- What evidence does the passage cite to support the restorer's conclusion that the hidden monk was painted over in response to the abbot's objection rather than the artist's own dissatisfaction?
Answer: The abbot's documented complaint that an early draft was "too crowded," paired with a later, smaller payment suggesting revision.
Lines 7-11 link the abbot's complaint that the draft was "too crowded" with the record of "a second, smaller payment made to the artist several months after the first installment," together supporting the conclusion in lines 12-14. Choice A shows only what the original composition looked like, not why it was changed. Choice B is true but irrelevant to the cause of the revision. Choice D restates the abandonment itself rather than the evidence explaining why it happened.
- According to the passage, why did the architect choose to leave the concrete supports exposed?
Answer: She wanted visitors to see how the new frame distributed weight differently than the old load-bearing walls.
The architect explained the exposed concrete "was meant to let visitors see how the new structure distributed weight differently than the old one, which relied on thick load-bearing walls rather than a steel and concrete frame." Choice A invents a budget rationale never mentioned. Choice B contradicts the passage, since the exposed concrete highlights a difference from the original, not a match. Choice D misattributes the request; preservationists opposed the exposed look, they did not request it.
- According to the passage, what does the narrator identify as the actual reason for Delia's departure from Millbrook?
Answer: The end of her friendship with Ruth following an incident at the harvest social.
Lines 8-11 reveal that "what she could not rebuild was her friendship with Ruth, who had stopped speaking to her after Delia was seen dancing with Ruth's fiance," identifying this as the true cause behind her leaving. Choice A is the town's mistaken assumption, explicitly corrected by the passage. Choice B is only what Delia told her neighbors, not the real reason. Choice C is true but irrelevant to her motive for leaving.
- According to the passage, why does the blacksmith require every apprentice, regardless of skill, to sweep the forge floor?
Answer: He believes ignoring small tasks like sweeping leads to broader inattention that causes injuries.
The blacksmith explains that "a careless apprentice who ignored the floor eventually ignored the temperature of his tongs as well, and burned himself or ruined a blade through simple inattention," citing his own lost fingers as proof. Choice A invents a humility rationale never stated. Choice C invents a financial constraint absent from the passage. Choice D invents a connection to hinge-making patience that the blacksmith never draws.
- According to the passage, how did the restoration team defend their decision to remove the soot layer?
Answer: They insisted historical accuracy should guide restoration and cited pigment samples confirming the recovered colors.
The team responded that "historical accuracy, not inherited assumptions about mood, should guide any conservation project," and noted the palette "matched pigment samples taken from areas the smoke had never reached." Choice A reverses the positions: the brown-tone-as-mood argument belongs to the historians who objected, not the restoration team. Choice B invents a market-value argument absent from the text. Choice D restates the critics' concern about viewer perception rather than the restorers' actual defense.
- In a letter backing a new water system, the sentence "Critics call the plan too costly, yet the old pipes waste more each year on repairs." mainly serves to:
Answer: answer an objection with a cost comparison
The sentence states the critics' objection, then uses 'yet' to counter it with evidence that the old pipes cost more. It does not admit the plan is too expensive; the first clause reports what critics say so the writer can refute it.
- According to the passage, why did colonies near upwelling zones recover more successfully than lagoon colonies?
Answer: Cooler upwelling temperatures kept those colonies below the thermal threshold during a second heat spike, unlike lagoon colonies.
The passage states "colonies in the cooler water were never pushed past the thermal threshold that causes coral to expel its algae, while lagoon colonies bleached a second time." Choice A restates the initial hypothesis that "further testing showed nutrient levels were similar at both sites," so it was ruled out. Choice B invents a pollution factor never mentioned. Choice D misreads the passage: both areas experienced the same second heat spike; the difference was temperature, not the number of spikes.
- According to the passage, recent measurements of brain activity suggest that the periodic rewarming episodes mainly serve to:
Answer: repay a buildup of REM sleep that could not occur during the coldest stretches of torpor
The passage states that "recent measurements of brain activity suggest a different explanation: the arousals coincide with bursts of REM sleep that the animals appear to have accumulated a debt for during the deepest, coldest stretches of torpor, when the brain is too cold to sustain normal sleep architecture at all." This directly identifies REM-sleep debt repayment as the newer explanation. Choice A restates what "researchers long assumed" before the newer explanation—an outdated view the passage explicitly supersedes. Choice C reverses the relationship: the passage says the squirrels' own body temperature drops, not the soil's, and tissue freezing is prevented by torpor itself, not by rewarming. Choice D introduces migration to warmer dens, a detail never mentioned in the passage.
- According to the passage, what did camera trap evidence reveal about why willow height failed to increase despite falling elk populations?
Answer: The remaining elk continued to graze streamside willows just as intensively, having concentrated in the few areas they still judged safe.
Lines 11-15 state that willows remained stunted "because a smaller number of elk continued grazing there just as intensively as before, concentrated now in the narrow strips of open ground the surviving elk still judged safe from ambush." Choice A is contradicted by line 5, which states elk numbers "did decline." Choice B is unsupported; no comparison of growth rates independent of grazing is made. Choice D is contradicted by line 8, which states elk "had not disappeared from the valley."
- A historian writes: "Tree-ring records corroborate the diaries' accounts of a decade-long drought." The word "corroborate" shows that the tree rings:
Answer: independently confirm what the diaries report
To corroborate means to confirm with additional evidence. The tree rings are a separate source that backs up the diaries. The word does not suggest doubt. It signals that the two kinds of evidence agree.
