Purpose, Structure, Ideas, Details

The following text is from Lucy Maud Montgomery's 1908 novel Anne of Green Gables. Anne, an eleven-year-old girl, has come to live on a farm with a woman named Marilla in Nova Scotia, Canada.

Anne reveled in the world of color about her.

"Oh, Marilla," she exclaimed one Saturday morning, coming dancing in with her arms full of gorgeous boughs, "I'm so glad I live in a world where there are Octobers. It would be terrible if we just skipped from September to November, wouldn't it? Look at these maple branches. Don't they give you a thrill—several thrills? I'm going to decorate my room with them."

"Messy things," said Marilla, whose aesthetic sense was not noticeably developed. "You clutter up your room entirely too much with out-of-doors stuff, Anne. Bedrooms were made to sleep in."

Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?

A) To demonstrate that Anne has a newly developed appreciation of nature

B) To describe an argument that Anne and Marilla often have

C) To emphasize Marilla's disapproval of how Anne has decorated her room

D) To show that Anne and Marilla have very different personalities

When ancient oak planks were unearthed during subway construction in Rome, Mauro Bernabei and his team examined the growth rings in the wood to determine where these planks came from. By comparing the growth rings on the planks to records of similar rings in oaks from Europe, the team could trace the wood to the Jura region of France, hundreds of kilometers from Rome. Because timber could only have been transported from distant Jura to Rome by boat, the team's findings suggest the complexity of Roman trade routes.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined sentence in the text as a whole?

A) It presents a conclusion about Roman trade routes based on the team's findings.

B) It questions how the team was able to conclude that the planks were used to build a boat.

C) It explains why the planks were made from oak rather than a different kind of wood.

D) It describes common methods used in Roman subway construction.

The Vizcaya is just one of approximately three million known historical shipwrecks spread throughout the world's oceans, and their impact on sea life and underwater ecosystems is of great interest to researchers. Rachel Mugge and colleagues were particularly curious about the effects of wooden shipwrecks on seafloor microbial communities. The researchers studied two wooden shipwrecks in the Gulf of Mexico by placing pieces of pine and oak between zero and 200 meters away from each shipwreck to collect samples of three kinds of microbes: bacteria, archaea, and fungi. They found that across the three microbial communities, peak diversity and richness was observed on pine and oak samples placed approximately 125 meters from the shipwrecks.

Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?

A) It states the number of known shipwrecks, describes the historical significance of one of those shipwrecks, and then comments on the various microbes found at the shipwreck site.

B) It introduces a study of microbial communities near shipwrecks that has received significant scholarly attention, summarizes the results of that study, and then describes a research team's reaction to the study.

C) It names a famous historical shipwreck, describes the type of wood used to build that ship, and then explains how that wood type influences underwater microbial communities.

D) It notes a general scientific interest in shipwrecks' ecological effects, describes a specific study related to that interest, and then states one of the study's findings.

Xin Wang and colleagues have discovered the earliest known example of a flower bud in a 164-million-year-old plant fossil in China. The researchers have named the new species Florigerminis jurassica. They believe that the discovery pushes the emergence of flowering plants, or angiosperms, back to the Jurassic period, which occurred between 145 million and 201 million years ago.

According to the text, how old was the fossil that Wang and colleagues discovered?

A) 150 million years old

B) 145 million years old

C) 164 million years old

D) 201 million years old

Artists in the land art movement that began in the 1960s chose to put their works in nature. For example, Michael Heizer's 1969 work Double Negative was installed outside in Nevada.

According to the text, when did the land art movement begin?

A) The 1960s

B) 2010

C) 1980

D) The 1800s

The Skin I'm In was Sharon G. Flake's debut novel. It was published in 1998. A debut novel is the first book that an author has published. Debut novels are especially interesting to literary critics (people whose job it is to evaluate books) and readers because these books offer a look at new voices in the literary world.

According to the text, what is someone who professionally evaluates books called?

A) A bookseller

B) An author

C) A literary critic

D) A book publisher

Which design makes a paper airplane fly the farthest? One way to explore questions like this is to use the scientific method. After asking a question, make a prediction or form a hypothesis. Then collect and analyze data. Finally, draw a conclusion. The scientific method helps us answer questions, such as the one about paper airplanes.

What is the main topic of the text?

A) An award-winning scientist

B) The discovery of DNA

C) The inventor of the automobile

D) The scientific method

What is a city? The answer depends on where you live! Many countries define an area as a city based on how many people live there. However, not every country uses the same numbers. Albania defines a city as an area with a population of at least 400, while Greece defines a city as having a minimum population of 10,000. Peru and other countries define cities using population and other data, such as the number of buildings in the area.

According to the text, what does Greece define as a city?

A) An area that has been settled for at least 25 years

B) An area with a population of at least 10,000

C) An area with a population density of at least 800 people per square kilometer

D) An area with its own mass transit system

A debut novel is the first book that an author has published. An example of a debut novel is The Skin I'm In by Sharon G. Flake. It was published in 1998. Debut novels are especially interesting to literary critics and readers because these books offer a look at new voices in the literary world.

Which choice best states the main topic of the text?

A) The benefits of reading

B) Famous literary critics

C) Debut novels

D) Careers in the publishing industry

Founded in 1904, the Hispanic Society of America showcases the arts and cultures of Spanish-speaking and Portuguese-speaking regions around the world, including Latin America. It is located in New York City and has more than 18,000 objects in its museum collection. Since 2000, a number of other institutions devoted to Latino cultures have opened in the United States. A notable example is LA Plaza de Cultura y Artes in Los Angeles. It focuses on Mexican American art and culture.

Which statement about the Hispanic Society of America is best supported by the text?

A) Its collection includes over 18,000 objects.

B) It is no longer located in New York City.

C) It was founded after 2000.

D) It is visited by more people than any other Latino cultural institution in the US.

Humans aren't the only ones who use tools. Other animals also find tools helpful. Octopuses use two halves of a seashell for protection or a place to hide. And despite sometimes being thought of as simple, many birds make clever use of tools as well. New Caledonian crows are well known for creating hooks and spears from twigs. Furthermore, palm cockatoos have been observed using leaves to pad their beaks when opening nuts.

According to the text, what are New Caledonian crows known for?

A) They have larger brains than palm cockatoos have.

B) They live longer than octopuses do.

C) They create tools out of twigs.

D) They use leaves as tools.

In the past, historians who wanted to examine Frederick Douglass's diary and other personal papers had to visit the Library of Congress in Washington, DC, to view them on microfilm (film containing scaled-down reproductions of documents). But traveling to the library often added time and costs to research projects. Now, by going to the library's website, researchers can access digitized versions of Douglass's papers without physically going anywhere.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined portion in the text as a whole?

A) It gives information about a famous person.

B) It explains the meaning of a word.

C) It describes a debate among historians.

D) It summarizes an unexpected finding.

Archaeologist Veronica Waweru visited the Lewa Wildlife Conservancy in Kenya. While exploring there, Waweru noticed many rows of shallow pits carved into stone. Waweru believed the pits could have been used as game boards to play ancient versions of mancala, a two-person strategy game that is still popular today. Some of the more recent pits were carved on top of older pits. This led Waweru to think that the game was played at the site for a long time.

According to the text, why does Waweru think that mancala was played at the site for a long time?

A. Some of the newer pits were carved on top of the older pits.

B. She noticed many rows of shallow pits carved into stone.

C. She discovered the pits at the Lewa Wildlife Conservancy.

D. Some of the pits were shallow and others were quite deep.

Emulsification is a process that creates a uniform mixture that includes two ingredients that do not combine on their own, such as oil and water. For this process to happen, a third ingredient, an emulsifier, must be combined with the other two. Carrageenan, a substance extracted from red seaweed, is a common emulsifier: it helps to create a smooth texture in yogurt that makes it more pleasant to eat.

According to the text, what result is associated with carrageenan?

A) It prolongs the time it takes for ingredients to mix together during the making of yogurt.

B) It assists in the evaporation of water during the making of yogurt.

C) It helps ensure that yogurt has a smooth texture.

D) It decreases the amount of one ingredient in yogurt while increasing the amount of another.

What is a city? The answer depends on where you live! Many countries define an area as a city based on how many people live there. However, not every country uses the same numbers. Denmark defines a city as an area with a population of at least 200, while Spain defines a city as having a minimum population of 10,000. Some countries even define cities using other factors, like the number of buildings in the area.

Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?

A) It offers a recommendation, then provides reasons for that recommendation.

B) It poses a question, then explains why the question has many answers.

C) It lists the number of cities in one country, then compares that number to the number of cities in another country.

D) It describes two locations, then explains why only one of the locations is considered a city.

What is a city? The answer depends on where you live! Many countries define an area as a city based on how many people live there. However, not every country uses the same numbers. Albania defines a city as an area with a population of at least 400, while Greece defines a city as having a minimum population of 10,000. Some countries even define cities using other factors, like the number of buildings in the area.

Which choice best states the main topic of the text?

A) What some people enjoy about cities

B) The number of small towns in Albania

C) How different countries define what a city is

D) The country of Greece

The Uffington White Horse in England is a large chalk image of a horse made by ancient peoples. Monuments like these were an inspiration for the land art movement that began in the 1960s. Land art artists create works set in the outdoors. For example, in her 1976 work Sun Tunnels, Nancy Holt placed four tubes made of concrete in a Utah desert to form an X and frame the sun.

Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?

A) The text argues against placing works of art outside.

B) The text provides information about the land art movement.

C) The text describes the popularity of art galleries in the 1960s.

D) The text describes the benefits of being an artist.

It has long been thought that the original author of the US Pledge of Allegiance was Francis Bellamy, who said that he wrote the pledge one evening in August of 1892. But a historian recently discovered a newspaper article that was published several months before August 1892. The article describes students reciting the same pledge that Bellamy claims he first wrote in August. This means that Bellamy may not have created the pledge after all.

Based on the text, what piece of knowledge about the Pledge of Allegiance has recently become uncertain?

A) The name of the newspaper that first published the pledge

B) How many changes were made to the pledge in the 1900s

C) The identity of the person who first wrote the pledge

D) Which part of the pledge students liked best in 1892

When people think of dinosaurs with feathers, they typically think of winged dinosaurs, such as the bat-like Ambopteryx. However, many dinosaurs that didn't have wings also had feathers on their bodies. For instance, research indicates that the wingless, large Yutyrannus likely had feathers.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined sentence in the text as a whole?

A) It indicates that the dinosaurs mentioned earlier in the text weren't the only ones that had feathers.

B) It reveals that the dinosaurs mentioned earlier in the text used their feathers for an important purpose.

C) It defines a term related to the type of dinosaur feathers mentioned earlier in the text.

D) It gives an example of a dinosaur with the characteristics mentioned earlier in the text.

Catherine L. Cardelús is a researcher who studies canopy soil. Canopy soil is formed in a tree's branches (its canopy) when dead leaves and other falling things collect. This material breaks down, becoming canopy soil. Canopy soil helps preserve a healthy water cycle (how water moves through the environment) in rainforests. This benefit is one reason Cardelús is interested in the canopy soils in large choibá trees in rainforests in Costa Rica.

Which choice best describes the text's overall structure?

A) It explains a disagreement between researchers and how it was resolved.

B) It presents an idea and mentions a researcher who disagrees with that idea.

C) It compares the sizes of two types of trees over several years.

D) It introduces a researcher and gives information about what she researches.

High-speed rail systems—in which trains can move at great speeds—are expanding in many countries because high-speed rail can reduce the number of automobiles on the road and ultimately conserve energy. In Austria, for instance, 254 kilometers of high-speed rail lines are in operation as of 2023, and 231 kilometers are under construction.

Based on the text, why might Austria be expanding its high-speed rail system?

A) Residents of Austria demand that high-speed rail be expanded despite the cost of doing so.

B) High-speed rail systems in Austria are currently viewed more favorably than they have been in the past.

C) The current high-speed rail systems in Austria are getting older and need improvements.

D) High-speed rail systems are a more energy-efficient choice for residents of Austria than automobile use is.

Founded in Long Beach, California, in 1996, the Museum of Latin American Art is dedicated to modern and contemporary art by Latin American artists and Latino artists in the United States. Since its founding, it has acquired more than 1,300 objects for its permanent collection. More recently founded US-based institutions devoted to Latino cultures include Casa de Rosado. Located in Lansing, Michigan, it focuses on the arts and cultures of Latino communities in Michigan.

Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?

A) To trace the founding of two institutions, including how they acquired funding to purchase artworks

B) To present information about two institutions, including each institution's area of focus

C) To trace a historical development that encouraged the founding of two institutions

D) To draw a contrast between the collection sizes of two institutions

Book lovers are often eager to watch movie versions of the books they admire. When Dr. Seuss's popular children's book How the Grinch Stole Christmas was turned into a movie in 2000, for example, fans of the book flocked to theaters to see the movie. Curious to know whether screen adaptations also inspire people to read the original books, Klaudia H.Y. Lee interviewed more than three thousand students. She found that many of the students indicated that they were more motivated to seek out and read certain books after having watched movies based on them.

Which choice best states the main topic of the text?

A) Books that have been adapted into movies

B) Students hoping to become filmmakers

C) Dr. Seuss's career as a writer

D) Movies about people working in bookstores

Animals use many objects as tools to achieve goals more easily. Such goals include grooming, finding food, and protecting themselves. For a long time, people thought tool use was unique to primates. Boxer crabs and other animals, though, have busted the myth that tool use is limited to certain primates. Inventively, boxer crabs use stinging anemones to defend against attack. Striated herons also get creative. They use breadcrumbs and other lures to attract fish to the water’s surface, making it easier for the herons to catch them.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) Animals find it difficult to use objects as tools.

B) Contrary to long-held beliefs, primates aren’t the only animals to use tools.

C) There are many myths about tool use that researchers are starting to challenge.

D) Unlike primates, boxer crabs are exceptionally skillful at using different tools.

The following text is adapted from Eugene O'Neill's 1920 play Beyond the Horizon. Andrew and Robert Mayo are brothers who grew up on their family's farm.

ANDREW: Farming ain't your nature. There's all the difference shown in just the way us two feel about the farm. You — well, you like the home part of it, I expect; but as a place to work and grow things, you hate it. Ain't that right?

ROBERT: Yes, I suppose it is. For you it's different. You're a Mayo through and through. You're wedded to the soil. You're as much a product of it as an ear of corn is, or a tree. Father is the same. This farm is his life-work.

Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?

A) It illustrates that two characters share a goal.

B) It shows how two characters solved a mystery.

C) It describes a place two characters visited on vacation.

D) It emphasizes a difference between two characters.

The following text is from Reyna Grande's 2012 memoir The Distance Between Us. In the text, Grande reflects on a time when she and her older sister Mago were children. A Barbie is a type of doll.

I begged Mago to come play with me. She wasn't as interested in my Barbie as she had been just two months before, which made me sad because that was the only thing Mago had envied me for. Usually, it was me doing the envying. After I pestered her relentlessly, she finally put her notebook down and came over to me.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined portion in the text?

A) It indicates Grande's unhappiness over Mago's disinterest in Grande's doll.

B) It expresses Grande's anger over Mago's refusal to spend time with her.

C) It presents an example of how Mago and Grande generally played together as children.

D) It provides a reason for why Mago is unwilling to play with Grande.

Although spiny lobsters and some other arthropods have long been known to actively care for their eggs and offspring, relatively little has been known about this kind of behavior in ancient insects. Now, Chenyang Cai and colleagues claim that Jurassic fossils from a site in China contain the earliest evidence of insect brood care. The researchers examined fossils of Karataviella popovi, an extinct water insect species, and found thirty adults that appear to have been storing clusters of eggs on one of their left legs. This discovery reveals that insects engaged in brood care much earlier than previously believed.

According to the text, where do Cai and colleagues think K. popovi adults stored their eggs?

A) On two of their right legs

B) On underwater plants

C) On one of their left legs

D) On fossilized remains of other insects

Women like Minnie McNeal Kenny made important early contributions to the history of US cryptology, a field concerned with secure data communication and storage. Kenny worked for the National Security Agency (NSA) and received the NSA’s two highest awards. She also held administrative positions at the National Cryptologic School. In this way, Kenny and others like her helped make it possible for more women—such as Anna Lysyanskaya, who currently works in and teaches digital cryptography—to enter the field of cryptology.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) Women such as Minnie McNeal Kenny and Anna Lysyanskaya have contributed to the field of cryptology.

B) Cryptology is a field that focuses primarily on securely managing data.

C) Minnie McNeal Kenny and Anna Lysyanskaya worked together on an important project in the field of cryptology.

D) Cryptology should be taught more often in schools to encourage more women to enter the field.

In Hoocak, an Indigenous language from the Midwest region of what is now the United States, zi means “yellow,” whereas zizi means “yellow in spots.” This phenomenon, in which an element of a root word is repeated, sometimes with modification, within another word that is related to the root word, is called reduplication. In this case, the entire word zi gets repeated in zizi. There are many examples of this type of reduplication in Hoocak.

The text makes which point about Hoocak?

A) It is one of the only languages in the world that makes use of reduplication.

B) It is closely related to another language from the Midwest region of what is now the United States that also makes use of reduplication.

C) It contains many instances of the type of reduplication seen in the words zi and zizi.

D) It has a wide variety of reduplicated words and phrases that mean “yellow.”

The average age at which people in the United States start businesses is 35. Economist Andrés Hincapié studied why young adults are relatively less likely to start businesses and whether there are ways to increase entrepreneurship in early adulthood. Hincapié found that one impediment is lack of knowledge about the practical details of how businesses are started; he further found that simply providing young adults with good informational resources on the topic significantly alleviates this problem.

Based on the text, what would Hincapié most likely say is a promising way to increase entrepreneurship in early adulthood?

A) Creating social networks of young adults who are interested in starting a business

B) Providing young adults with practical information about how to start a business

C) Encouraging young adults to brainstorm business ideas

D) Giving young adults training opportunities at a variety of businesses

Many visitors to Yellowstone National Park need airlines, car rentals, hotels and restaurants during their visits. These services generate carbon emissions. Emily Wilkins and Jordan Smith found that most of the environmentally harmful emissions come from travel services to and from the park. Wilkins and Smith found that policymakers could help reduce these emissions by encouraging people to visit state or national parks closer to their homes to cut down on their travel.

Which choice best states the function of the underlined sentence in the text as a whole?

A) It presents a harm that is unique to the location described earlier in the text.

B) It indicates that policymakers have been working on a certain problem for a long time.

C) It suggests a course of action to address the problem described earlier in the text.

D) It rephrases the question raised in the first sentence of the text.

Toads and macaque monkeys can see in three dimensions (3D), which helps them perceive distance and depth. Octopuses and squid are thought to lack 3D vision. Many researchers once thought the same about cuttlefish, but Trevor Wardill and his team wanted to test whether this assumption was true. The team studied how cuttlefish wearing 3D glasses reacted to 3D images of shrimp (a favorite prey) projected on a tank wall. Cuttlefish changed their striking position to match the 3D images, suggesting that their vision is more like that of toads and macaque monkeys than that of octopuses or squid.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) Wardill's team designed 3D glasses for cuttlefish.

B) Before completing their study, Wardill's team showed that toads have 3D vision, but macaque monkeys may not.

C) The findings of Wardill's team's study suggest that like toads and macaque monkeys, cuttlefish may also have 3D vision.

D) Cuttlefish eyes are much more complex than those of either toads or macaque monkeys.

