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Relationships on the ACT® Reading Test: Chronology, Cause & Effect, Comparative

Read time: 2 minutes Last updated: September 23rd, 2024

You'll see questions on the ACT® Reading Test asking about relationships. These questions tend to be quite different from one another, yet the central concept remains the same. The ACT® Reading wants to see if you can discern different relationships. While these questions are rare (often never occurring more than once a test), it's worth reviewing because the questions can be quite straightforward. Except the ACT® often tries to trick students with the answer choices.

Optimal Technique to Solve

Chronology

These questions tend to be deceptively straightforward. Chronology means order of events. The ACT® Reading will give you a question asking about a sequence of events, whether giving you dates or asking what happened first, second, third. Often – but not always – when the ACT® gives you dates, they're trying to trick you.

The dates may seem straightforward. For example, if the question asks you what year an event happened in, then the text may say something like, "… the event happened in the year 1950." Students see 1950, circle that answer, and move on.

If I had read the whole sentence, I might see the whole sentence says something like, "it is incorrect to say the event happened in the year 1950. This is the idea that many people hold dear. But the actual event happened twenty years earlier."

This example underscores the need to read the context for whatever question you're answering. You don't need to reread the entire passage. You just need to read enough to be able to answer the question confidently for yourself before going back to the answer. For this question, that often means reading the previous sentence, the sentence in question, and the following sentence. That usually gives you sufficient context.

Keep in mind, just because the ACT® has often used this type of question to trick students doesn't mean they always are or always will be. The takeaway from this question type should be to reread sufficiently to determine the context.

Cause & Effect

Cause and effect tends to be simpler when it appears, which is infrequently. The questions ask something along the lines of "what does the author think causes the shortages of the product?" That's clearly cause and effect. You would need to read sufficient context to determine the answer. Then, once you have an answer for yourself, go back to the answer choices. Use Process of Elimination to get rid of wrong answers. Choose the right answer, and move on.

Comparative

Comparative relationship questions are the least easy to recognize and historically, the least frequent relationship question. Understanding that the ACT® is asking for relationships, though, can help students understand how to solve these questions. Some students find these questions confusing until they look at them through the lens of relationships.

For example, consider the ACT® asks which character has the deepest voice, according to the passage. That might seem straightforward for some, not for others. The question is asking about the relationship among family members. In this specific passage, the family members all relate by singing. The brother has the deepest voice, so his relation is to always sing the baritones for them.

Once you understand the questions are asking for a comparative relationship, it can be easier to find the details for this question type. The brother has a deeper voice than all other family members, so they look forward to him singing with them. That's the logic I would use to find details to answer the question.

By understanding these three types of relationship questions, you'll be better prepared to answer them on the ACT® Reading Test.

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