Must be true except questions vs Cannot be true questions in Reading Comprehension

[albert_ortizzav@hotmail.com]

Hi everyone, I have some difficulties differentiating between MBT X and Cannot question stems in RC. The fact that both uses the same wording and "Least" or "Except" makes this task difficult.

Is this something I should worry about? or since the correct answer is one that does not follow from the passage, it does not matter if I cannot differentiate one from the other?

If it is something I should differentiate, do you have any suggestion on how to do it?


Thank you!

[Adam Tyson]

There is an important difference between those two question stems, Albert, and it's true in all three sections.

In a MBT-X question, the correct answer doesn't have to be true, but it also doesn't have to be false. The 4 wrong answers all Must Be True, so you find those and get rid of them. So in an RC setting, you would look for things that the passage proves to be true and eliminate those answer choices, leaving only the one answer choice that doesn't need to be true. Maybe it's impossible, and conflict with the passage, but maybe it's just something up in the air that the passage never definitively addressed.

In a Cannot Be True question, the correct answer is impossible. The stimulus, or the passage in RC, or the rules and inferences in a Game, disprove the correct answer. That means the 4 wrong answers are things that could be true. The wrong answers don't all have to be true, but they have to at least be possible. The correct answer is the only one that you can say is absolutely not true. In RC, that means you want the one answer that directly conflicts with the information in the passage. In most cases in RC, a Cannot question is put in the form of something the author disagrees with, so pay close attention to the views and beliefs expressed by the author and find the answer that opposes those views.