- What evidence do musicologists cite to challenge the composer's own explanation for the symphony's poor reception at its premiere?
Answer: The absence of unusual tempo markings in the surviving parts, together with a string section far smaller than the score specified.
Lines 7-11 state that "the surviving parts used at the premiere carry no unusual tempo markings" and that the orchestra used "only twenty-two players, well below the forty the composer had specified," together undermining the composer's tempo explanation. Choice A is the composer's own claim, not the evidence used against it. Choice B describes a later revision, not evidence about the premiere's failure. Choice D is true but irrelevant to the cause of the poor reception.
- According to the passage, what allowed Montgomery Ward to sell goods more cheaply than local general stores?
Answer: Farm granges guaranteed bulk orders large enough for Ward to buy directly from manufacturers, bypassing wholesaler markups
The passage explains that Ward's founder "had persuaded a coalition of midwestern farm granges to guarantee bulk orders large enough to let him buy directly from manufacturers rather than through the chain of regional wholesalers that ordinarily marked up goods at every stage," and concludes that the granges "functioned as the collective buyer that made low prices possible in the first place." Choice B reverses the credit arrangement described—the passage says Ward was "selling on credit to families," not that Ward received loans to eliminate credit sales. Choice C invents a wholesaler agreement that contradicts the passage, which says Ward's low prices came from avoiding wholesalers altogether. Choice D describes a boycott threat that is never mentioned; the passage says nothing about local stores reacting to grange pressure.
- An article claims insects communicate in complex ways, then says: "Honeybees, for instance, perform a 'waggle dance' that shows hivemates where flowers are." This sentence:
Answer: gives an example that supports the claim
'For instance' introduces a specific case, the waggle dance, that illustrates the claim about complex insect communication. It is not an exception, because the dance is exactly the kind of complex communication the article describes.
- "Mara checked the forecast twice, then packed an umbrella, rain boots, and a spare sweater." It can reasonably be inferred that Mara:
Answer: expects cold, rainy weather
The umbrella and boots point to rain, and the sweater points to cold, so she expects cold, rainy weather. Checking twice might suggest distrust, but she packs according to the forecast, which shows she believes it.
- According to the passage, how did the poet compensate for cutting the final stanza of "Low Tide"?
Answer: She revised the third stanza to include an image of a closed door conveying the same meaning implicitly.
The passage states she agreed to the cut "only after rewriting the third stanza to include an image of a closed door, which she felt could carry the same meaning without stating it outright." Choice A invents an opening-stanza revision never mentioned. Choice B invents a later restoration that contradicts the passage's claim that the published version preserves meaning "through implication." Choice D invents a prose preface that the text never describes.
- According to the passage, what does the narrator identify as the reason the grandfather stopped repairing things around the house?
Answer: A letter arrived reporting that his son would not be returning home from the war.
Lines 11-14 state the repairs stopped "after the letter arrived saying my uncle would not be coming home from the war after all," directly identifying the letter as the cause. Choice A describes an earlier problem (why he carved his own gears years before) and is true but irrelevant to why he stopped repairing things in 1962. Choice B wrongly conflates the clock's final stoppage with his decision to abandon all household repairs, a connection the passage never draws. Choice C is unsupported outside knowledge; the passage never mentions his health.
- According to the passage, why did fields planted in fresh ash produce higher yields than fields without recent ash deposits, despite identical irrigation and fertilizer?
Answer: Fresh ash released potassium and phosphorus, replenishing nutrients depleted from older fields lacking fallow periods.
The passage states that "fresh ash deposits release potassium and phosphorus as they weather, nutrients that had often been depleted from older fields after decades of continuous planting without fallow periods." Choice A invents a rainfall effect never mentioned. Choice C misreads the passage; the fallow-period issue concerns the older comparison fields, not the ash fields themselves. Choice D invents a water-retention mechanism that the passage does not describe, since irrigation was held identical between the two field types.
- According to the passage, what detail suggests that Thomas's stated enthusiasm about moving did not fully reflect his private feelings?
Answer: His late-night return to trace the pencil marks on the doorframe without preserving them before they were painted over.
Lines 8-14 describe his sister seeing him "standing in the emptied living room long after midnight, running his hand along a doorframe" marked with his children's heights, a mark he made "no effort to photograph or otherwise preserve" before it was painted over, suggesting unspoken sentiment beneath his stated cheerfulness. Choice B is the stated enthusiasm itself, not evidence contradicting it. Choices C and D describe practical, uncomplaining behavior consistent with his outward attitude, not evidence of conflicting private feelings.
- According to the passage, why does the clockmaker refuse to sell his shop?
Answer: The ledger in the shop records a meaningful period of his life with his late wife.
The clockmaker tells Marta that the shop was "the place where he taught her late mother to read a balance sheet" and that the ledger's numbers were "the only proof he had that those years happened at all" — a direct statement of his reason. Choice A invents confidence about regaining customers, which is never mentioned; the passage only notes customers were lost. Choice C invents an inheritance plan not stated in the text. Choice D invents a debt concern that never appears; the passage discusses emotional, not financial, reasoning.
- In an essay urging more bike lanes, a writer notes: "Our three new lanes cut downtown crashes by nearly a third last year." This sentence mainly:
Answer: supplies evidence for the main claim
The crash statistic is a concrete result offered to back the essay's argument for more bike lanes. It is not the main claim itself. That claim is the call for more lanes, and this data point supports it.
