Here are the basic things that you need to succeed on Critical Reasoning (CR) questions:

1. Understand the structure of an argument.

First, you must know how arguments are structured, so that you can know how to break them down into their core components. When we use the word argument, we don't mean a conversation where 2 people are shouting at each other. An argument in Critical Reasoning means any piece of text where an author puts forth a set of ideas and/or a point of view, and attempts to support it.

Every GMAT argument is made up of two basic parts:

• The conclusion (the point that the author is trying to make)
• The evidence (the support that the author offers for the conclusion)

Success on this section hinges on your ability to identify these parts of the argument. There is no general rule about where conclusion and evidence appear in the argument - the conclusion could be the first sentence, followed by the evidence, or it could be the last sentence, with the evidence preceding it. Consider the stimulus (in other words, a passage):

The Brookdale Public Library will require extensive physical rehabilita­tion to meet the new building codes passed by the town council. For one thing, the electrical system is inadequate, causing the lights to flicker sporadically. Furthermore, there are too few emergency exits, and even those are poorly marked and sometimes locked.

Suppose that the author of this argument was allowed only one sentence to convey her meaning. Do you think she would waste her time with the following statement? Would she walk away satisfied that her main point was communicated?

The electrical system [at the Brookdale Public Library] is inadequate, causing the lights to flicker sporadically.

Probably not. Given a single opportunity, she would have to state the first sentence to convey her real purpose:

The Brookdale Public Library will require extensive physical rehabilitation…

That is the conclusion. If you pressed the author to state her reasons for making that statement, she would then cite the electrical and structural problems with the building. That is the evidence for her conclusion.

But does that mean that an evidence statement like, "The electrical system is inadequate" can't be a conclusion? No, we're just saying it's not the conclusion for this particular argument. Every idea, every new statement, must be evaluated in the context of the stimulus in which it appears.

For the statement above to serve as the conclusion, the stimulus would be:

The electrical wiring at the Brookdale Public Library was installed over 40 years ago, and appears to be corroded in some places (evidence). An electrician, upon inspection of the system, found a few frayed wires as well as some blown fuses (evidence). Clearly, the electrical system at the Brookdale Public Library is inadequate (conclusion).

To succeed in Critical Reasoning, you have to be able to determine the precise function of every sentence in the stimulus. Use structural signals when attempting to isolate evidence and conclusion. Key words in the stimulus - such as because, for, since- usually indicate that evidence is about to follow, whereas therefore, hence, thus, and consequently usually signal a conclusion.

2. Preview the question.

Before you read the stimulus, look over the question. This will give you some idea about what you need to look for as you read. It gives you a jump on the question. Suppose the question with the library argument above asked the following:

The author supports her point about the need for rehabilitation at the Brookdale Library by citing which of the following?

If you were to preview this question stem before you read the stimulus, you would know what to look for in advance - namely, evidence, the "support" provided for the conclusion. Or if the question stem asked you to find an assumption on which the author is relying, you would know in advance that a crucial piece of the argument was missing, and you could think about that right off the bat.

Previewing the stem allows you to set the tone of your attack, and thus saves you time in the long. As you'll soon see, this technique will come in especially handy when we discuss methods for the various question types.

3. Paraphrase the author's point.

After you read the stimulus, paraphrase the author's main argument to yourself. That is, restate the author's ideas in your own words. Frequently, the authors in Critical Reasoning say pretty simple things in complex ways. So if you mentally translate the verbiage into a simpler form, the whole thing should be more manageable.

In the library argument, for instance, you probably don't want to deal with the full complexity of the author's stated conclusion:

The Brookdale Public Library will require extensive physical rehabilitation to meet the new building codes just passed by the town council.

Instead, you probably want to paraphrase a much simpler point:

The library will need fixing-up to meet new codes.

Often, by the time you begin reading through the answer choices, you run the risk of losing sight of the gist of the stimulus. So restating the argument in your own words will not only help you get the author's point in the first place, it will also help you hold on to it until you've found the correct answer.

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ВСЕ УРОКИ ПО ПРОХОЖДЕНИЮ ТЕСТА GMAT, ОПУБЛИКОВАННЫЕ НА НАШЕМ САЙТЕ, ВЫ НАЙДЕТЕ ЗДЕСЬ.