Boring is Sometimes Best on GMAT Verbal
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There’s a particular exercise I like to do with students who overthink Reading Comprehension and Critical Reasoning problems. (I initially got it from fellow instructor Ceilidh Erickson, who developed this exercise for her own GMAT classes.) It involves answering GMAT RC and CR problems without looking at the passage or the argument. With a little training, my students can often reach 50% accuracy or better! That might seem impossible — but keep reading to learn the secret.
Four specific problem types on the GMAT reward boring, wishy-washy answers. Those problem types are as follows:
- Critical Reasoning – Find the Assumption
- Critical Reasoning – Draw a Conclusion (Inference)
- Reading Comprehension – Inference
- Reading Comprehension – Main Idea
CR Assumption problems ask you to identify an argument’s background assumptions. There are always certain facts that an argument takes for granted. If one of these facts actually isn’t correct, then the argument won’t make logical sense. The right answer to an assumption problem, therefore, will be a statement that definitely has to be true in order for the argument to work. If an answer choice is “optional”, then the argument isn’t really assuming that it’s true, and it isn’t the right answer.
CR Draw a Conclusion problems also have you identify something that has to be true. This time, you’re choosing a conclusion that must be true, based solely on the facts in the argument. The right answer will be the only one that can be definitively proven using only the information from the argument, with a minimum of real-world knowledge.
RC Inference questions are very similar. The right answer always needs to be provable based on the passage. If there’s any way an answer choice could be false, it won’t be correct.
Finally, RC Main Idea questions are slightly different. You’re asked to choose an answer that accurately reflects what the whole Reading Comprehension passage does. The right answer won’t leave out any major parts of the passage, and it won’t add anything in — it won’t make any claims that the passage doesn’t make.
Notice what these problem types have in common. In the first three types, the right answer is something that has to be true. That’s a very high standard. If there’s even a single counterexample to an answer choice, then it doesn’t have to be true, and it won’t be the right answer. In the last problem type, the Main Idea question, the right answer can’t disagree with the passage in any detail. It also can’t leave out any major parts of the passage. That’s why the right answers to these problem types are generally weak, boring, and non-specific. It’s much easier to prove a weak, vague claim than a strong, specific one.
Give it a shot. Here are the answer choices that go with a particular CR Draw a Conclusion problem from the GMAC’s GMAT Prep software. Without having read the argument, which answer choices do you think would be easier to prove? Which would require quite a bit of evidence to prove?
(A) Individuals who are underweight do not run any risk of developing high levels of cholesterol in the bloodstream.
(B) Individuals who do not exercise regularly have a high risk of developing high levels of cholesterol in the bloodstream late in life.
(C) Exercise and weight reduction are the most effective methods of lowering bloodstream cholesterol levels in humans.
(D) A program of regular exercise and weight reduction lowers cholesterol levels in the bloodstream of some individuals.
(E) Only regular exercise is necessary to decrease cholesterol levels in the bloodstream of individuals of average weight.
Here are those answer choices again, with strong language in red, and wishy-washy language in green.
(A) Individuals who are underweight do not run any risk of developing high levels of cholesterol in the bloodstream.
(B) Individuals who do not exercise regularly have a high risk of developing high levels of cholesterol in the bloodstream late in life.
(C) Exercise and weight reduction are the most effective methods of lowering bloodstream cholesterol levels in humans.
(D) A program of regular exercise and weight reduction lowers cholesterol levels in the bloodstream of some individuals.
(E) Only regular exercise is necessary to decrease ch olesterol levels in the bloodstream of individuals of average weight.
(A), (C), and (E) would be pretty difficult to prove. For instance, to prove (C), the argument would have to somehow show that every other possible method was definitively less successful than exercise and weight reduction. It’s unlikely that a one-paragraph argument could do that! (D), on the other hand, intentionally makes a weak claim. It’s easy to prove that exercise and weight reduction work for some individuals, since you’d only need to show that it works for at least one person. And in fact, (D) is the correct answer.
Here’s another set of answer choices, this time from a RC Inference problem. This time, eliminate two answer choices that make excessively strong claims, without reading the passage.
With which of the following generalizations regarding management structures would the author of the passage most probably agree?
(A) Hierarchical management structures are the most efficient management structures possible in a modern context.
(B) Firms that routinely have a high volume of business transactions find it necessary to adopt hierarchical management structures.
(C) Hierarchical management structures cannot be successfully implemented without modern communications and transportation.
(D) Modern multinational firms with a relatively small volume of business transactions usually do not have hierarchically organized management structures.
(E) Companies that adopt hierarchical management structures usually do so in order to facilitate expansion into foreign trade.
If you chose to eliminate (A) and (C), you’re correct: neither of those is the right answer. (A) makes the powerful claim that one structure is the most efficient possible, while C claims that something cannot possibly happen. Both of those are unlikely to be provable based solely on the passage. The right answer is the much weaker (B), which hedges by specifying that only certain firms need to adopt hierarchical management.
Of course, you shouldn’t quit reading the passage when you do these problems on test day! But there are a few great ways to include this strategy in your GMAT practice. First, you can use it to double-check your answer. If you’re about to select an answer choice that makes a very strong or specific claim, be skeptical. If there isn’t equally strong evidence in the argument or passage to back up that strong claim, you’re probably falling for a trap. For practice, look through the answer choices to verbal problems from the Official Guide to the GMAT, and try to predict what answers are likely to be correct without reading the argument or passage. That’ll help you develop an intuitive feeling for right and wrong answers. You can even use the principle of “picking the boring answers” as a starting point on certain problems. Save time by identifying the answers that are most plausible first, then check the best answers against the text. Don’t bother checking the wrong-looking answers unless you’ve eliminated all of the right-looking ones. ?
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Chelsey Cooley
is a Manhattan Prep instructor based in Seattle, Washington. Chelsey always followed her heart when it came to her education. Luckily, her heart led her straight to the perfect background for GMAT and GRE teaching: she has undergraduate degrees in mathematics and history, a master’s degree in linguistics, a 790 on the GMAT, and a perfect 170/170 on the GRE. Check out Chelsey’s upcoming GMAT prep offerings here.