Next, we're revisiting the question types you'll encounter in Logical Reasoning.
I broke out this lesson to function mostly like flashcards—bite-sized reminders of what each question type addresses and the strategies we use to solve them.
We'll follow up with a standalone lesson about each question type and how to solve it with worked examples.
Main Conclusion
- Deals with arguments? Yes
- Task: Find the argument's overall conclusion
- Strategy: Look for the idea that's supported by all the rest, the thing the author's building toward
Must Be True
- Deals with arguments? Infrequently
- Task: Determine what else must be the case based on the facts provided
- Strategy: Look closely at relationships and make logical inferences
Most Strongly Supported
- Deals with arguments? Infrequently
- Task: Determine what answer choice is most likely based on the facts provided
- Strategy: Find an answer choice with direct support in the passage; beware outside information
Agree / Disagree
- Deals with arguments? Yes
- Task: Determine the central point of agreement or disagreement between speakers
- Strategy: Look for the main thing at issue between them, everything from their conclusions to the evidence they use
Reasoning
- Deals with arguments? Yes
- Task: Determine how the passage makes its argument
- Strategy: Identify what the argument's doing, not necessarily whether it's good or bad.
Role
- Deals with arguments? Yes
- Task: Identify the role played by a specific piece of the argument
- Strategy: Tease apart the argument's conclusion and evidence, assigning roles to each argument part
Principle
- Deals with arguments? Sometimes
- Task: Figure out an underlying justification presented in the passage, occasionally applying it to new contexts
- Strategy: Determine the principle, rephrase it, and apply it by analogy when required
Parallel Reasoning
- Deals with arguments? Yes
- Task: Match the passage's argument to an answer choice
- Strategy: Identify the argument parts from the passage and match them up to an answer choice part-for-part
Parallel Principle
- Deals with arguments? Sometimes
- Task: Spot a matching application of the passage's underlying principle or match it to an analogous scenario
- Strategy: Determine the principle and predict analogous scenarios that would use it
Flaw
- Deals with arguments? Yes
- Task: Find an answer that identifies the specific reason an argument errs in its reasoning
- Strategy: Find the answer that (1) happens in the passage and (2) properly explains why the argument is invalid
Parallel Flaw
- Deals with arguments? Yes
- Task: Match the flawed argument from the passage to a flawed argument in the answer choices
- Strategy: Identify the argument parts from the passage, why the argument goes bad, then find an answer choice that makes the same error the same way.
Necessary Assumption
- Deals with arguments? Yes
- Task: Find an assumption the argument's conclusion requires to have any hope of being true
- Strategy: Determine what the argument would have to agree with; use the negation test when necessary
Sufficient Assumption
- Deals with arguments? Yes
- Task: Find an answer choice that guarantees the truth of the argument's conclusion
- Strategy: Identify the argument's conclusion, the evidence provided, and the gap separating them; then, fill the entire gap.
Strengthen
- Deals with arguments? Yes
- Task: Find an answer choice that provides support to the argument's conclusion
- Strategy: Stay grounded in the conclusion; consider what would make it more likely to be true
Weaken
- Deals with arguments? Yes
- Task: Find an answer choice that makes the argument's conclusion less likely to be true
- Strategy: Cast doubt on any part of the argument, from conclusion to premises
Evaluate
- Deals with arguments? Yes
- Task: Find an answer choice that helps determine whether an argument wins or loses
- Strategy: Consider what you don't otherwise know about the argument as well as what would strengthen or weaken its conclusion
Paradox
- Deals with arguments? No
- Task: Explain an apparent discrepancy between facts or results
- Strategy: Consider alternative solutions that resolve the conflict between seemingly incompatible or paradoxical circumstances.
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That does it for our debrief of LR question types. Next, we're tackling each of these one by one, starting with Main Conclusion questions. See you there.