谈ＧＭＡＴ阅读的规律性（２）

goodman2008

GMAT阅读部分多年以来形成了几种固定的题型，占所有题目的四分之三左右。快速识别这些题型并加以练习，可以进一步熟悉出题规律，有效地提高解题效率。以下笔者将逐一分析这几种题型：
　　
　　直接陈述题
　　
　　此类题目对文中有明确叙述的内容进行正面陈述，常见的句型有According to the passage (author)... ；The author states that... ；The author mentions which of the following as...等等。这类题目的正确答案通常是对原文内容的改写，常见的改写方法有：同义词替换，句型替换，同根词词性替换。例如：
　　【原文】The historians have broadened the conventional view of nineteenth-century feminism.
　　【答案】The historians have expanded the traditional view of nineteenth-century feminism.（同义词替换）
　　【原文】 The case histories revealed how the authorities administered justice.
　　【答案】 The case histories indicated the manner in which those in power apportioned justice.（同义词替换和句型替换）
　　【原文】This dichotomy has its uses, but it can cause problems if taken too literally.
　　【答案】This dichotomy is useful, but only if its limitations are recognized.（uses替换为useful，即同根词词性替换 ）
　　
　　取非题/取反题
　　
　　此类题目包括对比题和改善题两种。
　　1. 对比题：根据强对比语气出的题。如文中提到A与B对立，只给出A的特征，问B的特征，答题时只要对A取非即可。例如：
　　Unlike the large businesses, they often need to make substantial investments in new plants, staff, equipment, and the like in order to perform work subcontracted to them. If, thereafter, their subcontracts are for some reason reduced, such firms can face potentially crippling fixed expenses.
　　【题】The passage suggests that the failure of a large business to have its bids for subcontracts result quickly in orders might cause it to
　　(A) experience frustration but not serious financial harm
　　(B) face potentially crippling fixed expenses
　　(C) have to record its efforts on forms filed with the government
　　(D) increase its spending with minority subcontractors
　　(E) revise its procedure for making bids for federal contracts and subcontracts
　　【翻译】和大公司不一样，小公司通常需要在以下方面进行大量投资： 新的工厂、 员工、 设备等等来完成交给他们的合同任务。如果在那以后，合同额由于某些原因减少了，它们将在固定成本上遭受很大的损失。
　　【讲解】题干问：“文中暗示如果大公司没能使它的投标迅速转化为订单的话将会怎样？”很明显，大公司和小公司是一对强对比关系，将小公司的特点取非就是大公司的特点，所以正确答案是A，（如果大公司没了订单） 会有些损失，但不会引起严重的后果。
　　2. 改善题：此类题型又可分为正改善题和负改善题两种，其中“虚拟语气+表示正改善的说法”是正改善题，表示正改善的说法有：better, improve, more illuminating/enlightening/convincing/useful。 解答正改善题的方法是“到文中找出缺点，然后取非”。例如：
　　However, these patterns cannot be viewed as an adaptation to wind pollination because the spiral arrangement occurs in a number of non-wind-pollinated plants.
　　【题】It can be inferred from the passage that the claim that the spiral arrangements is an adaptation to wind pollination would be more convincing if which of the following were true?（虚拟语气+表示正改善的说法）
　　(A) Such an arrangement occurred only in wind-pollinated plants.
　　(B) Such an arrangement occurred in vascular plants as a whole.
　　(C) Such an arrangement could be shown to be beneficial to pollen release.
　　(D) The number of bracts could be shown to have increased over time.
　　(E) The airflow patterns over the cone誷 surfaces could be shown to be produced by such arrangements.
　　【讲解】将文中提到的缺点“因为这种螺旋也出现在一些非风媒植物当中”取非，就可以得出正确答案A：这种螺旋仅仅出现在风媒植物中。
　　而“虚拟语气+表示负改善的说法”是负改善题。负改善的说法有less illuminating/enlightening/convincing/useful等。解答负改善题的方法是“到文中找优点，然后取非”。例如：
　　As an indicator of shifts in the Earth誷 climate, the isotope record has two advantages. First... Second, it is a more continuous record than that taken from rocks on land.
【题】It can be inferred from the passage that the isotope record taken from ocean sediments would be less useful to researchers if which of the following were true? （虚拟语气+表示负改善的说法）
　　(A) It indicated that lighter isotopes of oxygen predominated at certain times.
　　(B) It had far more gaps in its sequence than the record taken from rocks on land.
　　(C) It indicated that climate shifts did not occur every 100,000 years.
　　(D) It indicated that the ratios of oxygen 16 and oxygen 18 in ocean water were not consistent with those found in fresh water.
