GRE General

Sub Topics

Reading Comprehension - How to Infer Intended Meaning Get The Gist of an Essay Improve And Reading Comprehension Reading Comprehension - How to Answer Questions About Literature Reading Comprehension - Reading Strategies Using Visualization What Are Connotation And Denotation?Understanding Tone And Mood in a Reading Passage Structure in Writing And How Does it Affect Meaning?Close Reading vs Big Picture Reading How to Use Text to Guide Your Interpretation

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Lessons and MCQs

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GRE General: Reading Comprehension - How to Analyze a Literary Passage
Reading Comprehension - How to Infer Intended Meaning

In this Video Lesson, we will differentiate the real and intended meaning of the term inference. We will then discuss what steps to take when making inferences in literature passage.

Reading Comprehension - How to Infer Intended Meaning

Inference in day to day life

Refer to the video for detailed lecture

Assume that you have arrived at your home after work. All the lights are out, so you assume that you are the first one home.
As you walk from your car, you see there is a package on the front step. Before you even pick it up, you assume that it was left by the mailman.
You finally open the front door and see that the living room has been cleaned. You then conclude that someone must have cleaned the room while you were at work.

In each of these moments, you have practiced inference.

Inference

Inference is using observation and background to reach a logical conclusion.

Before you can begin to practice inference in literature, you should know what you are looking for. Your goal is to find the intended meaning of the text. The intended meaning is what we think the author is trying to teach us.

Practice Making Inferences

When reading, we make inferences through the author, the text and our response. The first step to reaching a conclusion of the intended meaning of writing is to look at the author.

As you read, make guesses. Try to guess what will happen next in the story, what a character may say or think or even what other characters not in the scene are doing.

Next, ask questions. Why are the characters acting a certain way?
What are they thinking? Where are they going?
What are they feeling? What do you already know? What is missing?
Why is the author not including information?
What do you think will happen next?
How will a character react?
What will the outcome be?

After you have made predictions, see what is missing or stated in the details and make connections. Fill in the missing information using your questions, guesses and predictions.