Women like Minnie McNeal Kenny made important early contributions to the history of US cryptology, a field concerned with secure data communication and storage. Kenny worked for the National Security Agency (NSA) and received the NSA's two highest awards. She also held administrative positions at the National Cryptologic School. In this way, Kenny and others like her helped make it possible for more women — such as Anna Lysyanskaya, who currently works in and teaches digital cryptography — to enter the field of cryptology.

According to the text, what is the relationship between Minnie McNeal Kenny and Anna Lysyanskaya?

A) Minnie McNeal Kenny taught Anna Lysyanskaya how to securely manage important data.

B) Minnie McNeal Kenny and Anna Lysyanskaya worked together early in their careers.

C) Minnie McNeal Kenny founded an organization that Anna Lysyanskaya currently works for.

D) Minnie McNeal Kenny made earlier contributions to a field that Anna Lysyanskaya currently works within.

Devon A. Mihesuah is a novelist and a citizen of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma. Critics and fellow writers have praised her work for combining traditional Choctaw stories with popular genres of literature, such as mystery fiction. But Mihesuah is not the only Indigenous writer to blend traditional stories with popular literature. In the 2018 novel Moon of the Crusted Snow, Waubgeshig Rice successfully blended the oral storytelling tradition of his people, the Anishinaabe, with horror fiction.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) Recent Indigenous fiction writers are mixing traditional stories with popular literary genres.

B) Several famous Indigenous writers increased their book sales when they began incorporating traditional stories.

C) The success of Devon A. Mihesuah has influenced non-Indigenous authors who write in popular literary genres.

D) Non-Indigenous authors should consider the expectations of Indigenous readers.

The following text is adapted from L.M. Montgomery's 1923 novel Emily of New Moon. Emily, a young girl who lives on a farm run by her aunt Elizabeth, wants to be a published writer someday.

One of the things they argued about was the fact that Emily, as Aunt Elizabeth discovered one day, was in the habit of using more of her egg money to buy paper than Aunt Elizabeth approved of. What did Emily do with so much paper? They had a fuss over this and eventually Aunt Elizabeth discovered that Emily was writing stories. Emily had been writing stories all winter under Aunt Elizabeth's very nose and Aunt Elizabeth had never suspected it. She had fondly supposed that Emily was writing school compositions.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) Emily forgot to buy eggs when she was supposed to.

B) Aunt Elizabeth thinks Emily should spend more time at school.

C) Aunt Elizabeth is surprised to find out that Emily has been writing stories.

D) Emily is relieved to learn that Aunt Elizabeth enjoys reading Emily's stories.

The following text is from Louise Erdrich's 1986 novel The Beet Queen. The narrator discusses her relationship with her young niece, Dot. Celestine, the narrator's sister-in-law, is Dot's mother.

Dot was as impatient with babyhood as I. She tried at once to grow out of it. Celestine never saw that, because she, and only she, took pleasure in Dot's helpless softness. Only Celestine was saddened by her daughter's fierce progress. Day by day, Dot grew stronger. In her shopping-cart stroller she exercised to exhaustion, bouncing for hours to develop her leg muscles.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined sentence in the text as a whole?

A) It offers a detail that shows how Dot is growing stronger.

B) It expresses hope that Celestine will mature psychologically.

C) It explores some of the narrator's psychological characteristics.

D) It indicates how sad Celestine is by describing a behavior she engages in.

The following text is from Reyna Grande's 2012 memoir The Distance Between Us.

Every few days, Abuela Evila washed Élida's hair with lemon water because, according to her, lemon juice cleans the impurities of the hair and makes it shiny and healthy. In the afternoons, she would fill up a bucket from the water tank, pick a few lemons from the tree, and squeeze the juice into the water.

Mago, Carlos, and I would hide behind a pink oleander bush and watch their ritual through the narrow leaves. Abuela Evila washed Élida's hair as if she were washing an expensive silk rebozo.

Which choice best describes the main purpose of the text?

A) To give an example of a typical interaction between Grande's siblings

B) To describe a regular occurrence from Grande's childhood

C) To illustrate how Grande's relationship with Élida grew over time

D) To explain how Grande felt about a location where she spent time as a child

When used to examine paintings, nonvisible light, such as ultraviolet, can penetrate the painting’s visible surface and give art historians important insights into an artist’s process. For example, imaging the underlayers of Artemisia Gentileschi’s Saint Catherine of Alexandria (1618–20) revealed that Gentileschi originally painted her own face on the figure. Imaging can also provide insights into a painter’s choice of materials, showing, for example, whether a painter used titanium oxide pigment in a given work.

According to the text, why are the images beneath the surface of a painting valuable to art historians?

A) They can show how long a painting took to complete.

B) They can indicate whether a painting is damaged.

C) They can be used to prove which artist painted a given work.

D) They can reveal aspects of an artist’s decision-making.

The following text is adapted from Akwaeke Emezi's 2019 novel Pet. Jam is a teenager who lives with her father, Aloe, and her mother, Bitter, who is a painter.

Bitter finished the painting in the dark morning of a day---it was well past midnight when Jam heard the studio door creak open. She stared into the velvet black of her room and listened to her mother's footsteps walking in her and Aloe's bedroom. There was a weight thrumming through the floorboards in a low song, and that was how Jam knew the painting was done. Bitter's feet were singing the news.

Which choice best states the function of the underlined sentence in the text as a whole?

A) It describes Aloe's reaction upon seeing the painting for the first time.

B) It indicates that Jam is more interested in music than in art.

C) It adds to the idea that Bitter's footsteps reveal something to Jam.

D) It indicates that Bitter always sings when working on a painting.

In Ojibwe, an Indigenous language from the Great Lakes region of what are now the United States and Canada, pangi means "a little bit," whereas pä-pangi means "rarely." This phenomenon, in which an element of a root word is repeated, sometimes with modification, within another word that is related to the root word, is called reduplication. In this case, the element "pa" in pangi gets repeated in pä-pangi. There are many examples of this type of reduplication in Ojibwe.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined sentence in the text as a whole?

A) It provides a general definition of the phenomenon discussed in the text.

B) It explains where the language discussed in the text is from.

C) It contrasts the language discussed in the text with other languages.

D) It provides English translations of the Ojibwe words discussed in the text.

Microplastics are tiny pieces of plastic waste. Areas of the ocean with higher concentrations of microplastic particles also have smaller and fewer waves. A study by Yukun Sun and colleagues found that the concentration of microplastic particles cannot be the only reason for this reduced wave activity because the concentration of particles that would have the observed effect is much higher than that found in these areas of the ocean. However, they found that surfactants, chemicals often used to manufacture plastics, are released into the water from microplastics and have a much stronger wave-reducing effect.

According to the text, what did Sun and colleagues discover about surfactants?

A) They can be used to contain microplastics within certain areas of the ocean.

B) They are helpful for removing microplastics from the ocean.

C) They have a much stronger effect on wave activity than microplastics alone do.

D) They are mainly composed of water.

The soil on Mars can make missions to explore the planet challenging, as the sand and dust are known to clog filters and lock moving parts on robotic rovers and other exploration devices. Using simulants, which are materials designed to simulate different planetary surfaces, scientists are able to study the characteristics of Mars's surface. Simulants like the Mars Mojave simulant---which was developed using lava deposits from California's Mojave Desert---help scientists evaluate how well their devices will handle the surface when operated on Mars.

Based on the text, what is one reason why simulants are valuable for scientists?

A) Simulants allow scientists to test the ability of research equipment to withstand some of the conditions it will encounter during a mission.

B) Scientists use simulants to compare the physical properties of Mars's surface to those of Earth's surface.

C) Simulants can be mixed with soil from Earth to explore how research equipment will handle extreme terrains on Earth.

D) Scientists use simulants to track how the chemical properties of planetary soils have changed over time.

Blue holes, such as Watling’s Blue Hole near San Salvador Island, are large marine sinkholes. They are typically located in areas where the ocean bedrock is made of soluble material (e.g., marble) because rock erosion is crucial to their formation. Because of the diverse marine life they contain, blue holes attract numerous divers and scientists. Currently, the Taam Ja’ Blue Hole in Chetumal Bay, Mexico, is the deepest blue hole on record, measured by Teresa Álvarez-Legorreta and colleagues to be at least 420 meters below sea level.

According to the text, what draws divers and scientists to blue holes such as Watling’s Blue Hole and the Taam Ja’ Blue Hole?

A) A hope to encounter a variety of marine organisms

B) A desire to witness the erosion of the rocks in the blue holes

C) A commitment to protecting the marble and other soluble materials in the blue holes

D) An interest in comparing the depths of Watling’s Blue Hole and the Taam Ja’ Blue Hole to the depths of other blue holes

The following text is from Maria Amparo Ruiz de Burton's 1885 novel The Squatter and the Don.

Don Mariano Alamar was silently walking up and down the front piazza of his house at the rancho; his hands listlessly clasped behind and his head slightly bent forward in deep thought. He had pushed away to one side the many arm-chairs and wicker rockers with which the piazza was furnished. He wanted a long space to walk. That his meditations were far from agreeable, could easily be seen by the compressed lips, slight frown, and sad gaze of his mild and beautiful blue eyes.

Based on the text, why does Don Mariano push aside the furniture on the piazza?

A) He feels that walking an uninterrupted path will help him think through a difficult issue.

B) He is determining which pieces of furniture to dispose of.

C) He wishes to create the impression that he has a large extended family.

D) He wants to make space so that he can engage in vigorous exercise.

Known for the albums Sorcerer and 'Round About Midnight, jazz trumpeter Miles Davis collaborated several times with pianist Gil Evans. Their 1958 adaptation of George Gershwin's opera Porgy and Bess bears little resemblance to the 1935 original. Davis and Evans felt no desire to please listeners expecting an exact duplication of the opera. They omitted parts, such as the aria "I Got Plenty of Nuthin'," and sometimes made only brief gestures toward Gershwin's melodies. But Davis and Evans's willingness to recompose Gershwin's work led to one of the most enduring albums in Davis's catalog.

Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?

A) To explain why works of art most likely to be praised by critics are those that defy tradition

B) To present reasons why one work of art should be considered superior to another

C) To describe how two artists transformed another artist's work

D) To summarize the history of a long collaboration between two artists

Stores often play background music to create a pleasant shopping experience. Based on a survey, Amir Manzoor found that such music was linked to reduced enjoyment among customers. Manzoor thinks that one explanation for this result is that the surveyed customers may have wanted to finish their shopping as quickly as possible. They therefore weren’t focused on enjoying the experience. It’s possible that background music could improve the experience of other customers whose main goal is to have a good time while they shop.

Based on the text, which research question was Manzoor’s study most likely intended to answer?

A) What genres of music do customers prefer to listen to while they are shopping?

B) Does the volume of a store’s background music affect how much time customers spend in the store?

C) Do customers spend more money when shopping for music in stores or online?

D) How does the use of background music in stores affect customers’ shopping experience?

Why do rusty-spotted cats purr but jaguars roar? Researchers hypothesize that this difference between the two feline species may be partly due to a U-shaped bone in their throats called the hyoid. Rusty-spotted cats, which are much smaller than jaguars, have a rigid hyoid that rumbles when the cat’s larynx vibrates, resulting in a purr. By contrast, jaguars have a somewhat flexible hyoid, and the bone is attached to the skull with a stretchy ligament that rusty-spotted cats lack. These traits allow jaguars and most other species of big cats to produce powerful roars. The same traits may also prevent most big cats from purring.

Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?

A) The text compares the habitats of two species, then explains how those habitats are changing.

B) The text presents a theory about two species, then discusses facts that weaken it.

C) The text poses a question about two species, then presents a possible answer.

D) The text describes a behavior shared by two species, then discusses other behaviors shared by them.

Biologist Grace Herzel and colleagues conducted a study of how butterfly color and weather conditions relate to butterfly behavior, which wouldn't have been possible without data gathered by students and other amateur science enthusiasts in the community. Considering over three years' worth of data, the researchers found that butterfly color might influence behavior more than butterfly size does, and that butterflies tended to prefer orange and red flowers on cloudy days and multicolor flowers on partly cloudy days.

According to the text, which factors seemed to be linked to the behavior of butterflies in Grace Herzel and colleagues' study?

A) Weather conditions but not butterfly color

B) Neither butterfly color nor weather conditions

C) Butterfly color but not weather conditions

D) Both butterfly color and weather conditions

In a period of great prosperity during his reign, Egyptian pharaoh Amenemhat II (circa 1800 BCE) had a pyramid with a massive substructure built at Hawara. The underground complex was largely dismantled in antiquity, but accounts of its splendor remain, including one from Greek historian Herodotus, who claimed to have seen it. In his Histories (circa 425 BCE), Herodotus writes of 3,000 chambers adorned with carved figures, a dozen courts flanked by white stone pillars, and many winding passages in the complex, characterizing it as a great labyrinth and "an unending marvel."

According to the text, what information did Herodotus include in his Histories?

A) An account of the magnificence of the complex that once stood beneath the pyramid at Hawara

B) A record of how long it took for the pyramid and complex to be constructed at Hawara

C) A discussion of how building the pyramid and complex at Hawara led to a period of prosperity

D) An explanation of how Herodotus was able to arrange to see the pyramid and complex at Hawara

Movies that are part of larger franchises are often criticized for being predictable. Take, for instance, Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019), which is part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe franchise. It's true that this movie resembles earlier Marvel movies. But just because a movie has familiar elements doesn't mean it can't also be worth watching. Critics generally agree that Spider-Man: Far From Home isn't the most exciting franchise movie, but franchise movies are rarely as stale as some people claim. And some franchise movies, like Logan (2017), are wonderfully original.

Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?

A) The text summarizes the plot of a franchise movie, then explains how the plot is continued in a later movie in that franchise.

B) The text explains why some people enjoyed a particular franchise movie, then considers why other people disliked it.

C) The text describes audiences' reactions to a movie that is part of a larger franchise, then presents some critics' reactions to that movie.

D) The text discusses a common criticism of franchise movies, then argues that the criticism is mostly undeserved.

A team of researchers discovered that Matabele ants can identify an infected wound in a member of the colony and then treat the infection by covering the wound with antimicrobial secretions that the ants produce. The team found that the mortality rate for Matabele ants with infected injuries was reduced by 90% with this treatment, and they are hopeful that this discovery could aid in the development of new antibiotics for human use.

Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?

A) It identifies an issue concerning Matabele ants and then proposes a solution to address the issue.

B) It describes unique properties of Matabele ants and then speculates on how those properties evolved.

C) It summarizes research findings on Matabele ants and then identifies an area for further research.

D) It introduces a study of Matabele ants and then explains the research methods used in the study.

The Marsalis family is often referred to as "the first family of jazz." Four of the children of celebrated pianist Ellis Marsalis Jr. went on to become performers who are also critically acclaimed: drummer Jason, trombonist Delfeayo, saxophonist Branford, and trumpeter Wynton. Wynton notably went on to become the first jazz composer to win the Pulitzer Prize for Music (for his oratorio Blood on the Fields).

Which choice best describes the main purpose of the text?

A) To explain why a family of musicians received a nickname

B) To compare the artistic achievements of several musicians

C) To show why a particular musician won a major award

D) To emphasize why musicians should work together

Seventeenth-century Flemish artist Clara Peeters played a crucial role in the history of still-life painting. At a time when historical paintings were the preferred genre — indeed, at a time when there wasn't even a term for still-life painting in Peeters's language — Peeters painted food, flowers, fish and game. Her influence spread throughout Western Europe and she became so strongly associated with the genre that painters who took up similar subjects were sometimes described as belonging to the "circle of Peeters."

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) Clara Peeters was an important figure in the development of still-life painting

B) Clara Peeters made significant contributions to multiple genres of painting.

C) Clara Peeters introduced the term "still-life painting" to Western Europe.

D) Some paintings attributed to Clara Peeters may have been painted by other artists in her circle.

The following text is adapted from Armando Palacio Valdes's short story "The Love of Clotilde," originally published in Spanish in 1884.

It was said that in [Don Jeronimo's] youth he once wrote a play which won him nothing but hisses and free entry for life behind the scenes of the theaters. Whether resigned or not to the verdict of the public, he ceased to write plays and assumed instead the nobler role of patron to unrecognized authors and artists and to ruined managers.

Any youth from the provinces who arrived in Madrid with a drama in his pocket could take no surer road to seeing it produced than that which led to the home of Don Jeronimo. One and all, he received them with open arms, the good and the bad alike.

According to the text, what change coincided with Don Jeronimo becoming a patron of the theater?

A) He achieved public recognition for a poem he had written earlier.

B) He accepted a new job as a stage manager.

C) He stopped writing plays.

D) He moved to a town outside of Madrid.

The food industry has long used thermal technologies to preserve food in large batches. Recent advancements in microwave heating were made through research in Mexico on the preservation of jalapeno peppers. Microwave heating is generally considered to be an improvement over more conventional thermal preservation methods: whereas conventional methods transfer energy from the surface of a food to its interior, microwave heating uses electromagnetic waves to generate heat within the food itself, thus reducing industrial cooking times.

Based on the text, what is one disadvantage of some conventional thermal preservation methods?

A) Their cooking times are longer than those of other methods.

B) They are only effective in heating foods that are lightweight and small in size.

C) They require more energy than other methods do.

D) They are especially vulnerable to technological breakdowns.

In 1826, English pharmacist John Walker was mixing a pot of chemicals with a stick when he noticed that his experimental substance had quickly hardened and dried to the mixer. When he tried to remove the paste by scraping it against his fireplace, Walker was astonished to see the end of the stick suddenly burst into flames. Walker had accidentally invented the strikeable match, which he eventually mass produced and sold as "Friction Lights."

Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?

A) To explain unexpected success in the marketplace of a new product

B) To highlight the fortuitous nature of a discovery

C) To describe the chemical composition of match tips

D) To note the impact of strikeable matches on nineteenth-century society

By April 2022, the Broadway show The Phantom of the Opera had racked up over eleven thousand performances. Its total theatrical run spanned thirty-five years. Its closest competitor, Chicago, still had thousands of shows and nearly a decade of stage time remaining if it hoped to seize the record. In short, when April saw the final curtain of Broadway's longest-running show, any theatergoer could predict that Phantom's legacy would be tough to beat.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined sentence in the text as a whole?

A) It illustrates how performances of Phantom were received by the general public.

B) It cites an especially lucrative time in Phantom's theatrical run.

C) It offers evidence used to support a conclusion about Phantom's impact.

D) It contrasts the longevity of Phantom with the brevity of Chicago.

Community science, which involves professional scientists collaborating with members of the public to study a topic, is often an effective and engaging way to conduct research. It can increase the amount of data researchers can collect, offer insight into the daily life of a scientist, and spark youth interest in science. This approach was essential to the success of biologist Grace Herzel and colleagues' study of how weather relates to a butterfly's flower choice, which included findings from hundreds of students and community members in northwestern Arkansas.

Which choice best states the function of the underlined sentence in the text as a whole?

A) It provides a contrast with an idea presented in the previous sentence.

B) It establishes the limits of the conclusion presented in the sentence that follows.

C) It offers details to clarify the claim made in the previous sentence.

D) It identifies the purpose of the study described in the sentence that follows.

Like most dog breeds developed in the Americas, the dogo argentino descends from dogs brought from Europe during the colonial era. In contrast, the Xoloitzcuintli is among a handful of breeds that descend from non-European populations that predated colonization. In 2013, researchers added another breed to this list: the Carolina dog, which is native to rural pockets of the Southeastern US. This breed has a unique genetic link to East Asian populations that were themselves the ancestors of the precolonial dogs of the Americas.