　　(E) It stretched back for only a million years
　　【讲解】将文中提到的优点“相对于陆地上岩石而言， 海洋中记录的连续性更强”取非，于是得出正确答案B：相对于陆地上岩石而言， 海洋中的记录在序列上有更多的间隔。
　　
　　 (in order)to /举例作用题
　　(题干以in order to 结束)
　　
　　解答此类题目的方法是先观察以illustrate或give an example of开头的选项。
　　标准做法分以下三种情况：
　　a) 先结论后举例（for example，for instance，such as，like）；
　　b)先举例后结论（注意因果关系词）；
　　c) 无任何语言现象。
　　其中以第一种情况“先结论后举例”居多，例如：
　　One argument against my contention asserts that, by nature, textbooks are culturally biased and that I am simply underestimating children誷 ability to see through these biases. Some researchers even claim that by the time students are in high school, they cannot take textbooks literally. Yet substantial evidence exists to the contrary. Two researchers, for example, have conducted studies that suggest that children誷 attitudes about particular cultures are strongly influenced by the textbooks used in schools.
　　【题】 The author mentions two researchers?studies most likely in order to
　　(A) suggest that children誷 political attitudes are formed primarily through textbooks
　　(B) counter the claim that children are able to see through stereotypes in textbooks（反对认为孩子们能看出教科书中的思维定式的观点）
　　(C) suggest that younger children tend to interpret the messages in textbooks more literally than do older children
　　(D) demonstrate that textbooks carry political messages meant to influence their readers
　　(E) prove that textbooks are not biased in terms of their political presentations
　　【讲解】在这道题里，for example引导的例子为前面的观点服务。
　　
　　except题/排除题：由四项小列
　　举出的题和罗马数字题（渐少）
　　
　　解答此类题目的方法是迅速定位文中的大(小)列举。例如：
　　The majority of successful senior managers do not closely follow the classical rational model of first clarifying goals, assessing the problems, formulating options, likelihood誷 of success, making a decision, and only then taking action to implement the decision.
　　【题】 According to the passage, the classical models of decision analysis includes all of the following EXCEPT
　　(A) evaluation of a problem
　　(B) creation of possible solutions to a problem
　　(C) establishment of clear goals to be reached by the decision
　　(D) action undertaken in order to discover more information about a problem
　　(E) comparison of the probable effects of different solutions to a problem
　　
　　逻辑题
　　
　　此题型分为反对题和支持题。解答反对题有两种方法，一是反对原因，二是反对原文的结论。解答支持题也有两种方法，其一是搭桥法，即把文中推理部分缺失的条件补上，只要将文中推理坍塌处（断桥）取非即可，例如：
　　In one behavioral experiment, researchers successfully trained an anteater to distinguish between two troughs of water, one with a weak electrical field and the other with none. Such evidence is consistent with researcher誷 hypothesis that anteaters use electro receptors to detect electrical signals given off by prey; however, researchers as yet have been unable to detect electrical signals emanating from termite mounds, where the favorite food of anteaters live.
【题】Which of the following, if true, would most strengthen the hypothesis mentioned in the passage?
　　(A) Researchers are able to train anteaters to break into an underground chamber that is emitting a strong electrical signal.
　　(B) Researchers are able to detect a weak electrical signal emanating from the nesting chamber of an ant colony.
　　(C) Anteaters are observed taking increasingly longer amounts of time to locate the nesting chambers of ants.
　　(D) Anteaters are observed using various angles to break into nests of ants.
　　(E) Anteaters are observed using the same angle used with nests of ants to break into the nests of other types of prey.
　　【讲解】文中“however，researchers as yet have been...”这一句之前推理都很顺畅，但从这个强转折开始，推理坍塌，于是断桥出现，只要将断桥取非就可以得到正确答案B。
　　其二是具体事例法，即列举文章没有提到的例子作为正面论据，例如：
　　Because the potential hazards pollen grains are subject to as they are transported over long distances are enormous, wind-pollinated plants have, in the view above, compensated for the ensuring loss of pollen through happenstance by virtue of producing an amount of pollen, that is one to three orders of magnitude greater than the amount produced by species pollinated by insects.
　　【题】 Which of the following, if known, is likely to have been the kind of evidence used to support the view described in the first paragraph?
　　(A) Wind speeds need not be very low for wind-pollinated plants to fail to release pollen.
　　(B) The female reproductive organs of plants often have a sticky surface that allows them to trap airborne pollen systemati-cally.
　　(C) Grasses, as well as conifers, generate specific aerodynamic environments within the immediate vicinity of their reproductive organs.
　　(D) Rain showers often wash airborne pollen out of the air before it ever reaches an appropriate plant.
　　(E) The density and size of an airborne pollen grain are of equal importance in determining whether a plant will capture that grain.
