Verbal Reasoning
Verbal Reasoning
Verbal Reasoning on the GMAT Focus Edition is 23 questions in 45 minutes, and it contains only two question types: Reading Comprehension and Critical Reasoning. Sentence Correction has been removed, so nothing asks you to repair grammar. What remains is argument analysis and disciplined reading - locating conclusions, exposing unstated assumptions, and answering strictly from the supplied text.
Critical Reasoning
Every argument has a conclusion (what the author wants accepted) and premises (the evidence given). The gap between them is the assumption: an unstated premise the argument needs in order to work.
- Question families: assumption, strengthen, weaken, inference, evaluate, resolve the paradox, boldface, method of reasoning, flaw.
- Read the question stem first so you know what you are hunting for, then prephrase an answer before scanning the choices.
- The negation test settles assumption questions: if negating a choice destroys the argument, that choice is necessary.
- Eliminate answers that attack a premise, drift out of scope, use extreme wording, or answer a different question than the one asked.
Reading Comprehension
Passages run roughly 200–350 words and carry three or four questions each. Read for structure - what each paragraph is doing, where the thesis sits, whose view is being reported - rather than memorizing detail. For detail and inference questions, return to the passage; outside knowledge is never rewarded.
Worked example
A company installed standing desks and its sick days fell 15%. A memo concludes the desks caused the decline.
Conclusion: the desks caused the drop. Premise: the two events coincided. The assumption is that nothing else changed - no new wellness program, no unusually mild flu season, no change in leave policy. A correct strengthen answer would rule out such a rival cause; a correct weaken answer would supply one. By contrast, a choice saying "some employees dislike standing" is irrelevant: it never touches the causal link.
Traps that cost marks
- Selecting a choice that merely restates a premise in new words.
- Confusing a necessary condition with a sufficient one.
- In Reading Comprehension, choosing a statement that is true per the passage but does not answer the stem.
- Quantifier slips: "some," "most," "all," and "none" are not interchangeable.
- Extreme language ("always," "never," "the only") is rarely correct in inference and assumption items.