What is the subject of the main distinction the text draws between the dogo argentino and the Xoloitzcuintli?

A) The size, coloration, and other traits typically associated with the two breeds

B) The geographical origins of the populations from which the two breeds descend

C) The degree to which the two breeds contributed to the ancestry of breeds developed more recently

D) The rate at which the two breeds spread from their places of origin to the Southeastern US

In 2014 Marta S. Pimentel and colleagues published a study concluding that ocean acidification has a strong effect on the behavior of Coryphaena hippurus, a species of fish. However, Pimentel and colleagues' study relied on a mean sample size of only 10 fish. In a 2022 review of various scientists' conclusions about the impacts of ocean acidification on fish behavior, Timothy D. Clark and colleagues caution that relying on such a relatively small sample size can increase the potential for biased analysis. Such analysis, in turn, can contribute to reports of exaggerated effects.

What is the main topic of the scientific research discussed in the text?

A) Feeding patterns of top marine predators

B) Loss of marine diversity due to overfishing

C) Changes in technologies used to capture fish

D) Effects of ocean acidification on fish behavior

Winter in the Blood, the 1974 novel by Blackfeet author James Welch, is typical of Native fiction written during the 1960s and 1970s. During that period, Welch and his peers wrote realistic and deeply serious portrayals of life in tribal communities. Recently, however, younger Native writers have embraced popular genres known for being entertaining and suspenseful, such as fantasy and horror. Anishinaabe author Nathan Adler is a figure in this movement. Their 2016 novel Wrist is a work of horror fiction.

Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?

A) It provides an overview of Native fiction, then compares it to fiction by non-Native writers.

B) It describes one Native author's early works, then describes his more recent works.

C) It praises one Native fiction writer, then criticizes a different Native fiction writer.

D) It discusses fiction by earlier Native writers, then describes how fiction by more recent Native writers differs from the earlier fiction.

The following text is adapted from Louise Erdrich's 2020 novel The Night Watchman. Louis Pipestone is collecting signatures for a petition from fellow members of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa on the tribe's reservation in North Dakota.

Louis Pipestone tended the petition like a garden. He kept it with him at all times. In town, his eyes sharpened when he noticed a tribal member who hadn't yet signed. Wherever they were — at the gas pump, mercantile [general store], at Henry's [Café], on the road, or outside the clinic and hospital — Louis cornered them. If they were waiting for a baby to be born, he'd have them sign. If they were laughing, if they were arguing. If they were taking a child home from school, they signed.

Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?

A) To demonstrate that most tribal members are enthusiastic about signing the petition

B) To show that attitudes toward the petition within the tribal community change over time

C) To portray Louis Pipestone's strong commitment to collecting signatures for the petition

D) To suggest that some tribal members refuse to sign the petition because they dislike Louis Pipestone

The following text is from Bram Stoker’s 1911 novel The Lair of the White Worm. Adam is meeting his great-uncle Richard at a port.

The meeting so auspiciously begun proceeded well. Adam, seeing that the old man was interested in the novelty of the ship, suggested that he should stay the night on board, and that he would himself be ready to start at any hour and go anywhere that the other suggested. This affectionate willingness to fall in with his own plans quite won the old man’s heart. He warmly accepted the invitation, and at once they became not only on terms of affectionate relationship, but almost like old friends.

Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?

A) It describes why Adam and his great-uncle Richard are excited for their upcoming journey on the ship.

B) It contrasts great-uncle Richard’s wary first impressions of Adam with his ultimate affection toward him.

C) It showcases how Adam’s flexibility and consideration strengthen his relationship with his great-uncle Richard.

D) It states the reasons why Adam and his great-uncle Richard decide to sleep on the ship rather than finding lodging on land.

With its combination of country and pop influences, “Here You Come Again” is typical of Dolly Parton’s recordings in the late 1970s and first half of the 1980s. Through songs bridging these two genres, she achieved her greatest commercial successes. A decade earlier, however, Dolly had first established herself as a songwriter steeped in the traditional folk music of the Blue Ridge Mountains, where she was born and raised. The influence of the ballads of this region can be heard in the word choice and subject matter of the lyrics to “Jolene,” one of her best songs from this period.

Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?

A) It explores Dolly’s lifelong interest in folk music, then debates whether pop music influenced “Jolene.”

B) It discusses a particular period in Dolly’s recording career, then considers the music in an earlier period of her career.

C) It enthusiastically recommends Dolly’s earliest recordings, then expresses disappointment with her later recordings.

D) It praises “Here You Come Again,” then notes how remarkably similar that song is to a song that Dolly recorded earlier in her career.

Researchers César A. Hidalgo, Elisa Castañer, and Andres Sevtsuk created a computer model to predict the mix of businesses and places of interest found in a given neighborhood. The team used data from the Google Places API service to help identify hotels, supermarkets, and other businesses and map their locations. This approach has some limits—data from Places API tend to be restricted to places that are customer facing—but the data set nonetheless provides an extremely reliable source to study colocation patterns of neighborhood amenities.

According to the text, what is one potential drawback of Hidalgo and colleagues' method?

A) It is based on recent advancements from other fields that have yet to be applied outside of those contexts.

B) It depends upon data that are likely to be outdated.

C) It may lead to conclusions that are not reflective of all the amenities in a given neighborhood.

D) It is likely to contribute to inaccurate identifications of the boundaries of specific neighborhoods.

Adult glass eels can be found off the coast of Maine, but the eels begin their lives in the Sargasso Sea, a biodiverse area in the North Atlantic Ocean where they are born and later return to breed. Though biologists believe they have identified the general area in the Sargasso Sea that is crucial to the endangered eels' survival, little is yet known about how the animals spawn there. Scientists believe that solving the mystery will lead to better conservation of glass eels and their habitat, helping in turn to sustain several other species that rely on them as a food source.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined portion in the text as a whole?

A) It suggests that scientists are more concerned about other species than about glass eels' habitat.

B) It indicates that the benefit of understanding glass eels' spawning behavior extends beyond the eels.

C) It discusses a role that glass eels and other species serve in supporting the ecosystem of the Sargasso Sea.

D) It presents a finding from a study that identifies the circumstances required to ensure the survival of glass eels.

Joseph A. Walker's award-winning play The River Niger was produced in 1972 by the groundbreaking Negro Ensemble Company (NEC). NEC cofounder Robert Hooks, an actor, producer, and activist, had met actor and playwright Douglas Turner Ward while they were performing in a 1960 touring production of Lorraine Hansberry's play A Raisin in the Sun. Together, they envisioned a theater company that would nurture and showcase the work of Black theater professionals. Since NEC's founding in 1967, its workshops and performances have given Black playwrights, including Walker, a forum for their compelling stories.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined sentence in the text as a whole?

A) It provides additional information about a person mentioned in the text.

B) It emphasizes the ongoing significance of the theater company discussed in the text.

C) It illustrates the widespread influence of a play discussed earlier in the text.

D) It explains the circumstances that led to the formation of the theater company discussed in the text.

Online surveys are a common tool researchers use to collect information. These surveys are usually designed for use on personal computers (PCs), but more people are using smartphones to complete them than they are PCs. This shift in device usage may change how participants interact with online surveys. When researchers Jean Philippe Décieux and Philipp F. Sischka investigated, they found that PC users were more likely to multitask while taking surveys than smartphone users were, but PC users were also more likely to complete the surveys.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) A study shows that the type of device people use to complete online surveys affects how they interact with these surveys.

B) Researchers are investigating why survey completion rates are higher on PCs than they are on smartphones, despite increased multitasking on PCs.

C) People are choosing to take online surveys on smartphones more often than they are on PCs because smartphones are convenient.

D) Researchers prefer online surveys to other ways of collecting information because they think online survey results are more reliable.

In the Greek village of Pyrgi, the buildings are embellished with xysta, a traditional design featuring rows upon rows of carved geometric shapes on the facades of buildings. Deeply rooted in Pyrgi's cultural history and handed down over generations, the techniques used for creating these precise patterns involve mathematical principles and tools, such as compasses and rulers. Studying the history of xysta, therefore, has given researchers an understanding of how mathematics has been used in this region dating to the medieval period.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) There is more academic interest in the tools the Pyrgi people use to construct xysta than in the appearance of xysta.

B) The people of Pyrgi constructed xysta on their buildings to show an appreciation for mathematics.

C) The construction of xysta on buildings was first completed in the village of Pyrgi during the medieval period.

D) Research on techniques used to construct xysta has helped reveal the role of mathematics in the culture of Pyrgi.

Films based on famous books tend to do well in theaters: when Terry McMillan’s acclaimed novel How Stella Got Her Groove Back was adapted into a movie in 1998, it was a commercial success. To investigate whether book-to-movie adaptations also have an impact on the books’ popularity, two researchers examined online activity related to The Monuments Men and two other books that have been turned into movies. They found that the films’ releases in theaters coincided with increased intent to read the original books but not with higher average ratings for those books.

Information in the text best supports which statement about book-to-movie adaptations?

A) They often achieve great commercial success but are generally perceived as lacking in artistic value.

B) They may lead to increased interest in the original books but not necessarily to greater liking of those books.

C) They are generally the least well received by people who have read the original books.

D) They may damage the reputation of the original books, but any such negative effect is of short duration.

The following text is from Louise Erdrich's 1986 novel The Beet Queen. Celestine takes her infant daughter with her to the butcher shop where she makes sausages.

Sometimes Celestine turned around and met the direct gaze of her daughter, a look so penetrating that Celestine's breath caught. She dropped the spice, the string, the knife she was using, and took the girl up in her arms, ready for her to speak as if a spell had suddenly lifted.

When the baby flexed her entire body and struggled to free herself, Celestine put her down. No matter how thorough Celestine's exhaustion, no matter how little sleep she'd had, there was a nerve of excitement running through each hour.

Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?

A) To imply that Celestine is dissatisfied with her job

B) To show that Celestine enjoys imagining her daughter's future life

C) To portray Celestine's excitement about her daughter

D) To analyze the interactions between Celestine's coworkers and her daughter

Bioluminescence is most commonly found among marine organisms: 70% of known luminescent species inhabit ocean environments. This trait is remarkably stable and has evolved independently in many marine species over time. Light-emitting marine species, like the Humboldt squid with its flashing light displays, exhibit accelerated diversification compared to non-luminescent relatives. This increased genetic variety among related light-emitting species further underscores bioluminescence's crucial role in marine biodiversity and evolution.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined portion in the text as a whole?

A) To provide a statistical comparison between two categories of bioluminescent species that is elaborated on in the rest of the text

B) To present a scientific finding that the text's discussion of the evolutionary history of bioluminescence calls into question

C) To provide data that support an argument made in the text about a particular light-emitting ocean species

D) To support the text's assertion that bioluminescence is associated with particular environments

Charles Fuller's award-winning play A Soldier's Play was produced in 1981 by the groundbreaking Negro Ensemble Company (NEC). NEC cofounder Douglas Turner Ward, who worked as an actor, director, and playwright, had met actor and producer Robert Hooks while they were performing in a 1960 touring production of Lorraine Hansberry's play A Raisin in the Sun. Together, they envisioned a theater company that would nurture and showcase the work of Black theater professionals. Since NEC's founding in 1967, its workshops and performances have given Black playwrights, including Fuller, a forum for their compelling stories.

Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?

A) To describe how Ward and Hooks's creative partnership changed over time

B) To discuss the origin and importance of the NEC

C) To bring attention to a work by Charles Fuller

D) To show how the play A Raisin in the Sun influenced Ward and Hooks

The following text is from Jerome K. Jerome's 1889 novel Three Men in a Boat (To Say Nothing of the Dog). The narrator and two friends are taking a boat down the River Thames in England.

In a boat, I have always noticed that it is the fixed idea of each member of the crew that he is doing everything. Harris's notion was, that it was he alone who had been working, and that both George and I had been imposing upon him. George, on the other hand, ridiculed the idea of Harris's having done anything more than eat and sleep, and had a cast-iron opinion that it was he — George himself — who had done all the labour worth speaking of.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined sentence in the text as a whole?

A) It establishes Harris's feelings about the narrator's idea of how boat trips usually proceed.

B) It offers Harris's belief as a specific example of a trend the narrator has observed while boating.

C) It suggests that Harris is focused on helping the group navigate a challenge.

D) It demonstrates that Harris finds his experiences on the boat to be confusing.

President Richard Nixon is most famous for his participation in the 1970s Watergate political scandal, a convoluted tale of criminality and eroded ethics involving a constellation of associates such as political operative Jeb Stuart Magruder and Nixon's secretary Rose Mary Woods. But Nixon's legacy is complex: he has been praised for his role in affirming the sovereignty of tribal nations, and he once made an attempt at reforming United States health care policy that is arguably a precursor to the Affordable Care Act, which became law during the Barack Obama administration.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) Richard Nixon's reputation is primarily due to the actions of his associates.

B) Some of Richard Nixon's policies influenced the policies of later presidential administrations.

C) Jeb Stuart Magruder and Rose Mary Woods were significant figures in the presidency of Richard Nixon.

D) Richard Nixon is commonly linked with an infamous historical event, but this overshadows some of his notable achievements.

Businesses selling clothing and other fashion items face obstacles in trying to forecast how much product to order: tastes and styles change quickly, while manufacturing clothing takes a significant amount of time. Researchers Youran Fu and Marshall Fisher have found that combining sellers' own data with information gathered from social media can dramatically improve the accuracy of such forecasts—by 24 to 57 percent in the cases they directly studied. Better predictions mean demand is easier to meet without retailers becoming overstocked.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A. Using multiple data sources can enhance the ability of sellers in the fashion industry to anticipate demand.

B. Social media is revolutionizing how both sellers and researchers view the fashion industry.

C. Becoming overstocked is the main preoccupation of sellers trying to forecast demand for fashion items.

D. Retailers can use their own data to accurately predict how tastes and styles are evolving.

A blend of sculpture and painting, sand bottle art is created by placing grains of sand inside of a clear container until the stacked particles form an image. Today, there are hundreds of sand bottle artists in the country of Jordan, where skilled practitioners create complete, intricate artworks for live audiences in as little as twenty minutes. In America, however, the undisputed king of sand bottle art worked much more slowly. To create the ornate images in his sand bottles, such as a ship sailing through a gale and George Washington riding a horse, Andrew Clemens would meticulously shift grains of sand for up to a year.

What is the function of the underlined sentence in the text as a whole?

A) It offers an example of an artist who performs his craft in the same way as artists mentioned previously in the text.

B) It shifts the discussion of sand art to a different location and a different type of sand artist.

C) It introduces a comparison between the artistic qualities of Jordanian and American sand art.

D) It reveals the extent to which cultural differences can produce significantly different kinds of art.

While commodities such as grain, salt, and cowry shells were used as money prior to 2000 BCE, metal gradually superseded these materials because of its portability, durability, and divisibility. By 700 BCE, metal coins were in use as currency in India, China, and cities around the Aegean Sea. These cultures likely developed coins independently, since each of these civilizations had a distinct manufacturing process: Indian coins were punched metal disks, Aegean coins were stamped, and Chinese coins were cast.

The author makes what point about the development of metal coins?

A) Metal coins evolved in form and function over several hundred years.

B) Metal coins required a specific metallurgical technology to become widespread.

C) Metal coins are a characteristic of an economically advanced civilization.

D) Metal coins likely did not have a single point of origin.

Historians point to the rule of the Piast dynasty as crucial to the formation of the Polish state. However, some differentiate between members of the dynasty like Mieszko II Lambert, who ruled as king from 1025 to 1031 CE, and less well-documented figures like Siemomysł, who is said to have ruled in the 10th century but whose historical actuality is disputed. Siemomysł appears in the Gesta principum Polonorum, a chronicle of medieval Polish history written between 1112 and 1118. However, the chronicle's documentation of Siemomysł relies on oral tradition, unlike its records of later rulers.

According to the text, what is a difference between how historians view Siemomysł and how they view Mieszko II Lambert?

A. Historians agree that Mieszko II Lambert existed, but disagree about whether Siemomysł existed.

B. Historians believe that the Gesta principum Polonorum provides more evidence for Siemomysł's existence than it does for Mieszko II Lambert's existence.

C. Historians agree that Siemomysł ruled Poland much later than Mieszko II Lambert.

D. Historians find the orally transmitted stories affirming the existence of Mieszko II Lambert to be more convincing than similar stories about Siemomysł.

The following text is from Yung Wing’s 1909 memoir My Life in China and America. Yung Wing was the first person from China to graduate from a US university.

Little did I realize when in 1845 I wrote, while in the Morrison school, a composition on “An Imaginary Voyage to New York and up the Hudson,” that I was to see New York in reality. This incident leads me to the reflection that sometimes our imagination foreshadows what lies uppermost in our minds and brings possibilities within the sphere of realities.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined sentence in the text as a whole?

A) It indicates Yung’s unwillingness to distinguish between reality and fantasy as a child.

B) It foreshadows Yung’s future difficulties in publishing his writings.

C) It describes an event in Yung’s life that exemplifies a phenomenon.

D) It illustrates the sense of adventure that Yung developed as a child.

With its mournful subject matter and haunting tune, “The Cuckoo” is one of the most celebrated folk ballads of the southern Appalachian Mountains. Dolly Parton, who was born and raised in the region, was deeply influenced by these traditional ballads, as can be heard in the songs she wrote in the first decade of her career. “My Blue Ridge Mountain Boy,” a song from her 1969 album of the same title, echoes Appalachian ballads in its narrative details.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined sentence?

A) It lists several Appalachian folk ballads that Dolly recorded early in her career.

B) It expresses disappointment in a song that Dolly wrote early in her career.

C) It cites an album by Dolly as one of her most commercially successful works.

D) It identifies a song by Dolly that was influenced by Appalachian music.

Insects like ground beetles, crustaceans like calico crabs, and many other animals without spines are known as arthropods. Their nervous systems are made up of a brain and different nerves. Javier Ortega-Hernández, James Weaver, and team studied two fossils of the extinct arthropod Mollisonia symmetrica and identified parts of the species' nervous system. The researchers spotted evidence of nerves extending into the animal's body parts and may have also found rare signs of a synganglion, a brain-like mass of nerves in the head.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined portion in the text as a whole?

A) It describes a feature that was missing from both fossils.

B) It gives the name of an arthropod species.

C) It explains how the team discovered the fossils.

D) It describes part of the nervous system the team identified.

In the US, the Lanham Act allows companies to own trademarks, which are words or images that represent specific products. “Xerox,” for example, refers to products made specifically by the Xerox Corporation, the company that owns the trademark. However, the Lanham Act also allows a trademark to be taken away if it ceases to be specific. For example, “cellophane” was once a trademark for a particular brand of food wrapping material. Over time, though, people started using “cellophane” to refer to many different brands. Because the word had become generic, a court decided that it could no longer be owned as a trademark.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined sentence in the text as a whole?

A) It adds to the text’s description of products made by the Xerox Corporation.

B) It concludes the text’s argument about how the Lanham Act can be improved.

C) It begins the text’s discussion of the fact that trademarks can be taken away.

D) It completes the text’s comparison of trademark laws in the US to laws in other countries.

The following text is from Jerome K. Jerome's 1889 novel Three Men in a Boat (To Say Nothing of the Dog). The narrator and two friends are taking a boat down the River Thames in England.

In a boat, I have always noticed that it is the fixed idea of each member of the crew that he is doing everything. Harris's notion was that it was he alone who had been working, and that both George and I had been imposing upon him. George, on the other hand, ridiculed the idea of Harris's having done anything more than eat and sleep and had a cast-iron opinion that it was he — George himself — who had done all the labour worth speaking of.

