On the SAT Reading, “inference” questions ask you to make a reasoned judgment about the passage that goes beyond the material on the page. Authors will often imply information but not state it directly; inference questions test your ability to spot the author’s implications without straying too far from the text.
We make inferences all the time during everyday conversations, but our casual inferences are often riddled with unsubstantiated leaps in logic. For example, if I told you that my lawn was wet, you might infer that it rained last night. This seems like a fair inference, but there are other logical reasons for my lawn being wet–I could have watered the lawn or perhaps a neighbor was washing his car and sprinkled my lawn. More information surrounding my original sentence might lead me to conclude that it rained last night, but from the simple statement “my lawn is wet,” I can only infer that my lawn is not dry.
The SAT inference questions will often offer you some tempting answers that infer too much information. Beware of these choices–they are the most common pitfalls for students.
What do inference questions look like?
Before diving into an example, let’s make sure you know how to spot an inference question. Most inference questions are characterized by the words suggest, infer, or imply. They might look something like this:
What might be inferred by the final paragraph?
The author implies that the frontiersmen quickly packed because…
By revealing the results of the scientific study, the author suggests…
Example of an inference question
Let’s look at an inference question from Grockit.
This passage concerns the speaker’s feelings about buying art and how they reflect upon her notions of adulthood. In the first paragraph, she describes how she chose not to buy art in her teens and twenties because each artwork would tend to ossify her then mutable conception of self. Here is the paragraph that follows:
As I grew older, though, I began to set down roots, as
(20) people generally do. Moving every year or so became a
hassle, not an adventure, and meeting new people was a
diversion but not a necessity, since I had collected friends
and loved ones along the road to being a grown-up. I
became more willing to settle on a particular version of
(25) myself: not a transitory, tacked-up-above-the-futon
version that could be bought for under $5.00 and
disposed of without regret, but a framed and matted,
carefully considered version that might not be
permanent, but was certainly going to arrive in the
(30) expectation of a long tenure.
The author suggests that the new “version” of herself mentioned in line 24 will be:
- More dedicated to cultivating a collection of art
- More financially stable than she was in her youth
- Sticking around for a while
- Spending more time with friends
- Focused on her career
Our first step, as always, is to locate the line and read a little before and after it. According to those lines, the speaker has now grown older and more secure in her stable identity. She has become more willing to “settle” on a version of herself that is “not…transitory,” a version that, while not totally permanent, will expect a “long tenure.” Using the context clues, we can logically infer that if her new version of herself is not “transitory” or temporary, then it must be more permanent or at least lasting a long time. Notice that C is the best articulation of the idea of permanence. Let’s look at some other choices to see why they’re incorrect.
Answer choice “A” diverts us from the important matter at hand; in the passage, the speaker’s decision to purchase art stands for her increasingly stable sense of self. To say that this new version of self is only more dedicated to collecting art is entirely missing the point; in this case, the wrong answer choice is overly literal.. “B” is the kind of inference that lacks any referent in the text. Although someone might infer that the speaker becomes more financially stable with age, such an inference lacks a textual basis–it is purely speculative. “D” simply locates a minor detail in the passage and overemphasizes its significance. “E,” like “B,” preys upon our biased expectations about adulthood–though we may associate adulthood with career ambitions, there’s no textual evidence for such an inference.
To avoid these trap answers and nail the right one, remember that inferences are objective and logical deductions based in fact. Leave your assumptions and biases at the door, and stick to what’s on the page!