　　【讲解】文中只是说花粉传播过程中会遇到很多危险，而答案D说得非常具体，即雨水通常会把空中的花粉冲散，以至于它们没法到达目标植物。
　　
　　信息题
　　
　　信息题的典型提问方法包括：
　　① Which of the following is (not) true?
　　② The author of the passage agrees (does not agree) with which of the following?
　　③ The information in the passage answers (does not answer) which of the following questions?
　　④ It can be inferred from the passage that...
　　⑤ The author (passage) implies (suggests) that...
　　信息题分成可定位(of, about, con-cerning, regarding)和不可定位两种，解答此类提问的方法是：回文中定位并且用同义变换进行验证。
　　
　　类比题
　　
　　在题干中出现similar to, analogous to, parallel, consistent with等的题目是类比题，常见的提问方式有：Which of the following is most similar to the situation in...？解答此类题目的要领是：回文中定位，抓本质特征。例如：
　　... Even more importantly, as these life stories moved from the traditional oral mode to recorded written form, much was inevitably lost. Editors often decided what elements were significant to the field research on a given tribe. Native Americans recognized that the essence of their lives could not be communicated in English and that events that they thought significant were often deemed unimportant by their interviewers.
【题】Which of the following is most similar to the actions of nineteenth-century ethnologists in their editing of the life stories of Native Americans?
　　(A) A witness in a jury trial invokes the Fifth Amendment in order to avoid relating personally incriminating evidence.
　　(B) A stockbroker refused to divulge the source of her information on the possible future increase in a stock誷 value.
　　(C) A sports announcer describes the action in a team sport with which he is unfamiliar.
　　(D) A chef purposely excludes the special ingredient from the recipe of his prize winning dessert.
　　(E) A politician fails to mention in a campaign speech the similarities in the positions held by her opponent for political office and by herself.
　　【讲解】文中说：那些文化人类学家在编辑美国印第安人的传记的时候，无视美国印第安人的文化，随意删减， 并且用英文记录他们的传记，显然这是门外汉的做法，与答案C比较吻合。
　　
　　主题题
　　
　　主题题型为长文章的必考题型，而且多出现在文章的首题。主题题型的实质就是Topic Sentence (下文简称TS)的寻找，所以我们可以把解题方法分为几种情况：TS可以找到；TS找不到；文章的focus找不到。这三种情况的优先级是依次递减的。看到主题题型，应先找TS，找到就直接改写；找不到，需要找到文章的focus，也就是谈论对象，随即运用排除法解题；如果focus也很难分辨，则考虑其它办法，下面我们来逐一介绍一下：
　　1. TS的寻找方式
　　1）套路结构法：
　　A. 现象解释型文章：TS则为给予正评价的那个。
　　B. 新老观点型文章：TS在新观点处。
　　C. 问题解决方案型文章：TS位于相应的解决方案处。
　　D. 结论解释型： 开头处的结论
　　2）文章中语言现象提示TS的位置：
　　A. 一段叙述后有转折连词：but, yet, however, actually, in fact, indeed, virtually, practically等，TS位于转折之后的作者态度处。
　　B. 设问以及回答：作者的自问自答，TS位于回答处。
　　C. 大段举例前的理论说明或者之后的归纳易成为TS。
　　2. 选项排除法
　　1) 主题题型的正确选项中不能含有任何的细节内容(如例子、比喻以及非关键人物等)。也就是说，看到选项中出现仅在某段提到的大写人名或者具体时间就要果断排除。
　　2) 正确选项中应含有文章的focus，也就是主题论述对象。
　　3) 正确选项中应含有作者的态度(包含让步语气)。
　　3. “从前不从后”：在文章的focus也很难分辨的情况下，要在文章靠前的部分寻找重点。着重阅读一段和二段的首句，体会作者态度，然后结合排除法解题。
　　附：主题题型的分类：
　　1) main idea/primary purpose (和文章的focus及作者的态度相关)
　　2) main content/best summarize passage/focus primarily on (不涉及作者态度的focus)
　　
　　作者态度题
　　
　　题干中凡是出现诸如which of the following best describes the author誷 attitude towards ...?的句型，都是作者态度题，对于此类问题，只需在阅读时把握作者对其所叙述的内容是正面还是负面态度就可以了，至于具体是揶揄讽刺、极力鞭挞、惋惜伤感、双手赞成还是略加保留，都不用深究。只是有时作者态度复杂，正负都有(多是一种为主，另一种以让步形式在文中出现)，这时的选项应注意与此相对应。
　　总而言之，在GMAT考试全部改为CAT化考试后，阅读部分无论在题型分布、出题原则，还是解题技巧上都没有多大改变。其原因就在于GMAT阅读的规律性始终贯穿其中。所以，同学们只需认真复习现有资料，辅以考前一个月的上机练习(尤其是对键盘与鼠标的熟练使用)，就会应付自如，游刃有余。