Which choice best describes the main purpose of the text?

A) To present the narrator's generalization along with supporting examples from a specific situation

B) To convey the narrator's confidence that he understands the role expected of him in a group

C) To examine how the narrator and his friends each contributed to navigating a challenge

D) To give an overview of a particular situation that the narrator finds startling

Researchers examining data from the New Horizons space probe, which passed Pluto in 2015, were puzzled by a 27-mile-long crater on Pluto's icy surface. Although Pluto is mostly covered in frozen methane and nitrogen, the surface near the crater seemed to show the presence of water ice and ammonia—both of which are associated with eruptions from ice volcanoes. Additionally, the shape and appearance of the crater did not suggest that it was formed by impact. Based on this evidence, scientist Dale Cruikshank and his team hypothesized that the crater was likely once a massive ice volcano.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined sentence in the text as a whole?

A) It implies that the research team eliminated an alternative explanation for the crater based on available evidence.

B) It identifies a misconception that the researchers had about the crater when they were first studying the data.

C) It emphasizes the importance of the New Horizons space probe to researchers.

D) It introduces previous findings that suggested a research method for Cruikshank and his team.

Moving beyond a simple "present or absent" designation, researchers created a new classification system that allows for a nuanced understanding of bioluminescence in marine organisms that was unavailable under binary classification systems. The new six-point scale considers varying levels of supporting evidence used to identify bioluminescent species. For example, the firefly squid scores 1 because of inconsistent reports, the emperor squid scores 4 because of its anatomical similarity to known luminous relatives, and the shaggy anglerfish scores 6 because of substantiated direct observations.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined sentence in the text as a whole?

A) It emphasizes the thoroughness of the research conducted.

B) It explains how the new classification system was derived from the previous binary system.

C) It justifies the need for a new classification system for marine species.

D) It explains the basis for the new system's scoring criteria.

Though Chloe Zhao's films are fictional, she incorporates real events into them in a documentary-like style and casts nonprofessional actors who reside in the places that she aims to portray. She also encourages these actors, whether they are teenagers living on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation or adults who travel the country for work, to put as much of themselves into their roles as possible. Her approach adds powerful resonance to films that explore the highly personal experiences of place and home, and often the difficult decision to stay or leave.

Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?

A) To discuss how Chloe Zhao's background in documentary filmmaking has influenced her storytelling style in films

B) To emphasize that Chloe Zhao's decisions during the filmmaking process reinforce the themes of her films

C) To summarize how Chloe Zhao's style of filmmaking changed over the course of her career

D) To argue that Chloe Zhao's films are best understood as documentaries

The following text is adapted from María Amparo Ruiz de Burton's 1885 novel The Squatter and the Don. Mercedes and Clarence, who develop a romantic relationship in the novel, have been traveling with a group of friends.

[Mercedes] was still very pale, and her hands yet trembled, when the thundering of the east-bound train was heard in the distance. Two shrieks pierced the air simultaneously, as the two trains passed each other. Her heart gave accelerated throbs when she heard those shrieks, because she knew that one of them came from the train which bore Clarence away, and it seemed to her as if expressive of his pain at being torn from her. Yes, that magician, the locomotive, understood it all, and shrieked to say he did so, because he knew she, too, wished to shriek like that.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) Mercedes shares a passion for locomotive travel with Clarence.

B) The sounds at the train station irritate Mercedes.

C) Clarence boarded his train at the last minute.

D) Mercedes feels heartbroken to be separated from Clarence.

The following text is from an 1894 translation of Alexandre Dumas's 1844 novel The Count of Monte-Cristo. Dantès is searching for a treasure and finds a cave whose opening has been deliberately blocked by a large rock. Hercules is a hero of Greek mythology.

Dantès dug away the earth carefully, and detected, or fancied he detected, the ingenious artifice. He attacked this wall, cemented by the hand of time, with his pickaxe. After ten minutes' labor the wall gave way, and a hole large enough to insert the arm was opened. Dantès went and cut the strongest olive-tree he could find, stripped off its branches, inserted it in the hole, and used it as a lever. But the rock was too heavy, and too firmly wedged, to be moved by any one man, were he Hercules himself.

Which statement about Dantès is best supported by the text?

A) He is determined in his efforts to move the rock away from the opening of the cave.

B) He is worried he will lack the courage to enter the cave when the entrance is finally opened.

C) He is unsure why the cave's opening was purposely hidden behind a wall and a large rock.

D) He is aware that his impatience is causing him to make clumsy errors as he enlarges the hole in the wall.

Benjamin Prud’homme and colleagues have explored how convergent evolution—a phenomenon that occurs when the same trait evolves independently in two reproductively separate lineages—can result from a genetic mechanism shared by both lineages. Meanwhile, Patricia J. Wittkopp and colleagues have investigated how convergence occurs through different genetic mechanisms, but the relative prevalence of convergence through shared and different genetic processes is still poorly understood. This motivated biologists Delbert A. Green II and Cassandra G. Extavour to evaluate both types of convergence in a single study for their 2012 paper.

Which choice best states the function of the underlined portion in the text as a whole?

A) It provides examples of how a phenomenon was studied by scientists in the field before Green and Extavour’s study.

B) It gives a basic description of a phenomenon that is central to the discussion that follows.

C) It clarifies a concept that the author implies was unclear in the studies mentioned in the text.

D) It introduces a method of scientific analysis that is discussed in greater detail later in the text.

Built in the 1970s, Raccoon Mountain is a pumped-storage hydropower facility (a "water-battery") located in the United States along the Tennessee River. When energy demand is low, excess power from the regional electric utility's nuclear plants is used to pump water (from a lower reservoir filled from the Tennessee River) up a shaft to the summit lake, where the water is stored as gravitational potential energy. When energy demand peaks, the water drains down from the summit lake, spinning turbines and generating upward of 1,700 megawatts of power — enough to power one million homes for twenty hours.

Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?

A) To point out the differences between two methods of energy generation

B) To explain the basics of how a specific energy technology works

C) To discuss the benefits of a new energy technology

D) To encourage regional electric utilities to build energy storage facilities

Modern dog breeds are largely the result of 160 years of owners crossbreeding certain dogs in order to select for particular physical appearances. Owners often say that some breeds are also more likely than others to have particular personality traits—basset hounds are affectionate; boxers are easy to train—but Kathleen Morrill and colleagues found through a combination of owner surveys and DNA sequencing of 2,000 dogs that while physical traits are predictably heritable among purebred dogs, behavior varies widely among dogs of the same breed.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) Dog breeds would not exist without many years of human intervention in dogs' reproduction.

B) Research fails to confirm a commonly held belief about dog breeds and behavior.

C) The dog breeds most popular among owners have often changed over the past 160 years.

D) A study of dog breeds is notable for its usage of both opinion surveys and DNA sequencing.

The following text is from Narciso Tondreau's 1898 poem "Yesterday and To-Day" (translated by Agnes Blake Poor in 1918). The poem is about an old statue of the Greek goddess Venus, which now lies on the ground in a state of disrepair.

How long ago, by summer breezes fanned,
Here stood the newborn Venus, fresh and fair,
All palpitating from the master's hand,
The last touch of his chisel lingering there.
"And surely this shall last!" he proudly thought;
"Fixed in immortal marble is my fame!"
Just here, where human hand has surely wrought,
Some crumbling letters may have spelled his name.

In the text, what does the speaker say that the artist believed about his sculpture?

A) Its beauty would be recognized as surpassing that of other images of Venus.

B) It would bring him enduring fame by withstanding time.

C) It would be praised for its intricate details that he carefully chiseled.

D) It would be carefully repaired when it inevitably begins to deteriorate.

From meerkats to aphid wasps, many animals practice some form of brood care (caring for offspring). Diying Huang and team claim to have found the earliest evidence of this behavior in insects in 163.5-million-year-old remains from the Haifanggou Formation in China, a location that has yielded many fossils, including those of carrion beetles. Huang and team examined 157 specimens of the extinct water boatman species Karataviella porovi and noted thirty individuals that appear to carry eggs on one of their legs. This finding establishes brood care in insects approximately 38 million years earlier than previously known.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) Huang and team concluded that K. porovi likely carried their offspring on one of their legs.

B) Huang and team's study of K. porovi fossils suggests that brood care in insects began earlier than formerly established.

C) The Haifanggou Formation is an abundant source of fossilized carrion beetles and K. porovi.

D) Research shows that carrion beetles inhabited the location that is now the Haifanggou Formation long before K. porovi did.

In 2011 Stephen D. Simpson and colleagues published a study concluding that ocean acidification has a strong effect on the behavior of Amphiprion percula, a species of fish. However, Simpson and colleagues' study relied on a mean sample size of only about 26 fish. In a 2022 review of various scientists' conclusions about the impacts of ocean acidification on fish behavior, Jeff C. Clements and colleagues caution that relying on such a relatively small sample size can increase the potential for biased analysis. Such analysis, in turn, can contribute to reports of exaggerated effects.

Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?

A) It states a similarity between two scientific studies, then notes a difference between them.

B) It describes a characteristic of a fish species, then explains why that characteristic is noteworthy.

C) It presents the result of a study, then raises a potential concern related to that result.

D) It summarizes a problem that scientists are investigating, then provides a possible solution to that problem.

On painter William H. Johnson's return to the United States in 1938 after a decade in Europe, his style underwent an abrupt transformation. Turning away from landscapes painted in an expressionist style—a style that often involves using fluid, distorted shapes and thick, textured brushstrokes to express the artist's subjective experience of reality—Johnson began painting portraits of Black Americans in a bold new way. Evocative of African sculpture and American and Scandinavian folk art, these portraits feature flat, deliberately oversimplified figures in a vibrant but limited color palette.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined sentence in the text as a whole?

A) It elaborates on the previous sentence's statement about a transitional moment in Johnson's artistic career.

B) It provides information about Johnson's travels in support of a claim about his artistic influences, which is advanced in the following sentence.

C) It recounts a moment in Johnson's personal life that enabled the success of his subsequent career, which is summarized in the following sentence.

D) It presents evidence that calls into question the previous sentence's characterization of Johnson's artistic development.

Dubautia carrii is among the twenty-eight species of silversword plants found only on the Hawaiian archipelago that collectively illustrate the process of adaptive radiation, or the rapid diversification of an ancestral species into different, related species. Each silversword species is physically distinct, with mature plant forms ranging from trees and shrubs to vines. However, they all descended from a common tarweed plant species, with their unique physical characteristics emerging as they adapted to the archipelago’s many specific habitats over time.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) All silverswords that grow on the Hawaiian archipelago have similar physical characteristics.

B) The Hawaiian archipelago exhibits many distinct habitats and species.

C) Most plants that grow on the Hawaiian archipelago are descendants of a single founder species.

D) Silverswords are good examples of adaptive radiation on the Hawaiian archipelago.

Harold Newton's Yellow Day, a wetland landscape with palm trees and lush greenery set against the pastel yellows and pinks of the sky and water, is typical of paintings by the mid-twentieth-century landscape artists now known as the Florida Highwaymen. Even though Florida was rapidly being developed at that time, tourists in particular held the idea that its distinctive tropical and coastal environments represented a pristine natural world, untouched by modernity. As with many Highwaymen paintings, the appeal of Yellow Day derived from its ability to capture this sentiment.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) Although many paintings by the Florida Highwaymen have subjects in common, Yellow Day is now more highly regarded by critics than other Florida Highwaymen paintings are.

B) Although Yellow Day and other paintings by the Florida Highwaymen were originally celebrated for their depictions of Florida's natural environments, art historians now question these paintings' accuracy.

C) Tourists to Florida in the mid-twentieth century were more likely to admire the sentiments expressed in Yellow Day and similar paintings than Florida residents were.

D) Yellow Day and other paintings by the Florida Highwaymen were notable for their ability to appeal to a popular conception about the state of Florida in the mid-twentieth century.

Artificial leaves are a developing renewable energy technology that mimics the process of photosynthesis in plants. These devices are silicon-based solar cells coated in chemical catalysts that activate reactions that split water molecules into hydrogen and oxygen gas. The technology, while generating lots of interest, is not yet commercially viable as a largescale energy source. To meet this challenge, scientists from many fields are researching ways to store, transport, and distribute the energy the devices produce while other scientists are working to improve the cost and efficiency of the devices.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) Continued research and development in artificial-leaf technology is needed before the devices can be widely used as an energy source.

B) Artificial leaves were developed to mimic the natural process of photosynthesis in plants in order to store energy for long-term commercial use.

C) The recent increase in the commercial use of artificial leaves as an energy source has encouraged many scientists to research ways to improve the technology.

D) Artificial leaves split water molecules into oxygen and hydrogen gas using catalysts more efficiently than plants do using the process of photosynthesis.

In what is now Washington state, the Tulalip Tribes operate the Hibulb Cultural Center. Relying on traditional knowledge to guide the design of exhibits, this institution presents Tulalip history and culture to the tribes' citizens. The Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa, a tribe in North Dakota, employs a similar strategy in its own cultural center. Both centers contrast with museums that aren't Indigenous-led; when displaying Indigenous artifacts, such museums tend to anticipate mainly non-Indigenous audiences and rely on Euro-centric strategies for designing exhibits.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) When staging Indigenous exhibits, non-Indigenous institutions should follow the example of the cultural centers operated by the Tulalip Tribes and the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa.

B) The cultural centers operated by the Tulalip Tribes and the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa differ in strategy from non-Indigenous museums that stage Indigenous exhibits.

C) Whereas non-Indigenous institutions stage exhibits on a wide array of subjects, the cultural centers operated by the Tulalip Tribes and the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa serve primarily to present Indigenous history and cultures.

D) The strategy used by the Tulalip Tribes to present history and culture to tribal citizens differs only slightly from the strategy used by the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa.

When Kenyan writer Ngugi wa Thiong'o, who had previously published four novels in English, began writing in his native language, Gikuyu, in the 1970s, several fellow writers and critics cautioned that doing so might make his works inaccessible outside his own community. Some noted that Kiswahili---widely spoken in Kenya and elsewhere in Africa---would be a more practical choice. Rejecting their arguments, Ngugi went on to author dozens of acclaimed works in Gikuyu that have been translated into a total of more than thirty languages.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) Although Ngugi's decision to write in Gikuyu was met with some skepticism, it didn't prevent him from achieving literary success.

B) In the 1970s, Ngugi became convinced that literature ought to be written in authors' native languages, and he proceeded to publish many works in Gikuyu.

C) Although Ngugi insisted on publishing his first works in Gikuyu, they have since been translated into many other languages.

D) The reaction to Ngugi's rejection of English illustrates that some literary experts believe that fame is most easily gained by writing in a widely understood language, such as Gikuyu.

The following text is from William Blake's 1794 poem "Introduction to the Songs of Experience." The speaker addresses Earth as if it has been asleep.

'O Earth, O Earth, return!
Arise from out the dewy grass!
Night is worn,
And the morn
Rises from the slumbrous mass.

Based on the text, what does the speaker most likely mean by saying that "night is worn"?

A) The night is ending.

B) The night is interesting.

C) The night seems like an old piece of clothing.

D) The night seems like it is happening for the first time.

During Rome's republican period, which ended in the first century BCE, libraries were predominantly owned by wealthy individuals who tightly controlled access to their book collections. The first public library became available in Rome in 28 BCE and was soon followed by one commissioned by Emperor Augustus. As modern scholar Fabio Fernandes notes, however, these two traditions aren't as distinct as they seem, as both the emperor and the private library owners viewed their libraries as extensions of their personal patronage, just on vastly differing scales.

Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?

A) To give a brief overview of public access to libraries throughout Rome's republican period

B) To contend that early imperial leaders in Rome wielded too much influence over libraries

C) To assert that private and early public libraries in ancient Rome had an essential similarity

D) To call into question the notion that private Roman libraries disappeared during the first century BCE

Dulauda saint is a species in a family of plants known collectively as the silverwood alliance, all of which grow only on the Hawaiian islands. Members of this alliance exhibit an extraordinary range of phenotypes, with some species maturing into vines and others into shrubs and trees. All species in the alliance descended from a single ancestral tarweed plant that arrived on the islands around 5 million years ago. The tarweed's descendants diversified into distinct species as they adapted to live in the wide variety of habitats found on the Hawaiian islands.

Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?

A) To indicate the specific tarweed ancestor of all plants that grow on the Hawaiian islands and explain why the plants have such varied physical characteristics

B) To describe the specific habitat where Dulauda saint are found and identify other plants that share a common ancestor with them

C) To describe the silverwood alliance and explain how the plant family became so large and varied

D) To advance the claim that all plants on the Hawaiian islands are part of the silverwood alliance and list possible ancestors of the plants that make up the alliance

Roy McLendon’s Moonlit St. Lucie, a riverscape featuring the silhouette of a single palm tree against the backdrop of shimmering water and a brilliant moonlit sky, is typical of paintings by the Florida Highwaymen, loosely affiliated landscape artists mainly active in Fort Pierce, Florida, during the 1950s and ’60s. Some art historians suggest that Highwaymen paintings played a role in shaping popular perceptions of the state that persist today: the natural iconography that McLendon and colleagues constantly revisited—placid inland rivers, windswept palm trees—is now seen as classically Floridian.

Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?

A) To describe the historical circumstances in which paintings by the Florida Highwaymen experienced a resurgence in popularity

B) To explain that a particular painting by Roy McLendon has had greater influence on the broader culture of the state of Florida than is generally acknowledged

C) To contrast the public’s reaction during the 1950s and ’60s to a particular painting by Roy McLendon with more recent reactions to it

D) To present the argument that paintings by the Florida Highwaymen likely helped to create a particular widespread impression of Florida

Though John Crowley, author of Engine Summer, is perhaps not as well known as the most commercially successful American writers of the past fifty years, his work has had several influential champions, including the poet John Hollander and the literary critic Harold Bloom. According to journalist Graeme Wood, Bloom claimed to have read Crowley’s novel Little, Big at least forty-six times, and in his posthumously published afterword to a 2022 edition of the book, Bloom rhetorically asked: “How many living authors of prose romance are universally relevant? Only Crowley.”

What is the main topic of the text?

A) The similarities between the prose of John Crowley and the poetry of John Hollander

B) The characteristics of John Crowley’s work that make it universally relevant

C) The reason why the work of John Crowley is not as commercially successful as it deserves to be

D) The reception of the work of John Crowley

Magical realism, a style that weaves fantasy into realistic narratives, coalesced in Latin America in the 1960s. It is associated with Gabriel García Márquez, whose One Hundred Years of Solitude is a key text. The style was embraced by Mexican American writers, such as Ana Castillo, whose So Far from God draws on Mexican folktales as a source of fantasy. Yet The Mixquiahuala Letters, also by Castillo, features no fantastical plot events. And despite his popular reputation, García Márquez himself wrote several works of strict realism, including Chronicle of a Death Foretold.

Which choice best states the function of the underlined sentence?

A) To identify an unrecognized point of similarity between Chronicle of a Death Foretold and So Far from God

B) To suggest that Mexican American authors who were influenced by García Márquez may have, in turn, influenced him

C) To refute the possible impression that García Márquez conformed to magical realism in all of his works

D) To challenge the common assumption that One Hundred Years of Solitude is superior to realist works by García Márquez

In her book Limitarianism, researcher Ingrid Robeyns criticizes economic policies that allow businesses to profit from their successes while displacing the burden of failure onto taxpayers. As an example she cites the US financial crisis of 2008 in which dozens of institutions including JPMorgan Chase and SunTrust received a collective $700 billion of government support. Had the US government previously exercised stricter regulation of risky financial instruments, Robeyns argues, this enormous expenditure of taxpayer dollars would not have been necessary.

