Verbal PAssage DEtail

[somuchwater]

So I have the opposite problem of most MCATers. I can get the tone done perfectly fine. What always screws me over are those questions such as "what did the author imply when using this word" or "according to the passage, what are some techniques we can do in this situation". I never remember those minute details and so I started skipping those, answering the inference/main idea questions first and then scouring through the passage.. else I would go through the passage and waste a lot of time and still have some unanswered questions.. any tips?

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[RC4L]

Great question. Those questions are perhaps the only reason why you should ever look back at the passage. The first thing I would do is try to eliminate the obviously wrong answers based strictly on the question and answer choices. There are probably going to be two that just don't make sense. Eliminate those first, always. One of the primary concerns you should have while reading the passage is to understand the point of the author. If you did this effectively and for example, you know that the author would never use the word "always" in reference to the topic at hand, use that understanding to answer rather than knowing exactly how the word/sentence was used in the passage. The word in question may be best identified by understanding the author rather than going back and trying to figure out by seeing it in the sentence. If these don't work and you have time, look back. If your are really pushing it though, eliminate as best you can and choose the one that seems least wrong. Move on. Unless you have time and you are very comfortable with your technique, it is just not worth it to get caught up on one question. If you do have the time to look back, there are certainly ways to make it easier to identify. While reading the passage, I would write down one sentence per paragraph that emphasized the primary personal point of the author in his/her words. I would use these sentences as structure references during and immediately after reading the passage so that I held the idea of the whole passage in mind throughout. These would provide a good reference point if you just had to look back. That being said, I never allowed myself to look back even if I felt that I needed to. I realized after a while that it was just not profitable. After practicing a lot with this rule and really learning how to follow the author, I found that I never really needed to look back even if I was unsure. I could always eliminate two, and most often, the third if I stripped away all personal interpretation and strictly used the author's. As someone who was always hard pressed for time, it was always better for me to eliminate and go with my gut without wasting time. Answering those logically often gave me the correct answer without having to sacrifice three easy questions at the end. Sorry if this is all over the place!

 

[somuchwater]

Great question. Those questions are perhaps the only reason why you should ever look back at the passage. The first thing I would do is try to eliminate the obviously wrong answers based strictly on the question and answer choices. There are probably going to be two that just don't make sense. Eliminate those first, always. One of the primary concerns you should have while reading the passage is to understand the point of the author. If you did this effectively and for example, you know that the author would never use the word "always" in reference to the topic at hand, use that understanding to answer rather than knowing exactly how the word/sentence was used in the passage. The word in question may be best identified by understanding the author rather than going back and trying to figure out by seeing it in the sentence. If these don't work and you have time, look back. If your are really pushing it though, eliminate as best you can and choose the one that seems least wrong. Move on. Unless you have time and you are very comfortable with your technique, it is just not worth it to get caught up on one question. If you do have the time to look back, there are certainly ways to make it easier to identify. While reading the passage, I would write down one sentence per paragraph that emphasized the primary personal point of the author in his/her words. I would use these sentences as structure references during and immediately after reading the passage so that I held the idea of the whole passage in mind throughout. These would provide a good reference point if you just had to look back. That being said, I never allowed myself to look back even if I felt that I needed to. I realized after a while that it was just not profitable. After practicing a lot with this rule and really learning how to follow the author, I found that I never really needed to look back even if I was unsure. I could always eliminate two, and most often, the third if I stripped away all personal interpretation and strictly used the author's. As someone who was always hard pressed for time, it was always better for me to eliminate and go with my gut without wasting time. Answering those logically often gave me the correct answer without having to sacrifice three easy questions at the end. Sorry if this is all over the place!

No no it makes sense. I just did EK 101 Test 8 which I use only to keep track of how many details I miss and I realized I miss 3 from not fully considering the answer choices, 3 from missing details from the passage and selecting contradictory passages, 1 from misreading the question, and 1 from reading the q but selecting the answer that gave the opposite definition of the word asked.

It's so frustrating!

 

[RC4L]

No no it makes sense. I just did EK 101 Test 8 which I use only to keep track of how many details I miss and I realized I miss 3 from not fully considering the answer choices, 3 from missing details from the passage and selecting contradictory passages, 1 from misreading the question, and 1 from reading the q but selecting the answer that gave the opposite definition of the word asked.

It's so frustrating!

Well that's a good analysis and gives you a lot to work with. It looks like a lot of your mistakes may be from lack of concentration or reading too quickly? I dealt with that issue too. I actually started to improve my timing by slowing down on reading. I read the question slowly and intently. Before looking at the answers, I tried to formulate the answer before looking at them. Caution is obviously a big player here.
Going back to the meaning of words and other specific questions like that, I think understanding the main points of the author is still your best tool with those questions. When a question like that is asked, it is likely going to involve a personal reference from the author rather than a random detail from background info. When I read the passage, I would mentally emphasize the point or points in each paragraph where the author added a personal interjection. That interjection will always contrast the rest of the paragraph because it will contain personal adjectives and will likely never be absolute. If you follow the passage according to those personal points in each paragraph, you will have the guide to navigate through questions regardless of whether they are directly or indirectly testing those key points.