DLPT flashcards

31 cards. Read the term and the definition here. The deck at the top of this page is optional.

ILR listening scale

The Defense Language Proficiency Test reports listening on an ILR-derived 0-3 (or 0-4) scale, where 0 is no functional ability and 3 is professional-level comprehension of authentic native speech.

Gist-first listening

On single-play passages, capture topic, setting, and speaker roles during the opening seconds; detail questions are answerable only if the frame is established before the specifics arrive.

Discourse markers

Words such as however, therefore, admittedly, and finally that signal contrast, causation, concession, or sequence; the tested proposition usually follows the marker rather than preceding it.

Hedged opinion

A stance expressed through qualifiers like somewhat, arguably, or I suppose rather than a direct claim; listening items about opinion usually target the hedge, not the surface statement.

Number trap

A passage cites two or more figures, such as a target and an actual result, and only one answers the question; classify each number as total, subset, past, or projected before selecting.

Speaker attribution

In multi-speaker passages, the tested fact is often one named speaker's position; the other speaker's contrasting view is the standard distractor and must be kept separate.

Register shift

A change from formal to colloquial speech or vice versa, often marking a change of addressee or topic; noticing the shift prevents misassigning a statement to the wrong context.

Irony and rhetorical questions

Constructions whose intended meaning is the reverse of their literal form; in listening items they frequently encode the speaker's real evaluation and are tested directly.

Regional accent variation

Authentic recordings may use dialect phonology or lexical variants; comprehension depends on recognizing the standard equivalent rather than on the surface pronunciation.

Code-switching

Alternation between two languages or registers within one passage; the switch often marks quotation, emphasis, or a technical term and is not a comprehension failure.

False start recovery

If the opening is unclear, continue listening for the topic sentence; abandoning the item early forfeits the gist questions that follow the initial seconds.

Distractor by detail

An option that is factually present in the passage but does not answer the specific question asked; it is the most common wrong-answer type in listening items.

Tone cue words

Evaluative adjectives and adverbs such as regrettably, fortunately, or allegedly reveal the speaker's attitude; tone questions are answered from these cues, not from the facts alone.

Interview structure

Interview passages typically move from background to current situation to opinion; questions about the interviewee's view are usually answered in the final third.

Announcement format

Broadcast announcements place the essential information, such as time, place, and condition, in the first sentence and add qualifications afterward; the qualification often carries the tested detail.

Negation reversal

A negative or double negative flips the proposition; when an option restates a negative statement affirmatively, verify the polarity before accepting it as correct.

Main idea versus detail

The main-idea answer must cover the whole passage; a true statement confined to one paragraph is a detail distractor even though it is factually accurate.

Headline compression

Headlines drop articles and copulas and use present tense for past events; reading them literally produces the wrong time reference and the wrong agent.

Vocabulary in context

The tested sense of a word is fixed by its clause and register, not by its most frequent dictionary meaning; idiomatic and technical uses are common targets.

Author's purpose

Whether a text informs, persuades, criticizes, or instructs is signaled by framing verbs such as claims, warns, and concedes, and by the presence or absence of evaluative adjectives.

Pronoun resolution

Demonstratives and pronouns carry meaning across sentence boundaries; identifying the antecedent is a prerequisite for inference items that depend on the referent.

Sequence versus causation

Markers like before and after express order, while because and thereby express cause; a passage may narrate events out of chronological order, so the two must not be conflated.

Quotation framing

Verbs introducing quoted speech, such as alleged, acknowledged, or disputed, attribute stance; the framing verb, not the quotation's content, often determines the answer.

Inference across paragraphs

Level 3 reading items require combining information stated in separate paragraphs; the answer is not stated verbatim anywhere and must be constructed from two premises.

Morphological decoding

Roots, affixes, and case or particle marking narrow the meaning of unfamiliar words; structural cues often eliminate two of the four options before any vocabulary knowledge is applied.

Scope of claim

Whether a statement applies to all, most, or some is marked by quantifiers; an option that broadens or narrows the original quantifier is incorrect even if the topic matches.

Contrastive paragraph pair

Expository passages often present a claim and then a counterclaim; questions about the author's position require deciding which paragraph carries the author's own voice.

Notices and forms

Short functional texts test conditions and exceptions, such as eligibility, deadlines, and penalties; the tested element is usually the restrictive clause rather than the main instruction.

False friends

Words that resemble a term in another language but differ in meaning; context and collocation, not resemblance, determine the correct sense in reading items.

Ellipsis recovery

Omitted words in coordinated or comparative structures must be supplied from the preceding clause; failing to restore them reverses or distorts the comparison being tested.

Tone from modality

Modal verbs such as must, should, and may indicate obligation, recommendation, or possibility; the modal strength determines whether the author is asserting or merely suggesting.