Which choice best states the main topic of the text?

A) Consequences of the 2008 financial crisis for JPMorgan Chase and SunTrust

B) How the US government used money received from taxation to help institutions recover from a period of financial instability

C) Techniques of assessing the risks of particular methods of financial investment

D) Why a scholar believes it would be beneficial for certain governmental economic practices to be reconsidered

The following text is from Julia Alvarez’s 2000 novel In the Name of Salome. Salome, a poet, is hosting guests in the front parlor of her family home, and Ramona is her sister. A salon is a social gathering for the exploration of intellectual ideas.

It was evening when the two men got up to leave. Tia Ana had already come into the room several times to see if these guests had departed yet. The front parlor had always been her special province, as she used it for her little school. Now, every evening, it turned into Salome’s salon, as Ramona called it, and it was never in order for its transformation back to a classroom the following morning.

Which choice best describes the function of the reference to the parlor as Tia Ana’s “special province”?

A) It reveals that Tia Ana feels as if Salome has betrayed her trust by allowing guests into a space she considers her own.

B) It indicates the joy that Tia Ana feels when she uses her classroom for varying purposes.

C) It characterizes the room as a place where Tia Ana can go to escape social pressures.

D) It introduces an idea that helps explain Tia Ana’s apparent eagerness for Salome’s guests to leave the space.

The following text is from Anthony Trollope's 1855 novel The Warden. Tom Towers is a writer for the newspaper The Jupiter.

It is true that in far-off provinces men did not talk daily of Tom Towers but they read The Jupiter, and acknowledged that without The Jupiter life was not worth having. This kind of hidden but still conscious glory suited the nature of the man. He loved to sit silent in a corner of his club and listen to the loud chattering of politicians, and to think how they all were in his power, ⁠— how he could smite the loudest of them, were it worth his while to raise his pen for such a purpose.

What does the text most strongly suggest about Tom Towers?

A) He takes private satisfaction in his capacity to influence public opinion.

B) He seeks mainly the admiration of readers in places that are far away.

C) He has received much praise but tends to place too much value on his own importance.

D) He flatters himself that his readers take a greater interest in him than in politicians.

A study by Mohamed Alburaki, Dennis vanEngelsdorp, and colleagues suggests that overall, US honey bee populations exhibit low genetic diversity. Working with a large sample of honey bee specimens collected from most US states, the researchers determined that there are just three maternal evolutionary lineages in the populations: the North Mediterranean lineage, the West Mediterranean lineage, and the African lineage. They found that of the specimens from Montana, 100% descended from the North Mediterranean lineage—a finding in keeping with that for the lineage in many of the other states studied.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined portion in the text as a whole?

A) It expands on the claim made earlier in the sentence by providing specific data.

B) It indicates that a result described earlier in the sentence reflects a widespread trend.

C) It acknowledges that the results of the study discussed in the text are not entirely consistent with the researchers’ hypothesis.

D) It summarizes the central conclusions of the study that is discussed in the text.

Like all species of baleen whales, the humpback whale feeds on tiny creatures known as krill by filtering water through bristle-like keratin structures called baleen plates. In this way, baleen whales can eat up to 30 percent of their total mass per day. And while no one would call the humpback whale small—it can have a mass as high as 30,000 kg—it is one of the smaller baleen whales and is much smaller than the fin whale, which can weigh a whopping 80,000 kg and consume as much as 24,000 kg of krill per day.

Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?

A) It details a relationship between humpback and fin whales and krill and then discusses an unexpected consequence of a change in baleen whale populations.

B) It discusses a unique feature of the humpback whale and how the lack of that feature in the fin whale explains differences in the two species' behavior.

C) It describes a characteristic shared by all baleen whales and then illustrates a difference between the humpback whale and the fin whale that is relevant to that characteristic.

D) It draws a distinction between the sizes of the humpback whale and the fin whale and then presents a feature that they have in common.

The following text is from Virginia Woolf's 1919 novel Night and Day. The text describes a gathering of young artists and intellectuals.

One person after another rose, and, as with an ill-balanced axe attempted to hew out his conception of art a little more clearly, and sat down with the feeling that, for some reason which he could not grasp, his strokes had gone awry. As they sat down they turned almost invariably to the person sitting next them, and rectified and continued what they had just said in public.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined portion in the text as a whole?

A) To demonstrate individuals' puzzlement over the reputation of a certain artwork.

B) To highlight the physical effort involved in individuals' construction of large-scale works of art.

C) To draw attention to individuals' discontent with the group's conversation about art.

D) To emphasize the extent of individuals' struggles to articulate thoughts on art.

Vertical gene transfer involves the transmission of genetic material from a parent to offspring; horizontal gene transfer, on the other hand, involves the exchange of genetic material between organisms not in a parent-offspring relationship. While horizontal gene transfer is common among prokaryotes—single-celled organisms such as the bacteria Carnobacterium viridans and Massilia timonae—it has rarely been observed among eukaryotes (typically multicellular organisms). However, new studies suggest that horizontal gene transfer is more common in eukaryotes than originally thought.

Which choice best states the function of the underlined sentence in the text as a whole?

A) It implies that a common perception of horizontal gene transfer may be inaccurate.

B) It compares the frequencies with which horizontal gene transfer has been detected in two categories of organisms.

C) It argues that a particular direction of research concerning horizontal gene transfer is likely to be fruitless.

D) It indicates a distinction between horizontal gene transfer and vertical gene transfer.

Chorioactis geaster, a species of mushroom that makes a distinctive hissing sound when it releases its spores, is an elusive fungus that has been observed only in Texas and Oklahoma in the US and in the Miyazaki and Nara Prefectures in Japan. Scientists aren’t entirely sure why C. geaster is distributed in this way (genetic analysis reveals that the US and Japanese strains diverged 19 million years ago), but the mushroom appears to be very selective: it is typically found on the decaying stumps and roots of only a few tree species that are abundant in these areas.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined portion in the text as a whole?

A) It provides an explanation for the relationship between C. geaster and its habitats.

B) It highlights the negative impact C. geaster has on the trees on which it’s found.

C) It emphasizes the uncertainty about C. geaster alluded to earlier in the text.

D) It elaborates on a characterization of C. geaster presented earlier in the text.

The following text is adapted from Guy de Maupassant’s 1884 short story “A Recollection,” from the collection Guy de Maupassant Short Stories (translated by Albert M.C. McMaster et al. in 1903). The narrator is taking a boat down the Seine river from Paris, France, to the surrounding countryside.

I took up a position in the bows [front of the boat], standing up and looking at the quays, the trees, the houses and the bridges disappearing behind us. And suddenly I perceived the great viaduct of Point du Jour which blocked the river. It was the end of Paris, the beginning of the country, and behind the double row of arches the Seine, suddenly spreading out as though it had regained space and liberty, became all at once the peaceful river which flows through the plains, alongside the wooded hills, amid the meadows, along the edge of the forests.

Based on the text, which choice best expresses the narrator’s characterization of the Seine?

A) Though the Seine is calm during most of the journey, the arches of the Point du Jour created a small area of heavy current.

B) The Seine is beautiful but not as beautiful as Paris.

C) As the journey progressed from Paris to the countryside, the waters of the Seine gradually cleared.

D) The waters of the Seine are more confined and rough in Paris than they are in the countryside.

Linguist John McWhorter asserts that translation apps for smartphones and computers are—despite generally failing to convey many nuances—increasingly obviating the need to learn new languages. Advances in language processing technology have greatly boosted the utility of these apps for perfunctory tasks, like inquiring about an item on a menu, and passing interactions; be that as it may, richer communication (e.g., in business dealings or meaningful personal exchanges) often hinges on conversational patterns and gradations of meaning.

What does the text most directly suggest about translation apps?

A) They have improved remarkably over time but remain insufficient to support the complexity called for in certain interactions.

B) They are coming to be embraced by international tourists but are viewed with skepticism by many business professionals.

C) They are becoming simpler to use but are inconsistent in how comprehensively they cover different languages.

D) They have gained impressive capabilities but continue to be widely viewed as inadequate for most practical purposes.

Researchers César A. Hidalgo, Elisa Castañer, and Andres Sevtsuk created a computer model to predict the mix of gyms, clothing stores, and other businesses found in a given neighborhood. How we define a neighborhood and its boundaries is subjective, so the team used a clustering algorithm to locate dense groupings of amenities that represent human-identified neighborhoods like Boston's Union Square. The predictive model, which incorporates this algorithm, is sure to be invaluable in determining the optimal mix of a city's amenities.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined sentence in the text as a whole?

A) It praises an algorithm's accuracy in identifying neighborhood boundaries.

B) It emphasizes the potential utility of the team's model.

C) It summarizes trends in recent urban development in Boston.

D) It suggests a difficulty associated with analyzing neighborhoods that the research team attempted to overcome.

The following text is from Rachel Heng's 2023 novel The Great Reclamation. Ah Boon is fishing off the coast of Singapore.

When he pulled up the nets, they contained only one kind of fish — black pomfrets, the flat diamonds of their bodies slick in the morning light. This uniformity did not surprise him, over the years, he'd learned that the waters here were temperamental. They could be relied upon for a good catch, but from time to time threw up only prawns or squid, and other times colorful varieties of fish that weren't even supposed to be found in this region. He'd grown to accept the unpredictability, embracing it as a game to be played, like the reading of tea leaves or the grooves of a palm.

Taken together, the three underlined portions most clearly serve which function in the text as a whole?

A) They illustrate the changeable nature of the fishing grounds where Ah Boon is.

B) They emphasize the wide variety of sea creatures that Ah Boon has caught on this particular fishing trip.

C) They underscore Ah Boon's lack of surprise at seeing sea creatures that aren't usually found in the region.

D) They provide examples of what Ah Boon most frequently catches in the area.

In Koasati, an Indigenous language from what is now the southeastern United States, misip-lin is the singular form of "to wink," whereas mis-lin is the plural form of "to wink"; similarly, lataf-kan is the singular form of "to kick something," whereas the plural form is lat-kan. These are instances of subtractive morphology, in which a base word is truncated---removing the ip and af, in these cases---to form a new, related word. This kind of subtractive morphology is pervasive in Koasati.

Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?

A) It describes the relationship between Koasati and several other languages, raises a question about the nature of that relationship, and then answers that question.

B) It identifies the most frequently occurring words in Koasati, explains why it is difficult to translate those words into English, then provides examples of languages other than English into which those words can be translated.

C) It presents some specific words in Koasati, describes the general linguistic phenomenon exemplified by those words, then states that this phenomenon occurs frequently in Koasati.

D) It explains the phenomenon of subtractive morphology, discusses why subtractive morphology has been controversial among scholars, then argues that an analysis of Koasati could help resolve that controversy.

The following text is from Mark Haber's 2022 novel Saint Sebastian's Abyss. The narrator and Schmidt are both art critics.

When my first wife admitted to Schmidt over dinner that she didn't find art, painting in particular, especially compelling, Schmidt winced, set down his fork, and sighed dramatically; he then excused himself, explaining an appointment he'd forgotten about had suddenly and inexplicably been remembered, while making it abundantly clear there was no appointment at all.

Based on the text, what is notable about Schmidt's behavior?

A) Schmidt's departure is occasioned by the resumption of a previous disagreement with the narrator's first wife about a particular painting.

B) Schmidt conveys his feelings about one of his dining companions without explicitly stating them.

C) Schmidt's absentmindedness regarding his schedule is uncharacteristic of him.

D) Schmidt is only given to theatrical behavior when in the company of the narrator and his first wife.

Postcranial skeletal pneumaticity (PSP) refers to the presence of extensions of an animal's lungs and air sacs inside its bones. These extensions are known as pneumatic diverticula. Vascularity and other identifying characteristics of pneumatic diverticula tend not to fossilize, so paleontologists have relied on studies of living bird species to document these qualities, augmenting their findings from fossil analysis to glean additional insights into the respiratory systems of extinct genera such as Tyrannosaurus, Euhelopus, and other Cretaceous theropods and sauropods that may have also exhibited PSP.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined portion in the text as a whole?

A) It presents information about the fossilization of pneumatic diverticula that has led paleontologists to question the applicability of studies of certain living species.

B) It accounts for disagreements among paleontologists about how the respiratory systems of certain extinct genera functioned.

C) It highlights an issue with fossils that previously led paleontologists to misidentify certain characteristics of pneumatic diverticula.

D) It indicates why paleontologists have used another approach in addition to fossil analysis to learn about certain aspects of pneumatic diverticula.

Editor Jared Shurin's 2023 anthology The Big Book of Cyberpunk contains 108 stories, an enormous number. The anthology has a vast chronological scope, including both James Tiptree Jr.'s "The Girl Who Was Plugged In" (1973) and Lavanya Lakshminarayan's "Etudes" (2020). In his introduction, Shurin defines cyberpunk as a subgenre of speculative fiction concerning "the influence of technology on the scale, the pace, or the pattern of human affairs"; however, many critics have previously argued that cyberpunk is a literary movement that is not just idea driven but that has distinctive aesthetic components as well.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined portion in the text as a whole?

A) It points out a characteristic that is shared by the work of Tiptree and Lakshminarayan.

B) It explains one of several points of disagreement that an editor of a cyberpunk anthology has with a group of critics.

C) It explains why some critics think that a particular anthology of cyberpunk stories should not be considered a definitive summary of its genre.

D) It suggests a way in which a particular editor's definition of cyberpunk may be considered incomplete.

Pollination syndromes are suites of floral traits that have independently evolved as a result of selection pressure exerted by pollinators; psychophilous (butterfly-pollinated) flowers, for example, frequently exhibit yellow, red, or orange coloring. In a review of previous studies covering 417 plant species, Victor Rosas-Guerrero et al. concluded that the syndromes reliably predict angiosperms' most effective pollinators. However, in a response paper, Jeff Ollerton et al. note that Rosas-Guerrero et al. may have inadvertently ignored inconsistencies in how authors of previous studies evaluated floral traits.

What does the text most strongly suggest about the study conducted by Rosas-Guerrero et al.?

A) A limitation in the methodology used by the researchers may entail that the study's conclusion is not well supported.

B) The approach selected by the researchers enabled them to sort through and remove obviously incomplete or inconsistent data before conducting their analysis.

C) Because the study contained data on a limited number of plant species, its conclusion is accurate for those species but cannot be applied to species not in the study.

D) Due to the difficulty of gathering representative research on angiosperms, the study may have included previous research with a focus too heterogeneous to be comparable.

Paleontologist Lucas E. Fiorelli and colleagues have reported the discovery at a mine in Brazil of several egg clutches, partially preserved single eggs, and egg shells from the Late Cretaceous period. The researchers have concluded that the area was once a nesting and breeding site for titanosaurs, a group of sauropod dinosaurs. The finding is significant given the previous lack of known nesting sites in northern regions of South America, which led many paleontologists to assume that titanosaurs migrated south to lay eggs.

What does the text most strongly suggest about the site discovered by the researchers?

A) It is the earliest known example of a titanosaur nesting and breeding site.

B) It was very difficult to excavate given that it was discovered in a mine.

C) It may have been occupied by other sauropods in addition to titanosaurs.

D) It is farther north than any other nesting site discovered in South America.

In a study by Mika R. Moran, Daniel A. Rodriguez, and colleagues, residents of Mexico City, Mexico, and Bogota, Colombia, were surveyed about parks in their cities. Of the 562 respondents from Mexico City, 77.6% indicated that they use the city's parks, and of the 1,121 respondents from Bogota, 71.9% indicated using city parks. Given that the percentage of Mexico City respondents who reported having access to other desired amenities near parks was much lower than that reported by Bogota respondents, the difference in park use can't be explained by Mexico City residents having more access to desired nonpark amenities near parks.

Which choice best describes the main idea of the text?

A) Even though the study found that parks in Bogota are more likely to be close to other amenities than parks in Mexico City are, Mexico City has more amenities overall than Bogota does.

B) Although the study found that a greater proportion of residents use parks in Mexico City than in Bogota, that difference isn't due to greater access to amenities near parks in Mexico City.

C) The study's findings suggest that an increase in the number of amenities near city parks would likely increase park use in Mexico City but not in Bogota.

D) The study's finding that a greater proportion of residents use parks in Mexico City than in Bogota is partly due to the greater prevalence of parks in Mexico City.

The following text is from John Dryden's 1697 translation of Virgil's poem the Aeneid, written in the first century BCE. Queen Dido has just heard the Trojan hero Aeneas recount a sad tale.

But anxious cares already seiz'd the queen:
She fed within her veins a flame unseen;
The hero's valor, acts, and birth inspire
Her soul with love, and fan the secret fire.
His words, his looks, imprinted in her heart,
Improve the passion, and increase the smart.

Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?

A) To indicate that Dido is hiding her skepticism of Aeneas's account

B) To emphasize that Dido has been deeply affected by Aeneas's story

C) To imply that Dido engages both emotionally and intellectually with Aeneas

D) To suggest that Dido is worried that Aeneas might discover a secret she is keeping from him

The following text is from George Marion McClellan's 1895 poem "Eternity."

My spirit swoons, and all my senses cry
For Ocean's breast and covering of the sky.
Rock me to sleep, ye waves, and rumward bound,
Just let me drift far out from toil and care,
Where lapping of the waves shall be the sound,
Which mingled with the winds that gently bear
Me on between a peaceful sea and sky,
To make my soothing slumberous lullaby.

Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?

A) To illustrate the increasing intensity of the speaker's desire to escape ongoing hardship by gliding on the ocean

B) To contrast the demands of the speaker's everyday life with the serenity of being rocked to sleep by the ocean

C) To convey the speaker's longing for the ocean to impart a sense of inner tranquility

D) To justify the speaker's qualms about being transported by the ocean to a quiet destination

In 2023 Nobel Prize-winning physicist Giorgio Parisi published In a Flight of Starlings, a collection of essays on scientific subjects. Acclaimed author Sam Kean, who uses the form of nonfiction narrative to explore scientific discoveries, is interested in the collection less for its aesthetic merit than for its focus on "the false starts...and mistakes that beset real scientific research every day." Kean argues that all too often, scientists omit this "human stuff" from written accounts of their research and thus ultimately "fail to explain how science really gets done."

Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?

A) It outlines an area of agreement between Parisi and Kean in how they think about the work of science.

B) It describes Kean's view that nonfiction narrative is an effective way for Parisi to share his accomplishments.

C) It explores a subtle difference between Kean's and Parisi's respective objections to scientific research methods.

D) It presents Kean's claim that Parisi is too modest about his own achievements as a scientist.

The Heege Manuscript (HM) is a collection of booklets of once-unbound paper sheets on which Richard Heege copied various texts at his fifteenth-century home between Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire in England. Most other contemporaneous personal manuscripts like the Findern Anthology (FA) consist primarily of pieces for polite society like courtly love poems and other readings favored by elites, whereas the HM has a distinctive emphasis on the popular, including entertainments like nonsense verse, and the practical, with advice about medicine.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined portion in the text as a whole?

