree with this option but Kincaid is not mentioned it in the passage. So this option is out.
The third option is directly mentioned in the third line of the passage.
So, options A and C are correct.
Happy Weekend Everyone!!
Day 4: 4th July, 2019
This is a short exercise that speaks about supernova in general and then talks about the appearance of a supernova in 1604 while Galileo was still alive.
We’ll look at the following question
This question inquires about the primary purpose of the passage.
Option A says history of supernova, but the passage only talks about the explosion part, not the events that led to the explosion. So this option does not stand a chance.
Option B talks about describing a shift in thought as a result of natural event. The natural event is the appearance of the supernova in 1604. The shift in thought is “seriously undermined the views of many philosophers that the heavens were unchangeable” Although this line does not come until almost the end of the paragraph, we keep it as a maybe
Option C is juxtaposing two opposing views about supernovae. The view mentioned in the paragraph above is about the heavens, not specifically about supernova. So there is no evidence for option C
Option D talks about corroborating the fact that the earth is not the center of the universe. But the passage only mentions that, does not provide any conclusive evidence for that. So it is a much weaker option than B
Option E is very generic and is not really the theme of this passage.
Hence option B is the strongest contender for this question.
Day 3: 3rd July, 2019
This is a fairly straightforward exercise.
There are three questions, out of them I thought this question had some complexity(Let me know if you think otherwise)
The paragraph talks about how bacterias have become immune and how virus is more dangerous than bacteria because of the way it multiplies.
The question talks about intracellular obligate parasites. First we find out whether it refers to bacteria or virus.
Now that we know that the term refers to virus, let us check the options one by one.
The first option says that they are unable to propagate on their own. This is directly reflected in line 8 where the passage says, viruses lack the necessary structures for reproductions. So this is a strong option, let us look at the others.
The second option says that viruses assemble their components randomly out of virions. It looks like a correct option because line number 9 speaks something similar. However the giveaway word is randomly. Nowhere is it mentioned that the assembly of components is done randomly.
The third option speaks about sexual combination between virus and host cells. There is no evidence of that in the passage.
The fourth option speaks about antibiotics that is not applicable to virus.
The fifth option says that viruses construct reproductive structures out of destroyed host cells, but that is also not mentioned in the passage.
Hence the correct option is A.
Day 2: 2nd July, 2019
This passage is pretty straightforward. It tells us that women who participated in the wars were either beyond the child bearing age or less than the same.
The options mentioned in the question are a classic example of how GRE makes you extrapolate inferences from the passage and make you select the option that “seems” right. Remember that, we are not going to select an option unless there is infallible evidence of the option being correct from the passage and the passage only. We should not keep any space for assumption unless the question asks for it explicitly.
Now lets look at the options.
First option says that death of women of child bearing age were lamented more than other women.
When we try to look for evidences, we see only one line mentioned about the deaths of the women, dying as individuals vs dying as potential source of life. However there is no evidence of more or less mourning between either category of deaths.
Second compares courage between the two category of women. There is no such comparison in the passage.
Third option says that some of the women working as nurses or providing supplies died in the battles.
This can be corroborated from the 1st and last line of the passage. So this can be correct.
The fourth option is another trap because the passage makes us “feel” that women with potential to bear child are considered more highly than other women. However, we cannot go by feelings, so negate this option.
The final option is talking about men who are not even in the scope of this passage. :D
So the correct option is C
Day 1: 1st July, 2019
We will now look at a tricky question that I got wrong when I attempted that passage.
The question asks us about the number of American high-value businesses founded per year, whether it has decreased or increased over time.
We look at the following line in the passage.
At first sight, the line gives the idea that high value businesses have reduced over the year. So we would be tempted to go for either of options A or B.
However, the word that we are missing to note is “proportion”. The line says that the proportion of high value businesses founded per year has decreased.
This proportion is nothing but the number of high value businesses founded divided by total number of businesses founded.
The question however, does not ask about the ratio but asks about the number of high value businesses.
Thus, since the passage does not contain any specific details about the number of high value businesses kicking off each year, the correct answer is E.
