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When you finish reading the passage and the stem and you have analyzed everything using the preceding techniques, you usually can come up with a pre-phrase of the right answer, before even getting to the answer choices. With practice, you'll have a reliable notion of what the question wants before considering the answer choices.

Test takers should not be discouraged, however, if they cannot come up with a pre-phrase. Some questions are difficult, and an immediate answer will not always jump out at you. Often, reading the answer choices will give you hints about what the argument is about – after all, one of those five choices must be right. But be careful not to fall for trap answer choices.



Eliminate wrong answers and then select the right one.

Coming up with the right pre-phrase of the answer is only half the battle. You have to then pick the answer choice that most closely resembles your pre-phrased answer. As we discussed in the Reading Comprehension section, there is rarely "one true" answer on the hard GMAT questions. Instead, there are usually several answer choices that are "good," with a small nuance distinguishing the best from the rest.

f you jump at the first answer choice that looks "good," you might get the question wrong because there could be a better choice. The best strategy is to narrow down answer choices using the process of elimination until you get the best choice.

Beware of trick answer types!

Test writing is an extremely time-consuming task. One of the most difficult parts of test writing is generating the "junk" wrong answer choices. Here is an overview of how choices for a question might be constructed:

(A) If you misread the passage, this looks right.
(B) Maybe right – close call with some subtle difference most students miss.
(C) Correct answer!
(D) The opposite of the correct answer.
(E) Something completely off topic, but it sounds impressive.

Test writers have an easy way out. On nearly every question you will see wrong answers that they pull out of a bin of typical junk answers. These wrong answers do not do much to test ability; they are simply there to fool inexperienced and unskilled test takers. Test writers like to use them because they take only a few seconds to write and catch students who aren't "on the ball."

If you have gone far enough to be able to identify and assess an argument, don't fall into a trap when picking an answer.

On the positive side, a skilled test taker can identify trap answer types quickly and then use process of elimination to increase the chances of getting the right answer.

Trick Answer Type #1: The Sentimental Favorite

The GMAT has trap answer choices that appeal to your higher ideals.

The level of diabetes in the United States among those over 50 has been attributed to high levels of sugar usage. In Zaire, however, diabetes rates among those over 50 are nearly as high as those in the US and individual sugar consumption levels are much lower.

What is the most reasonable conclusion from the above passage?

(A) If most people used sugar-replacement sweeteners instead of sugar, the rate of diabetes worldwide would drop rapidly.
(B) There are other factors besides sugar usage that determine diabetes levels.

Choice (A) sounds good, but answer choices that espouse high ideals or provide convenient explanations or easy solutions may not be correct.

Choice (B) is the correct answer because it gets to the flawed causal argument: sugar usage may not be the sole factor behind diabetes rates.

Trick Answer Type #2: Scope Trap

If you've found the main point, you must also identify what is in the range of the argument. Scope is related to more than just the general topic being discussed: it is the narrowing of the topic. Is the article about graduate-school admissions, MBA admissions, or helping international students get into the business school program of their choice? Each step represents a narrowing of the scope.

Let's look at this critical reasoning question to examine scope.

Apartment building owners argue that rent control should be abolished. Although they acknowledge that, in the short term, rents would increase, they argue that the long-term effect would be a reduction in rents. This is because rent increases would lead to greater profitability. Higher profits would lead to increased apartment construction. Increased apartment construction would then lead to a greater supply of residences, and lower prices would result because potential apartment residents would have a better selection. Thus, abolishing rent control would ultimately reduce prices.

Name an assumption made by the owners:
(hint: this is a difficult question, but you can eliminate four of the five answers as outside the scope of the argument).

(A) Current residents of rent-controlled apartments would be able to find new apartments once their rents increased.
(B) The fundamental value of any society is to house its citizens.
(C) Only current apartment owners would profit significantly from market deregulation.
(D) New apartment construction will generate a great number of jobs.
(E) The increase in the number of apartments available would exceed the number of new potential apartment residents.

Which possible answers are outside of the scope? The scope is the argument that deregulation will increase supply and lower prices. "Name an assumption" means find a direct assumption of the supply/demand argument.

(A) Current residents of rent-controlled apartments would be able to find new apartments once their rent increased.
Is this outside of the scope?
This sentence expresses a nice sentiment for the welfare of renters, but it has nothing to do with our argument, which is about a supply/demand dynamic.

(B) The fundamental value of any society is to house its citizens.
Is this outside of the scope?
Again, nice sentiment, but this has no bearing on the argument. This is a "Sentimental Favorite" trick answer choice.

(C) Only current apartment owners would profit significantly from market deregulation.
Is this outside of the scope?
The issue at hand is not profits made by owners but the prices of apartments. And there is a secondary problem with this choice: "Only current owners." Why wouldn't future owners profit? As previously mentioned, be suspicious of answer choices that use words such as only; they are usually more restrictive than the passage intends.

(D) New apartment construction will generate a great number of jobs.

This is clearly outside of the scope.

(E) The increase in the number of apartments available would exceed the number of new potential apartment residents.
Aha! This is an argument about supply and demand and we are looking for an answer about supply and demand. This is clearly within the scope of the argument, and it is the correct answer. If demand rises as new apartments are constructed, prices would not decline – they might even rise – invalidating the owners' argument.

Trick Answer Type #3: Trick Opposites

This trap involves contradicting the question stem. This trap is very common on Strengthen/Weaken questions where the answer choice does the opposite of what the stem wants:

Here are examples of these deliberate tricks intended to catch students who rush through questions:

1. All of the following may be inferred from the passage EXCEPT:
   Then the GMAT gives one answer that absolutely may be inferred from the passage (which test-takers tend to pick automatically if they forget the "EXCEPT").
   
   
2. The stem asks for an assumption in an argument, and one of the answer choices is a summary of the argument (but not an underlying assumption).
   
   
3. Which of the following weakens the argument above?
   Then the GMAT gives an answer choice that obviously strengthens the argument.
   
   
   

	On test day, expect to run into a stem that looks like this: All of the following are true, EXCEPT: The translation of "EXCEPT" is that, of the five choices, all of them fit the condition EXCEPT one of them. All of the following are reasons to go to business school EXCEPT: (A) networking with future powerful executives (B) eager to learn accounting (C) increase your income (D) impress your friends (E) hone your poetry skills

II-2. Rewording and Evaluating	III. Reasoning Skills