A) To provide context for the text's suggestion that the HM is an outlier among collections of its time

B) To suggest that the FA is a poor point of comparison for a collection like the HM

C) To emphasize the ubiquity of hand-copied collections like the FA and the HM in medieval England

D) To illustrate how the discussion of the HM earlier in the text can improve historians' understanding of the FA

Ethicist Ingrid Robeyns argues in her work that taxes on the very wealthy should be increased so that governments will be enabled to solve problems of collective action, such as mitigating climate change. Robeyns cites the work of economist Mariana Mazzucato, who shows that government subsidies are a more effective engine of innovation than private sector investments; in addition, government-funded innovations tend to lead to further developments in disparate fields (such as the United States mission to land a person on the Moon, which accelerated developments in textiles as well as electronics).

Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?

A) It offers a claim by a scholar, then uses the results of a project by another scholar to show why that claim should be rejected.

B) It summarizes the research of one scholar, then presents a study by another scholar that was inspired by the findings of that research.

C) It details the findings of a research project by one scholar, then puts forward the suggestions of another scholar for further investigation.

D) It introduces a proposition by a scholar, then describes that scholar’s use of findings by another scholar to support that proposition.

The following text is adapted from Mark Twain's 1876 novel The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. Aunt Polly is having dinner with Tom, her mischievous young nephew.

Aunt Polly asked [Tom] questions that were full of guile, and very deep—for she wanted to trap him into damaging revealments. Like many other simple-hearted souls, it was her pet vanity to believe she was endowed with a talent for dark and mysterious diplomacy, and she loved to contemplate her most transparent devices as marvels of low cunning.

Which choice best describes how Aunt Polly is presented in the text?

A) The narrator gently makes fun of Aunt Polly's mistaken confidence in her subtlety.

B) The narrator humorously exaggerates Aunt Polly's view of herself as an intellectual.

C) The narrator characterizes Aunt Polly as being excessively nosy about other people's private lives.

D) The narrator emphasizes that Aunt Polly's intentions are good even when she behaves impolitely.

In an analysis of fungal thermoregulation mechanisms, Radames Cordero et al. determined that Amanita brunnescens, species from the genus Cantharellus, and other mushrooms engage in evapotranspiration to maintain temperatures below ambient temperatures. This hypothermic behavior is particularly intriguing, since it remains unclear what benefits---if any---it confers, though several have been posited. For example, the researchers speculate that relative coldness is a source of attraction for the insects that aid in the distribution of fungal spores.

Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?

A) It describes empirical evidence collected by researchers, suggests that the significance of that evidence is uncertain, and then advances a possible interpretation that the researchers should have considered.

B) It reports on observations made of a natural process, explains the challenges in identifying the process's benefits, and then suggests a means to overcome these challenges.

C) It introduces a broad study of a biological mechanism, narrows to focus on one detail of that study, and then indicates the most promising avenue for additional research.

D) It presents one conclusion from a study of a biological phenomenon, acknowledges an aspect of that phenomenon that has yet to be determined, and then indicates a potential explanation for that aspect.

Although notorious for its strict formal requirements, the sonnet is nevertheless represented by such wide-ranging examples as Maggie Anderson's "Sonnet for Her Labor" and Tyehimba Jess's "Millie and Christine McCoy" — poems that differ remarkably in subject, rhythm, and structure. It may seem counterintuitive that the sonnet — ostensibly rigid and timeworn — could accommodate such variety, but poet Carl Phillips contends that the form invites experimentation: when a genre's conventions are as recognizable as those of the sonnet, the opportunity to subvert them is especially irresistible.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) Although Anderson's and Jess's sonnets are both widely celebrated for their striking originality, most modern examples of the form are generally regarded as conventional.

B) As a form, the sonnet encourages a surprising amount of variety, even though certain characteristics associated with it suggest this would be unlikely.

C) That the sonnet remains as popular as it is today is unexpected, given that many of the features associated with the form have long since seemed antiquated to readers.

D) Although the sonnet is now recognized for the way it facilitates experimentation, there was a long period in its history in which very little innovation occurred.

Establishing protected areas (PAs), such as Abrolhos Marine Park in Brazil, is a common conservation strategy, but because PAs restrict some kinds of economic activity, it's widely thought that they hinder economic development. This perception is driven in part by the fact that economic assessments often don't capture the indirect effects of tourism linked to PAs. But Heng Zhu et al. found that tourism associated with Abrolhos boosts local demand for goods and services in other economic sectors, resulting in, for instance, increased income from fishing in nearby areas.

Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?

A) It states a hypothesis that accounts for why PAs generally negatively impact local economies, outlines how a research team's findings support that hypothesis, and then suggests how a novel methodology led a separate team of researchers to a different conclusion.

B) It makes a generalization about the difficulty of using PAs to reconcile economic and conservation priorities, demonstrates why most PAs fall short of achieving that goal, and then holds up a particular PA as an example of how that goal can be achieved.

C) It introduces a widely held belief about the effect PAs have on the economy, proposes a reason for that belief's prevalence, and then details a study whose findings seemingly conflict with that belief.

D) It explains how PAs typically affect economic development in the regions where they are established, summarizes the findings of several economic studies that support this explanation, and then concedes that a particular PA is an exception to the general trend.

Technological advances have prompted companies to increasingly rely on automation to streamline production. Armin Granulo and colleagues, however, found that for products with higher symbolic value (those viewed as contributing to individual self-expression), consumers prefer products made by humans rather than by robots, likely because human-made products are more strongly associated with uniqueness. When considering automation, therefore, companies — especially those specializing in products of symbolic value — should weigh trade-offs between efficiency gains and consumer preferences.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined sentence in the text as a whole?

A) It refers to a finding presented in the previous sentence to recommend that companies that value product quality reconsider automating their production processes.

B) It emphasizes that a research finding discussed in the text has practical implications that are particularly relevant for businesses making a certain class of product.

C) It presents evidence supporting the text's argument that consumers prefer products with high symbolic value over products with low symbolic value.

D) It illustrates the need for additional research to evaluate the claim in the previous sentence that automation affects how consumers prefer products.

Paul Linebarger is often recognized as an influential science fiction writer (under the pen name Cordwainer Smith), but his most significant work was a 1940s classified US Army guide exploring the role of propaganda in times of war. Citing the uniquely absorbing nature of motion pictures, he contended that US propaganda should equal popular films in its appeal, entertaining audiences while engendering views of the nation as an ally. Linebarger's work shaped the distinctive US approach to promoting national interests, one that continues to draw inspiration from elements of pop culture.

Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?

A) It distinguishes a work from others in its genre, outlines the central objective of that work, and then addresses a recent resurgence of interest in that work.

B) It sketches the development of a prominent work, familiarizes readers with an argument in that work, and then suggests that the work has had repercussions in other fields.

C) It characterizes a work as having been underappreciated, describes a core concept in that work, and then argues that the influence of that concept is recognizable in other works.

D) It introduces a significant work, summarizes a noteworthy idea in that work, and then places that idea into a context that demonstrates its broader implications.

The synthesis of novel superheavy elements, such as nihonium (Nh), has led theorists to consider the feasibility of synthesizing all possible chemical compounds. In 2022, Guillermo Restrepo calculated the historical rates at which newly discovered compounds have entered the scientific literature, expanding the "chemical space." Using a conservative estimate of the number of viable compounds and assuming a doubling of the historical pace of discovery, Restrepo found that under these hypothetical conditions, all potential compounds could be synthesized and documented by 2050.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined portion in the text as a whole?

A) It introduces information that helps explain why the synthesis of superheavy elements has rapidly expanded the chemical space.

B) It provides details about the qualification later in the sentence regarding the prospect of cataloging the full range of possible chemical compounds.

C) It emphasizes the point implicitly made earlier in the text that human inefficiency is the primary constraint on the expansion of the chemical space.

D) It makes a comparison between the past and current rates at which new chemical compounds have entered the scientific literature.

The desirability of minimizing the use of adverbs, especially those ending in -ly (e.g., "obediently"), in prose fiction is a point of agreement among many novelists, including Graham Greene, who described adverbs as "damaging to a writer." To investigate whether -ly adverb avoidance is associated with literary achievement, statistician Ben Blatt calculated the frequency with which such adverbs occur in the works of E.M. Forster and other prominent English-language novelists and found that there is a positive correlation between low -ly adverb frequency and novels' perceived literary merit.

Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?

A) It makes a claim about a trait of prose fiction, details an observation about that trait's increasing proliferation, and then makes a supposition based on that observation.

B) It mentions a popular strategy for crafting prose fiction, outlines a benefit of that strategy, and then presents research that provides a more nuanced view of that benefit.

C) It describes a phenomenon inherent to prose fiction, summarizes a procedure used to investigate that phenomenon, and then notes a benefit of that procedure.

D) It introduces a widely held view on prose fiction, offers an example of what a proponent of that view has asserted, and then discusses a study examining data relevant to that view.

People tend to assume that being happy is the ideal emotional state and should be an ongoing aspiration; recently, however, research has suggested that it is at times beneficial to embrace negative emotions. To test whether anger can contribute to problem-solving abilities, researcher Heather Lench led an experiment in which participants were randomly assigned to view images designed to create an emotional condition—either neutral or one of anger, amusement, desire, or sadness. When asked to then solve a series of challenging puzzles, the participants in the anger condition had greater success than those in the other conditions.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined portion in the text as a whole?

A) It describes a general psychological tendency that the study discussed in the text was designed to explain.

B) It suggests a psychological basis for the behaviors of the participants in the experiment reported in the text.

C) It explains an assumption underlying the hypothesis investigated in the study discussed in the text.

D) It notes a generally accepted belief that is called into question by a finding of the experiment outlined in the text.

Tomi Adeyemi's first published work, the inventive West African–inspired fantasy novel Children of Blood and Bone, has intriguing things to say about the relationship between identity and power. Adeyemi works in a decades-long tradition going back to writers such as Samuel Delany and Octavia Butler, who wove cultural elements of the Black diaspora into their science fiction and fantasy in a movement known as Afrofuturism. At its core, the movement is characterized by speculation, not just about distant futures or other planets but also about alternate versions of our shared past. Afrofuturism's meditations on authority reinvigorate the creative potential of fiction.

Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?

A) It notes the political stance of an author, compares that author's book to other earlier works, and then analyzes the influence of political events on the book.

B) It praises a newly published author, compares that author with others who might appear superficially similar, and then points out the features of that author's work that make it unique.

C) It introduces an intriguing debut work, contextualizes that work as part of an ongoing literary tradition, and then describes important themes of that tradition.

D) It summarizes a book, describes characteristics of the artistic movement of which the book is a part, and then points out the features the book shares with more widely read works.

Quality assessments of concrete typically focus almost exclusively on compressive strength as a measure of durability, overlooking other potentially relevant factors. Lisa Ptacek et al. therefore investigated the potential of gas permeability (vulnerability to incursion by gases), which is caused in part by excessive porosity, as a durability indicator. Their measurements and observations revealed that quality of conditions during the concrete curing phase negatively correlates with gas permeability and that high gas permeability values are associated with increased deterioration as concrete surfaces age.

Information in the text best supports which statement about Ptacek et al.'s findings?

A) They suggest that gas permeability testing presents a more reliable indication of concrete durability than compressive strength testing does.

B) They bolster the claim that concrete's susceptibility to damage decreases as its gas permeability increases.

C) They call into question the idea that quality of curing conditions directly affects concrete gas permeability but is unrelated to compressive strength.

D) They indicate that evaluation of gas permeability is an appropriate addition to concrete quality assessment procedures.

Guadalupe Romero Villanueva et al. conducted radiocarbon analysis of paint used in rock art at the Patagonian archaeological site Cueva Huenul 1, revealing that images of a comblike motif date to as early as 8,000 years ago, predating other paintings in the region by several millennia. The motif was subsequently reproduced multiple times at the site over the next 3,000 years, a period coinciding with extremely arid conditions and slightly negative population growth. The motif may therefore have functioned to help preserve cultural knowledge during a time of ecological and demographic stress.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined portion in the text as a whole?

A) It explains the environmental circumstances that account for the rarity of rock art dating to the same period as the motif discussed in the text.

B) It emphasizes the historical conditions that explain why production of the painted motif described in the text abruptly ceased after 3,000 years of continued use.

C) It identifies a consideration that factored into an interpretation of the rock art at Cueva Huenul 1 that is presented in the text.

D) It provides context that informs the text's claim about why the peoples of Patagonia chose Cueva Huenul 1 as a culturally significant site.

While many initiatives aimed at limiting atmospheric warming focus on curbing emissions of methane (CH4), a greenhouse gas that is typically generated by microbially mediated processes, Lisa Y. Stein and Mary E. Lidstrom caution that under certain circumstances, such efforts cause microbial communities to accelerate production of nitrous oxide (N2O), another potent greenhouse gas, thus offsetting the impact of CH4 reduction. Researchers, therefore, need to take such biological interactions into account to ensure that any CH4 mitigation strategy has an overall positive climate effect.

Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?

A) It mentions a phenomenon that negatively affects the environment, summarizes competing methods for remedying that phenomenon, and then concedes that even apparently distinct methods share similar problems.

B) It describes a widely accepted approach to addressing an environmental issue caused by a type of chemical emissions, indicates a potential disadvantage of that approach, and then discusses an implication of that disadvantage

C) It reports on a predicament resulting from emissions of a particular greenhouse gas, outlines a strategy aimed at solving that predicament, and then admonishes those who utilize that strategy without fully comprehending its ramifications.

D) It presents an ongoing environmental challenge, demonstrates why the impact of that challenge may intensify over time, and then criticizes a misguidedly narrow attempt to address that impact

The following text is from Ameen Rihani's 1911 poem "The Wanderer."

I wander among the hills of alien lands
Where Nature her prerogative resigns
To Man; where Comfort in her shack reclines
And all the arts and sciences commands.
But in my soul
The eastern billows roll—
I hear the voices of my native strands.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined lines in the text as a whole?

A) It establishes that the speaker's enthusiasm about current travels conflicts with the growing urge to return home.

B) It illustrates the speaker's uncertainty about maintaining strong links with relatives in distant places.

C) It conveys the speaker's sense of feeling a pull toward home while traveling in an unfamiliar place.

D) It reveals that upon returning after an extended absence, the speaker longs for the way a location once felt.

The following text is adapted from George Eliot's 1857 short story "The Sad Fortunes of the Rev. Amos Barton." Mr. Ely is a clergyman in the town of Milby.

By the laity of Milby and its neighbourhood [Mr. Ely] was regarded as a man of quite remarkable powers and learning, who must make a considerable sensation in London pulpits and drawing-rooms on his occasional visit to the metropolis; and by his brother clergy he was regarded as a discreet and agreeable fellow. Mr. Ely never got into a warm discussion; he suggested what might be thought, but rarely said what he thought himself; he never let either men or women see that he was laughing at them, and he never gave any one an opportunity of laughing at him.

Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?

A) It shows that [Mr. Ely] had originally been held in high regard by his friends and then details the events that caused that regard for him to subside.

B) It implies that Mr. Ely's neighbors are more naive in their estimation of him than people in London are and then explains how each group reached its conclusion.

C) It stresses the discrepancy between Mr. Ely's public and private conduct and then alludes to the motivation for this dichotomy.

D) It indicates how Mr. Ely is regarded by various groups and then provides examples of his behavior to explain that perception.

The usual view of the Victorian novelist Charlotte Brontë, who died at the age of 38, has seen her as a figure of pathos in the shadow of tombstones. But if her inward and creative life is seen to coexist with externals, the picture shifts. We see a determinedly professional writer who was impatient, sarcastic, strong in spirit, with an unquenchable fire. This character, at odds with her public image, drove her life in a volcanic way beneath the still, gray crust: not feebleness but a potency that goes unseen.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) Charlotte Brontë suppressed her personality to meet social expectations.

B) Charlotte Brontë's life was marked by tragedy and death.

C) Charlotte Brontë's life must be interpreted in light of her hidden inner strength.

D) Charlotte Brontë's talents were unappreciated during her life.

In their study of the steering muscles regulating sclerites (minute hardened structures) in the Drosophila (fruit fly) wing hinge, Johan M. Melis et al. used machine learning to devise a convolutional neural network (CNN) model capable of predicting the pattern of wing motion produced by the maximum activity of the muscles. The CNN model's output aligned with results of prior studies by other researchers measuring muscle activity patterns directly---one of several indications, said Melis et al., that the model accurately represents important biomechanical processes underlying wing motion.

Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?

A) To present evidence from Melis et al.'s study in support of the efficacy of their CNN model

B) To provide an overview of how Melis et al. honed the accuracy of their CNN model

C) To account for Melis et al.'s reliance in their study on a CNN model in lieu of direct measurement

D) To compare results obtained by Melis et al. using their CNN model to prior results obtained from other researchers' models

Driven to sell as many paintings as possible, Alfred Hair, an influential figure among the landscape artists known as the Florida Highwaymen, pioneered "fast painting," a technique (which in part involved swift applications of paint) that many Highwaymen, including Livingston Roberts, adopted. To conclude that this approach accounts for the ethereal qualities now synonymous with the Highwaymen aesthetic is tempting but inaccurate, as Hair's methods weren't universally practiced by his affiliates: George Buckner, for example, painted with greater deliberateness but achieved the same effects.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined sentence in the text as a whole?

A) It details evidence that contradicts a claim mentioned earlier in the text about a long-standing disagreement within a group of artists.

B) It considers and rebuts an interpretation of the effect of a painting technique mentioned earlier in the text on the perception of work by a group of artists.

C) It establishes a contrast between the aesthetic qualities of works by artists who were central to a movement introduced earlier in the text and those of an artist who was more peripheral to that movement.

D) It explains how an artist mentioned earlier in the text developed a distinctive style by adapting a particular approach to painting originated by his colleagues.

Mexican architect Luis Barragán's prolific career, which spanned the 1920s to the 1980s evolved through distinct phases. After traveling to the United States and Europe in the early 1930s and immersing himself in a broader architectural discourse, Barragán began incorporating principles derived from fictionalism and modernism in his work, as seen in the Pizarro Suárez, House, whose unadorned geometric forms contrast with his earlier projects in Guadalajara, such as the house in Calle Pedro Loza, which evince the aesthetics of traditional Mediterranean and Mexican styles.

Information in the text best supports which statement about the design of the house in Calle Pedro Loza?

A) It represents a transitional moment between the early and late phases of Barragán's development.

B) It reflects an approach to ornamentation and shape that Barragán later stopped using.

C) It displays the effects of Barragán's exposure to international architectural trends in the 1930s.

D) It is characteristic of the Guadalajaran architecture that influenced Barragan throughout his career.

Berlin has high pedestrian traffic, but simply replicating a feature of Berlin associated with walkability — e.g., its dense concentration of services — may be insufficient to induce increased walking in other cities. As urbanist Mariela Alfonzo argues, our understanding of individuals' decision-making about whether to walk is insufficiently robust: some studies emphasize the role of average commuting distance, others the role of perceived safety, and so on, but walking decisions are made in complex contexts in which multiple conditions and needs inform individuals' choices.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined portion in the text as a whole?

A) It acknowledges a potential objection to the argument presented earlier in the sentence.

B) It illustrates a scholarly disagreement described earlier in the sentence.

C) It elaborates on a claim presented earlier in the sentence.

D) It summarizes the findings of studies whose methods are discussed earlier in the sentence.

Asteroid 6478 Gault has experienced intermittent mass loss since at least 2013, but in contrast to some other asteroids with repeated mass-loss episodes, 6478 Gault has not lost mass at its perihelion (the closest point of its orbit to the Sun), and thus the loss is not attributable to solar energy-driven ice vaporization. And as Jane X. Luu et al. point out, the singular nature of impact ejection makes it untenable as an account of multiple loss episodes of similar duration over several years. Instead, Luu et al. are likely correct that 6478 Gault is shedding mass due to rotational instability.

Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?

A) It presents a scientific observation, describes a contrast between that observation and other observations, and then explains why those other observations should not be considered credible.

B) It describes an astronomical finding, discusses competing theories about that finding that the author regards as flawed, and then describes new evidence that supports an alternative theory.

C) It discusses a physical process, evaluates possible causes of that process, and then states that a persuasive account of the process has yet to be put forward.

D) It introduces a natural phenomenon, refutes two potential explanations for that phenomenon, and then presents a third explanation that the author regards as plausible.

The fynbos shrubland is a diverse habitat found only in South Africa. It is adjacent to the Afro-temperate forest, with almost no transition space between the two distinct habitats. Plants in the fynbos have uniquely thin and long root systems that spread out over large distances to absorb nutrients from the soil. Ecologists transplanted tree seedlings from the forest into plots in the fynbos. Seedlings in plots isolated from the roots of fynbos plants exhibited a growth rate five times greater than that of the seedlings in plots in close proximity to the roots of fynbos plants.

Based on the text, what role do fynbos roots most likely play in maintaining the border between the fynbos shrubland and the Afro-temperate forest habitats?

A. Fynbos roots damage the root systems of forest plants, leaving those plants unable to acquire sufficient nutrients.

B. Fynbos roots extend close enough to the forest plants' roots that they constitute a physical barrier that forest plants' roots cannot pass.

C. The root systems of fynbos plants allow the plants to take in so many soil nutrients that forest plants are prevented from flourishing in the fynbos.

D. The root systems of fynbos plants enhance the soil immediately surrounding the plants, allowing them to thrive in an otherwise harsh habitat.

Vadamalai Elangovan and Ganapathi Marimuthu showed that high moonlight intensity inhibits the activity of the greater short-nosed fruit bat (Cynopterus sphinx), a result explicable in terms of benefits and costs: greater lunar intensity may not enable the bats to increase foraging success enough to offset the higher chance of detection by predatory owls or hawks. Most other nocturnal mammals respond to lunar intensity variations similarly to greater short-nosed fruit bats, but mongoose lemurs (Eulemur mongoz) display the opposite pattern, as their heavy reliance on visual foraging results in a different balance of reward and risk.

Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?

A) It discusses two different responses to the same natural phenomenon, explains why one of those responses occurs, and then suggests that the other response still needs to be explained.

B) It describes and accounts for a finding, characterizes the finding as representative of a general pattern, and then describes and accounts for an exception to that pattern.

C) It presents and explains a study result, indicates that the result is similar to the results of many other studies, and then attributes a conflicting study result to a difference in that study's methods.

D) It introduces an observation of a behavioral pattern, presents an explanation for the pattern, and then describes an exception to the pattern that casts doubt on that explanation.

The material featured in both the structure of the House in Kamiaraya by Kazuto Nishi Architects and the hardware in the One-Room Residence of 5 Layers by Matsuyama Architect and Associates is representative of a trend in contemporary Japanese interior design to juxtapose sleek, modern accents with traditional organic materials such as paper. The prominent featuring of metal stems from the post — World War II emphasis on technological progress, while more traditional natural materials help preserve longstanding architectural and aesthetic approaches.

Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?

A) The text introduces the salient characteristics of two buildings and then details the historical events that occasioned the buildings' designs.

B) The text names projects that are noteworthy for their inclusion of certain materials and then explains past important uses of the materials.

C) The text distinguishes between two aesthetic approaches to architecture and then submits that one approach has had more of a long-term impact than the other has had.

D) The text cites examples of a design trend and then briefly establishes the principles underlying the trend.

Elio Sucena and colleagues have explored how convergent evolution — a phenomenon that occurs when the same trait evolves independently in two reproductively separate lineages — can result from a genetic mechanism shared by both lineages. Meanwhile, Michael D. Shapiro and colleagues have investigated how convergence occurs through different genetic mechanisms, but the relative prevalence of convergence through shared and different genetic processes is still poorly understood. This motivated biologists Delbert A. Green II and Cassandra G. Extavour to evaluate both types of convergence in a single study for their 2012 paper.

Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?

A) To suggest that Green and Extavour's conclusions would be more persuasive if they incorporated findings from the studies by Sucena and colleagues and Shapiro and colleagues

B) To argue that Green and Extavour's study revealed a previously unrecognized issue that evolutionary biologists need to address

C) To summarize Green and Extavour's criticism of the study by Sucena and colleagues

D) To situate Green and Extavour's study in the context of their field

Research by economists Wei Feng and Jinzhe Yan indicates that the degree of linguistic abstraction in negative reviews influences how consumers perceive businesses: reviews with concrete details were more likely to result in stronger attributions of fault to companies than vague reviews were. They also found that varying levels of linguistic abstraction in reviews require different types of responses to mitigate their effects. Conciliatory responses were most effective at mitigating the impact of concrete reviews, whereas more defensive responses were more useful when reviews were relatively abstract.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) When negative reviews provide specific details, they are more likely to damage companies' public perception, and efforts by companies to mitigate this damage are less likely to be successful than when negative reviews are vague.

B) Given its implications for companies' reputation among consumers, the level of linguistic abstraction in negative reviews is an important consideration when companies devise a response strategy.

C) Increasing linguistic abstraction in negative reviews correlates with the degree to which consumers hold companies accountable for negative experiences, but companies can mitigate this effect by responding to such reviews promptly.

D) Consumers are more likely to find companies blameworthy for negative consumer experiences if the companies are overly defensive and linguistically abstract in their responses to negative reviews than if their responses are accommodating and linguistically concrete.

"Culture" has considerable currency among sociologists but has no fixed definition: it might include art, or laws, or one of several other concepts. Indeed, Susan Silbey has observed that "the meaning of the word 'culture'...is unstable." This uncertainty impedes formulating empirically testable claims about reality, which should be an aim of sociological research---a standard definition of culture is a worthy goal even if impossible to achieve, for the closer we come to one, the closer we come to reducing conceptual incoherence in the field.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined portion in the text as a whole?

A) It explains why the text's author thinks that a particular aspiration would improve the discipline of sociology.

B) It shows why the common definition of culture that includes art and laws is inadequate to serve the needs of rigorous sociological inquiries.

C) It presents what the text's author sees as an important implication of the research finding by Silbey.

D) It suggests that any appearance of empiricism in sociology is ultimately illusory, since the language of sociology has subjective elements that cannot be fully eliminated.

From petroleum refining to fuel for residential heating, hydrogen has many applications. Currently, producing hydrogen is carbon intensive, but Alexandra M. Oliveira is one of many scholars investigating the feasibility of large-scale production of hydrogen through electrolysis, a process that emits no carbon when renewable energy is used. Oliveira suggests that although some obstacles may prevent electrolytic hydrogen from dominating energy systems, there is utility in its ability to decarbonize the petroleum and heating industries, where reducing carbon emissions is especially challenging.

Which statement about the use of hydrogen in the petroleum and heating industries is most strongly supported by the text?

A) The adoption of electrolytic hydrogen by these industries has been impeded by concerns about how carbon intensive its production is.

B) Development of applications for electrolytic hydrogen is less advanced in these industries than it is in most other carbon-intensive industries.

C) At least some of electrolytic hydrogen's potential to lessen these industries' carbon emissions is as yet unrealized.

D) The fact that large-scale electrolytic hydrogen production is not yet available has limited these industries' interest in pursuing hydrogen-based applications.

Through adaptive radiation, multiple species of Tetragnatha—a genus of orb-weaving spiders—have significantly diversified their web architecture over a relatively short timescale. To investigate whether the material properties of Tetragnatha silk have been similarly affected by this evolutionary process, Angela M. Alicea-Serrano et al. examined the chemical composition of both the radial (non-sticky threads extending from the center) and capture (sticky threads that hold prey) silks that form the web as well as tested the tensile strength and viscosity of samples collected from three Tetragnatha species at two sites in the Hawaiian archipelago. The team found significant interspecies variation in these biomaterials.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) A study indicates that variations in web architecture among species of Tetragnatha spiders can likely be explained by corresponding variations in the material properties of their silks.

B) Research reveals that web architecture among species of Tetragnatha spiders has likely diversified more rapidly than the material properties of Tetragnatha’s silk have.

C) A study shows that adaptive radiation can explain interspecies variation in the web architecture of Tetragnatha spiders but not in the material properties of the spiders’ silk.

D) Research suggests that the material properties of silk from species of Tetragnatha spiders have diversified during adaptive radiation.

The fifteenth-century English Heege Manuscript is unusual among collections of its kind and time given its focus on fantasy tales over more acclaimed works by celebrated medieval authors like Hoccleve. But according to professor James Wade, even more unusually, three texts in the manuscript's first booklet were likely copied by Richard Heege from a traveling minstrel's repertoire book. The evidence includes performative elements such as the narrator politely addressing the audience, joking about peasants and royalty, and making jokes that could be modified to refer to the town of Radford when in nearby Brackonwet to avoid giving offense.

As presented in the text, Wade would most likely agree with which statement about the first booklet of the Heege Manuscript?

A) It was likely a copy Heege intended to give to a traveling minstrel working in the area around Radford and Brackonwet.

B) The texts it includes were based on stories about the area around Radford and Brackonwet, but these names were later removed

C) It was copied from a text that originated from a traveling minstrel who worked in the area around Radford and Brackonwet.

D) It was written down by Heege from memory based on a performance by a traveling minstrel who worked in the area around Radford and Brackonwet.

Why do some people with high incomes vote for politicians supporting higher taxes on those with high incomes like themselves? Economists Benjamin Enke et al. propose that values are a luxury good: that is, the higher one's income, the more weight one has the liberty to assign to one's values when voting. Thus, Enke et al. suggest that although the behavior of high-income earners who advocate for higher taxes may seem counterintuitive, such people likely do so because they feel enabled by their economic security to take a stance they think is morally correct.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) A group of economists asserts that people with relatively high incomes are consequently enabled to take certain considerations into account when voting.

B) A team of economists finds that people who vote for higher taxes on those with high incomes are likely to think their moral values coincide with their material interests.

C) According to a group of economists, politicians who support higher taxes on those with high incomes must convince a sufficient number of people with such incomes to vote against their material interest if the politicians are to be elected.

D) According to a team of economists, the higher a voter's income, the more likely that voter's values are to conflict with their material interests.

In 2019, 20 previously unknown moons were confirmed to be orbiting Saturn. Three of the moons have prograde orbits (orbiting in the direction the planet spins), and the other 17 have retrograde orbits (orbiting in the opposite direction of the planet's spin). All but one of the 20 moons are thought to be remnants of bodies that orbited Saturn until they broke apart in collisions. Although the one exceptional moon orbits in the same direction as the planet's spin, its orbit is highly eccentric compared to the rest, which may suggest that it has a different origin than the other 19 moons.

Based on the text, which choice best describes the moon with the eccentric orbit?

A) It doesn't have a retrograde orbit, but it likely has the same origin as the moons with retrograde orbits.

B) Its orbit is so tilted with respect to the other moons' orbits that it's neither prograde nor retrograde.

C) It has a prograde orbit that is likely the result of having collided with another body orbiting Saturn.

D) It has a prograde orbit and may not be a remnant of an earlier body that orbited Saturn.

The following text is adapted from Anthony Trollope's 1855 novel The Warden. The narrator is describing a rectory, the residence of a clergyperson.

Let us observe the well-furnished breakfast-parlour at Plumstead Episcopi, and the comfortable air of all the belongings of the rectory. Comfortable they certainly were, but neither gorgeous nor even grand; indeed, considering the money that had been spent there, the eye and taste might have been better served; there was an air of heaviness about the rooms which might have been avoided without any sacrifice of propriety; colours might have been better chosen and lights more perfectly diffused; but perhaps in doing so the thorough clerical aspect of the whole might have been somewhat marred.

Which choice best states the function of the underlined portion in the text as a whole?

A) It offers a potential explanation for the furnishing choices the narrator critiques.

B) It emphasizes that the narrator finds it inappropriate for a clergyperson to have such grand furnishings.

C) It signals how the inexpensive-looking ornaments in the rectory could be enhanced.

D) It concedes that there is a lack of attention to the impression the rectory makes on people.

Despite potential independent confirmation, the apparent detection in 2020 of phosphine (PH3) — a gas that on Earth almost exclusively derives from biological sources — in Venus's cloud deck remains controversial, in part because Venus is thought to be uninhabitable. To evaluate such a finding's plausibility, William Bains et al. modeled multiple abiotic PH3 pathways, including geochemical, atmospheric, and photochemical reactions, but none adequately explain the observed levels of PH3. If Venusian PH3 does exist, it would indicate insufficiencies in the current consensus on Venus's chemistry.

Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?

A) It introduces an unexpected observation of a particular gas in Venus's atmosphere, presents an effort to investigate possible mechanisms that could explain that observation, and then notes an implication of that investigation's findings.

B) It outlines recent efforts to confirm the presence of a particular gas in Venus's atmosphere, summarizes a research team's evaluations of those efforts' methodological shortcomings, and then explains why that team remains skeptical of the gas's future detection.

C) It compares the levels of a particular gas on Venus and Earth, sketches the chemical processes that account for differences in these levels, and then addresses some of the practical challenges of studying the presence of this gas on Venus more closely.

D) It explains why the consensus view of a particular gas in Venus's atmosphere has recently become controversial, expands on a scientific team's reasons for questioning that consensus, and then suggests that future observations of Venus's atmosphere will likely be needed to settle the controversy.

Given the immense scope of space, the search for extraterrestrial life is almost necessarily concentrated on the exoplanets deemed to have the most plausible chance of success — typically, atmosphere-bearing terrestrial planets orbiting within a certain range of their stars (termed the habitable zone). Claiming that Earth experienced a long transition from single-lid to plate tectonics that accelerated the emergence and evolution of complex organisms, researchers Robert J. Stern and Taras V. Gerya hold that consideration of tectonics, an often overlooked factor, could help further narrow the search for advanced extraterrestrial species.

Based on the text, what do Stern and Gerya most likely believe about the development of complex life on exoplanets?

A) It is unlikely unless the transition from single-lid to plate tectonics occurs before the acquisition of a lasting atmosphere.

B) It is probably more dependent on the presence of plate tectonics than on orbital distance from a host star or the presence of an atmosphere.

C) It is more likely to occur on habitable zone planets with atmospheres and plate tectonics than on otherwise similar planets that lack plate tectonics.

D) It is more likely to occur if habitable zone planets with atmospheres transition from single-lid to plate tectonics late in their history than if they transition early in their history.

Advancements like the emergence of ceramics manufacturing in central Europe circa 28,000 BCE are overemphasized in innovation studies, contributing to the idea that technological change always brings greater complexity. Research by Nathaniel Erb-Satullo reveals an important exception: gold metallurgy flourished in the Caucasus in the Bronze Age, but a steep drop during that time (circa 1500 BCE) in objects featuring gold inlay (in which pieces of contrasting materials are inserted in a gold base) and other sophisticated goldsmithing techniques suggests that simpler processes supplanted advanced methods.

Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?

A) It explains that a particular interpretation of technological development has been perpetuated in an academic field and then provides a counterexample demonstrating that the interpretation isn't always accurate.

B) It summarizes the findings of several studies into the origins of a particular invention and then presents additional evidence from a more recent study that contradicts those findings.

C) It advances a claim made by researchers in one academic field about the nature of technological change and then critiques a contrasting claim presented by a researcher from a related academic field.

D) It details the near-consensus among researchers in a particular field of study regarding how technology evolves and then indicates the controversial nature of a study challenging that broadly accepted view.

The following text is from Vita Sackville-West's circa 1920 poem "Evening." Spars are ships' masts, moorings are ropes that hold docked ships in place, and a riding-light is a light that a ship shines when it is anchored.

When little lights in little ports come out,
Quivering down through water with the stars,
And all the fishing fleet of slender spars
Range at their moorings, veer with tide about;

When race of wind is stilled and sails are furled,
And underneath our single riding-light
The curve of black-ribbed deck gleams palely white,
And slumbrous waters pool a slumbrous world;

—Then, and then only, have I thought how sweet
Old age might sink upon a windy youth,
Quiet beneath the riding-light of truth,
Weathered through storms, and gracious in retreat.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A. The tranquility of a port in the evening can incline a person to appreciate the stillness of old age.

B. The difficulty of bringing a ship into port is apt training for dealing with the types of struggles encountered in old age.

C. A person who leads a long life that is varied and active may find it difficult to stay in a calm place.

D. The contrast between the peacefulness of a port at night and its activity during the day reflects the contrast between the calm of old age and the vibrancy of youth.

Jürgen Kocka and other historians of capitalism rarely discuss domestic capitalism in Africa before the period of European colonization, implicitly presenting capitalism as external to and imposed on Africa. Cristayne Alfagáli and other Africanist scholars have shown, however, that in parts of Africa, returns-focused investment, the establishment of open markets for wage labor, and other features of capitalism predated colonization. One reason for this discrepancy is that historians of capitalism tend to focus on longitudinal economic data drawn from archival records, which do not exist for much of precolonial Africa.

Which statement about Alfagáli and other Africanist scholars is best supported by information in the text?

A. They likely make use of different types of evidence than historians of capitalism typically rely on.

B. They likely differ from historians of capitalism in the methods they use to draw longitudinal economic data from archival records.

C. They likely have a different view about which activities should be considered capitalist in nature than historians of capitalism do.

D. They likely view capitalism as having been more beneficial for Africa than historians of capitalism do.

Svante Pääbo and other researchers studying the history of organisms have long utilized ancient DNA—DNA recovered from ancient organic material that has been preserved under natural conditions. However, Nicolas Dussex and colleagues' 2021 study of the evolutionary trajectory of the kakapo parrot (Strigops habroptilus) instead relied on historical DNA—genomic data incidentally preserved in specimens that are housed in natural history collections—thus capitalizing on the research potential offered by a vast but hitherto relatively underutilized source of insight into the biological past.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined portion in the text as a whole?

A) It offers commentary on the significance of the approach that Dussex and colleagues used for their study.

B) It specifies potential applications of the approach that Dussex and colleagues used in their study.

C) It explains why the research methodology selected by Dussex and colleagues is not widely used.

D) It emphasizes the importance of Dussex and colleagues' findings about the DNA of birds.

The following text is from Ralph Waldo Emerson's 1841 essay "The Method of Nature."

The scholars are the priests of that thought which establishes the foundations of the earth. No matter what is their special work or profession, they stand for the spiritual interest of the world, and it is a common calamity if they neglect their post in a country where the material interest is so predominant as it is in America.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) In a country whose citizens are largely preoccupied with tangible gains, it is crucial that some people work to foster and preserve ideas.

B) Military experience encourages Americans to contemplate aspects of human life that they would not choose to otherwise.

C) Many descriptions of the role of scholars in society unfairly diminish their importance.

D) It is unfortunate that so many intellectuals are concerned with material things rather than ideas.

Readers sometimes divide the works of twentieth-century English author Evelyn Waugh into two periods: one consisting of his early satirical novels and the other consisting of his later, more serious—even ponderous—books. Critic Seamus Perry, however, challenges that strict division. Perry argues that Waugh's writing didn't change over time as much as some readers have suggested. For instance, Perry contends that some of Waugh's earliest works, notably his biography of artist Dante Gabriel Rossetti, exhibit the earnest romanticism that would characterize Waugh's later fiction.

Based on the text, which statement about Waugh's works would Perry most likely agree with?

A) Regardless of when they were written, Waugh's works have important similarities that transcend their differences.

B) Over time, Waugh's works became less humorous and more focused on weightier topics.

C) Waugh's works can appropriately be separated into two periods by their subject matter and tone.

D) The earliest of Waugh's works exhibit a satirical tone, even if that tone is more apparent in Waugh's later works.

The following text is from William Shakespeare's circa 1611 play The Winter's Tale. Camillo has been away from his home in Sicily and serves in the court of Polixenes, the king of Bohemia. He has asked Polixenes for permission to return to Sicily.

POLIXENES: I pray thee, good Camillo, be no more
importunate. 'Tis a sickness denying thee anything,
a death to grant this.

CAMILLO: It is fifteen years since I saw my country.
Though I have for the most part been aired abroad,
I desire to lay my bones there. Besides, the penitent
king, my master, hath sent for me, to whose feeling
sorrows I might be some allay---or I o'erween [presume] to
think so---which is another spur to my departure.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined portion in the text as a whole?

A) It conveys Camillo's recognition that one benefit his presence may afford the king of Sicily is merely speculative.

B) It bolsters the idea that Camillo's primary motivation to return home is his concern for the king of Sicily's well-being in his absence.

C) It suggests that Camillo feels compelled to persuade Polixenes that Camillo's decision to leave the court is justified.

D) It establishes Camillo's hope that Polixenes will be comforted knowing that Camillo isn't departing at his own discretion.

The following text is adapted from Matthew Arnold's 1869 nonfiction book Culture and Anarchy.

The Times [a British newspaper], replying to some foreign strictures on the dress, looks, and behaviour of the English abroad, urges that the English ideal is that everyone should be free to do and to look just as he likes. But culture indefatigably tries, not to make what each raw person may like, the rule by which he fashions himself; but to draw ever nearer to a sense of what is indeed beautiful, graceful, and becoming, and to get the raw person to like that.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) The process of determining what should be considered beautiful is likely to lead to disagreement.

B) The English are unjustly derided for their sense of taste.

C) Culture's duty is to use scientific methods to determine what is beautiful.

D) One of the functions of culture is to create a consensus about matters of good taste.

When a landscape with native megafaunal (large-bodied) mammalian herbivores experiences a substantial decline in those populations, it loses a functional component of plant ecology. Introducing non-native proxy species has been beneficial in some such cases, but the reasonable concern persists that ecosystems may be negatively affected by species that didn't coevolve with local vegetation. Scholarly analysis of findings from 221 studies revealed no evidence that nativeness mediates the ecological effects of megafauna, however, determining instead that other traits, such as diet selectivity, are more germane.

Which choice best states the function of the underlined portion in the text as a whole?

A) It presents an insight suggesting that a concern acknowledged as sensible earlier in the text is unsubstantiated.

B) It explains why data do not show the expected pattern described at the beginning of the text.

C) It identifies an inconclusive finding that motivated a shift in the focus of an analysis discussed in the text.

D) It outlines the reasoning behind the claim about a benefit that is presented in the previous sentence.

The establishment of urban green spaces for the abatement of fine particulate matter and other major air-pollutant concentrations is gaining public support, but urban planners must proceed with caution given subtleties in the body of evidence for the strategy's efficacy. High-level reports have attributed pollutant reductions to cities' inclusion of green spaces; however, one study found that while trees are negatively associated with air pollutants when considered on a citywide scale, at the street level, this association is minimal and at times positive. Because research tends to focus on large-scale effects in cities, decision-makers may be unaware that those outcomes are not always generalizable across spatial scales.

Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?

A) It outlines a problem that is of growing public concern, explains why an innovative solution to that problem is challenging to implement, and then suggests the importance of researching alternative solutions.

B) It addresses an appealing approach to a prevalent problem, illustrates that the approach is not as uniformly successful as it may seem, and then further emphasizes the importance of recognizing nuances in the research on that approach.

C) It details an initiative implemented in response to certain research findings, identifies an apparent inconsistency within those findings, and then explains how that inconsistency has typically been accounted for.

D) It establishes the growing intensity of a public concern, details the most common method of mitigating that concern, and then refers to evidence that the method is broadly ineffective.

Mushrooms, including Coprinellus micaceus and species from the genus Cantharellus, are known to use the process of evapotranspiration to maintain internal temperatures below ambient temperatures. This hypothermic behavior is enhanced by the many thin gills (lamellae) on the fungi's caps, with substantial surface-area contributing to capacity for evaporation. Examining fungal thermoregulation mechanisms, Radames Cordéro et al. determined that molds and yeasts also engage in evaporative cooling to facilitate hypothermia and suggest that, lacking features analogous to lamellae, these unicellular fungi aggregate into colonies to derive the benefit of greater surface area.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) Although a certain thermoregulation process has been observed in colonies of unicellular fungi, it has yet to be observed at the individual organism level.

B) A recent analysis of specimens of Coprinellus micaceus and species from the genus Cantharellus substantiated the findings of earlier studies of thermoregulation mechanisms in several types of fungi.

C) A study of a fungal thermoregulation mechanism determined that it is used more efficiently by molds and yeasts than by mushrooms and other multicellular fungi due to variances in colony size.

D) Despite significant differences in their biological structures, mushrooms, molds, and yeasts have been observed to utilize the same thermoregulation process to achieve a particular effect.

The fecal-steroidal profile of pronghorn is clearly distinct from those of other ungulates. By contrast, bison dung cannot be distinguished from elk dung based solely on their fecal-steroidal profiles, as both contain similar levels of beta-sitosterol and cholestanone, among other sterols. The relative levels of fecal zoostanols (steroids with animal origins), such as coprostanol and epi-coprostanol, in layers of lake bed sediments at Buffalo Ford Lake in Yellowstone National Park show that bison, elk, or both have been the dominant ungulate species in the lake's watershed for at least the last 2,000 years.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined portion in the text as a whole?

A) It offers context that helps account for the finding that the dominant ungulate species in the Buffalo Ford Lake watershed have been largely unchanged for at least 2,000 years.

B) It presents an observation that supports an argument about why the dominant ungulate species in the Buffalo Ford Lake watershed shifted over the course of the last 2,000 years.

C) It describes an assumption about two types of ungulates' fecal-steroidal profiles that the research on Buffalo Ford Lake sediment calls into question.

D) It provides information that explains why the data from Buffalo Ford Lake allow for multiple possibilities regarding the dominant ungulate species in the watershed.

In Algeria, use of solid fuel (e.g., coal, wood) as a share of total household fuel use fell by approximately three-fourths between 2000 and 2019; such shifts are often explained by appeal to the energy ladder, a model holding that fuel choice is mediated mainly by household income (specifically, high-technology fuels displace solid fuels as incomes rise). Rasmus Heltberg’s study of fuel use in Ghana shows this model to be reductive, however: household fuel use was heterogeneous, flexible, and influenced by several factors, including the stability of the local electrical grid.

Which choice best describes the function of the information about Algeria in the text as a whole?

A) It provides an example of a type of change that the text goes on to suggest is poorly suited for evaluating whether the energy ladder is a viable model.

B) It introduces a finding that the text goes on to suggest can be explained in two different ways that are equally compelling.

C) It describes a trend that the text goes on to suggest has a similar cause as a seemingly unrelated trend observed in Ghana.

D) It illustrates the kind of phenomenon that the text goes on to suggest is frequently but inadequately accounted for by the energy ladder.

The following text is from George Eliot's 1857 short story "The Sad Fortunes of the Rev. Amos Barton." The Countess Czerlaski is a newcomer to the town of Milby.

It is true, the countess was a little vain, a little ambitious, a little selfish, a little shallow and frivolous, a little given to white lies, — But who considers such slight blemishes, such moral pimples as these, disqualifications for entering into the most respectable society! Indeed, the severest ladies in Milby would have been perfectly aware that these characteristics would have created no wide distinction between the Countess Czerlaski and themselves: and since it was clear there was a wide distinction — why it must lie in the possession of some vices from which they were undeniably free.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) The residents of Milby had initially viewed the Countess Czerlaski with suspicion, but they have gradually come to see her as mostly harmless.

B) Although the Countess Czerlaski actively cultivates a sense of mystery about her, her background is less interesting than what many residents of Milby have been led to believe.

C) Although the residents of Milby are generally thought to be hospitable, the Countess Czerlaski has committed many social blunders that have caused her to be widely disliked.

D) Some residents of Milby are determined to disapprove of the Countess Czerlaski, even though the reasons for their dislike are largely groundless.

Arturo Casadevall et al. have confirmed that twenty mushroom species (including Amanita muscaria and species from the genus Hortiboletus) maintain subambient temperatures in both their fruited bodies and their mycelium (the root-like hyphae from which the fruited bodies grow), though the benefits of this hypothermic behavior are unclear. Noting that relative coldness was more pronounced in fruiting than in nonfruiting sites of the mycelium—a difference that persisted even after fruited bodies were detached—the researchers speculate that thermoregulation in the mycelium may influence reproductive success.

Which statement about the mycelium of the twenty mushroom species is best supported by the text?

A) Temperatures in the fruiting areas of the mycelium are lower than in the nonfruiting areas due to differences in the depth and spread of the mycelium within soil or other organic matter.

B) Variation in thermoregulation across the mycelium may occur independent of the presence or absence of fruited bodies.

C) The mycelium generally maintains temperatures lower than those of the fruited bodies even when considering temperature variations between fruiting and nonfruiting sites.

D) The correlation between higher mycelium temperature and greater fruit productivity indicates that successful reproduction may be dependent on thermoregulation in the mycelium.

The following text is adapted from Daniel Defoe's 1704 nonfiction book The Storm.

If I judge right, 'tis the duty of an historian to set everything in its own light, and to convey matter of fact upon its legitimate authority, and no other: I mean thus, (for I would be as explicit as I can) that where a story is vouched to him with sufficient authority, he ought to give the world the special testimonial of its proper voucher, or else he is not just to the story: and where it comes without such sufficient authority, he ought to say so; otherwise he is not just to himself.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) The only figures that a historian should quote are those who are widely viewed as credible.

B) Because no memories can be trusted, all historians are forced to admit that some records of events may be, in part, false.

C) It is difficult for historians to be completely accurate, and eventually they will feel remorse for some of their work.

D) Historians should clearly indicate the extent to which each of their sources is trustworthy.

In a 2024 study, Corrine Walsh and colleagues examined whether the composition of soil microbial communities could affect plants' flavor chemistry. Whereas Baslam et al. (2011) showed that adding specific bacterial or fungal strains to soil can yield increased flavonoid content in spinach crops, Walsh and team applied intact microbial communities gathered from ecologically distinct settings across Colorado, including areas of ponderosa pine forest and irrigated pasture, to mustard plants and evaluated the flavor compounds in the plants' seeds. This ensured that the microbial conditions in their experiment would better reflect the variation and complexity of naturally occurring communities.

Based on the text, what is the most likely reason Walsh and colleagues chose to avoid the method used in the spinach study?

A) The composition of microorganisms in the soil in the spinach study may not have been representative of a naturally existing composition.

B) The microbial community in the soil from the spinach study affected plants' nutrition, not their flavor chemistry.

C) The microbial community in the soil from the spinach study likely included similar species to those in wild soils.

D) The diversity of species of microorganisms in the soil from the spinach study was already abnormally high before the researchers added further microorganisms.

Philosophers note that many people have an intuitive sense that while we ought not to lie, there may be circumstances in which lying is permissible. If this intuition is correct and we lack an inviolable duty to speak truthfully, what grounds opposition to lying in the first place? Jaya Pallikkathayil has advanced one answer by appealing to a duty to respect others' agential interests, arguing that we may have an obligation to respect other people's agency that entails a commitment to truthfulness except in certain circumstances.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A. One potential means of justifying opposition to lying is Pallikkathayil's argument that we have an obligation to respect other people's agency that entails a commitment to truthfulness except in certain circumstances.

B. Many people have an intuitive sense that lying is permissible in some circumstances but lack a principled way to identify those circumstances, and Pallikkathayil's argument may provide a means of resolving that problem.

C. Pallikkathayil's argument suggests that if we have a duty to respect other people's agential interests and if possession of false beliefs constrains agency, then we have an inviolable duty to speak truthfully.

D. Pallikkathayil's argument shows that if our intuition that circumstances may make lying permissible is correct, then it is unclear whether there are any grounds for an opposition to lying in the first place.

In their 2022 paper, Christos Dimopoulos et al., having granted that the existence of antigravity—in which antimatter and matter repel rather than attract each other—lacked affirmative experimental support, rightly argued that such antigravity was worth considering on theoretical grounds given that evidence against it was similarly lacking. But a 2023 report by an international team of researchers details the first direct ballistic observations of antihydrogen atoms under gravity inside a CERN particle accelerator. Corresponding most closely to predictions under gravitational attraction, these observations were thoroughly inconsistent with antigravity.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A. Antihydrogen ballistics observations were conducted at CERN to test specific conclusions about antigravity presented in the 2022 paper by Dimopoulos et al.

B. Although theoreticians were justified in studying antigravity before the release of the 2023 report, the report's findings suggest that the rationale for theoretical consideration offered in the 2022 paper by Dimopoulos et al. is no longer applicable.

C. The theoretical approach represented in the 2022 paper by Dimopoulos et al. assumed that unambiguous proof of antigravity would not be achievable, but the results in the 2023 report undermine that assumption.

D. Before 2023, researchers' inordinate focus on theoretical considerations hindered the development of the experimental regimen for direct antihydrogen ballistics observations.

Studies of ocean wave breaking have predominantly focused on traveling waves (those propagating along the horizontal plane), so Mark McAllister et al. utilized a circular wave tank to produce and study spike waves, axisymmetric standing waves that can erupt vertically when traveling waves propagating in opposing directions intersect. Traveling waves break when wave steepness (height-to-length ratio) passes a critical threshold; breaking thus constrains wave height. McAllister et al. found that spike waves can exceed that constraint, as other factors than just steepness (e.g., jet stability and cavity shape) mediate spike-wave breaking.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) McAllister et al. suggest that spike waves can form when traveling waves propagating in opposing directions intersect and that spike waves tend to be higher than traveling waves.

B) The process of breaking limits the height of traveling waves, but the study by McAllister et al. suggests that spike waves can exceed those limits if their height-to-length ratio reaches a critical threshold.

C) The study by McAllister et al. suggests that when traveling waves intersect in specific ways, the resulting wave may be higher than would be expected based on the properties of traveling waves.

D) Previous studies have suggested that steepness mediates breaking in traveling waves, but the study by McAllister et al. shows that jet stability and cavity shape may also influence breaking in such waves.

Philosopher Hans-Georg Gadamer’s epistemological position as expressed in Truth and Method is at odds with both those critics who believe that analyses of artistic works should take inspiration from objective methods of research in the natural sciences and those critics who hold that a correct interpretation of a text must privilege the author’s intention. Rather, Gadamer held that what we think of as “meaning” is subjective: not entirely inherent in the text, but existing in the interaction between text and reader as the reader draws on their background and experience during the act of interpretation.

Which choice best describes the overall structure of the text?

A) It details two possible methods of interpreting a text, then describes how a particular philosopher chose to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of both methods.

B) It offers a simplified version of an argument presented by a certain philosopher, then describes how that simplification may lead those not intimately familiar with that philosopher’s work to misunderstand his meaning.

C) It summarizes two critical views that differ from the view of a particular philosopher, then illustrates that difference by explaining the philosopher’s view.

D) It presents the stances of two groups of critics who disagree with each other on a particular subject, then shows that a certain philosopher drew from both stances when establishing his own position on the same subject.

Optimal foraging theory (OFT) holds that animals' foraging behaviors reflect cost-benefit trade-offs that vary by species and with dynamic ecological circumstances. One such circumstance is lunar intensity, which Mary V. Price and colleagues found to be negatively associated with foraging by white-throated woodrats but Simon Kenneth Bearder and colleagues found to be positively associated with foraging by Mohol bushbabies. This discrepancy is explicable in terms of OFT: the bushbabies' greater reliance on vision means that higher lunar intensity benefits them more than it benefits the woodrats.

Information in the text best supports which statement about Mohol bushbabies?

A) If increased lunar intensity imposed the same costs on the bushbabies that it imposes on white-throated woodrats, there would be no association between lunar intensity and the bushbabies' foraging.

B) If the advantages that the bushbabies gain from increased lunar intensity explain the change in their foraging behavior, those advantages are likely shared by some other species that are not heavily reliant on vision.

C) If increased lunar intensity creates any disadvantages for the bushbabies, those disadvantages are more than compensated for by the advantages that the bushbabies gain.

D) If the bushbabies' foraging behavior under increased lunar intensity actually reflects a cost-benefit trade-off, their behavior should be more similar to that of white-throated woodrats than it is.

Most Native languages belong to language families, or groups of languages whose structural and lexical correspondence likely derives from their descent from a single language spoken long ago. A minority—such as Washoe, which is spoken in California and Nevada, and Chitimacha, which is spoken in Louisiana—are isolates, having no demonstrable genealogical relationship to other languages. Yet Washoe and Chitimacha, like all isolates, are potentially remnants of families whose other members vanished before the historical record could attest to them, perhaps through the geographical expansion of extant families.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined sentence in the text as a whole?

A) It implies that a nonisolate language may have influenced both Washoe and Chitimacha to such a degree that their relationship to their former families is no longer discernible.

B) It suggests that the ancestral languages of both Washoe and Chitimacha were likely isolates that replaced nonisolate languages through geographic expansion in the distant past.

C) It asserts that the historical record tends to overrepresent nonisolate languages relative to isolates, such that the origins of Washoe and Chitimacha are obscure to scholars in the present day.

D) It proposes that the distinction made between present-day nonisolate languages and isolates like Washoe and Chitimacha may not have been applicable in the distant past.

The following text is from Nathaniel Hawthorne's 1830 short story "Sir William Phips."

The knowledge, communicated by the historian and biographer, is analogous to that which we acquire of a country by the map, — minute, perhaps, and accurate, and available for all necessary purposes, but cold and naked, and wholly destitute of the mimic charm produced by landscape painting. These defects are partly remediable, and even without an absolute violation of literal truth, although by methods rightfully interdicted to professors of biographical exactness.

Which choice best states the main idea of the text?

A) Historians should not worry if their readers believe they are embellishing the truth.

B) Historians' fidelity to the truth often results in work that is less engaging than it could be.

C) Historians do not agree among themselves about the best methods of recording history.

D) Maps are more practical to own than paintings.

The following text is from William Carlos Williams's 1925 creative nonfiction book In the American Grain. Williams is discussing how works by nineteenth-century US poet and fiction writer Edgar Allan Poe were received by American readers.

Poe must suffer by his originality. Invent that which is new, even if it be made of pine from your own yard, and there's none to know what you have done. It is because there's no name. This is the cause of Poe's lack of recognition. He was American. He was the astounding, inconceivable growth of his locality. Gape at him they did, and heat them in amazement. Afterward with mutual hatred; he in disgust, they in mistrust. It is only that which is under your nose which seems inexplicable.

What does the text most strongly suggest about Poe's work and American readers?

A) Poe's work was so innovative that there was not even terminology to describe it, which led American readers to regard both the work and Poe himself as strange but quintessentially American.

B) American readers largely ignored Poe's work because its tone and subject matter were out of keeping with mainstream literature.

C) American readers failed to appreciate Poe's work because of its novelty and the fact that it reflected aspects of the American character too ingrained in those readers for them to comprehend.

D) Poe's work had few defenders among American readers because it tended to present a negative image of American life and institutions.