English Language

Reading Comprehension

7,656 Questions
All Explicit Fact Retrieval 2427 Inference and Logical Deduction 1147 Contextual Vocabulary Meaning 845 Main Idea and Title Selection 781 Cause and Effect Extraction 699 Synonym and Antonym Identification 692 Sentence Structure and Discourse Function 336 Author Tone and Perspective 194 Interpretation of Figurative Language 190 Passage Style and Organization 173 Pronoun Referent Identification 49

Reading Comprehension Questions

Multiple choice

Directions: Answer the following question with the appropriate information given in the passage. Choose the correct option 1 - 4 from the given options.

We understand from the passage that the name “Sandwich” became a favorite in Europe

Directions: Read the passage carefully and answer the question that follows:

Time for Snacks

A sandwich is, in its basic form, slices of meat, cheese, or other food placed between two slices of bread. This way of eating must be as old as meat and bread. But the name was used only in the 18th century for John Montagu, 4th Earl of Sandwich, who had sliced meat and bread brought to him at the gaming table so that he could continue to play as he ate. He was a gambler who did not want to be disturbed even for eating. His famous name was easy to remember and it was given to the slices of bread with a stuffing in between.
Soon it was fashionable to serve sandwiches in the European continent, and the word was introduced into the French language. Since that time the sandwich has been included in every cuisine of the West because of its simplicity of preparation, endless variety, and the ease with which it could be taken anywhere.
Any type of roll or bread and any type of food that can be conveniently so eaten can go into a sandwich, hot or cold. British tea sandwiches are made with thin-cut bread filled with fish paste, cucumber, watercress, or tomato. Scandinavian smorrebrod are served open-faced, with skillfully prepared toppings of fish, sliced meats, and salads. In France, hollowed-out rolls are a popular base.

The United States made complex sandwich formulas, two of the most successful being the club sandwich of sliced chicken or turkey, bacon, lettuce, and tomato, and the Reuben of corned beef, Swiss cheese, sauerkraut and Russian dressing served grilled on black bread. Hot sandwiches, notably the hamburger on a bun, now found everywhere, are a very important food of the American diet, and with the peanut butter and jelly sandwich, the mainstay of the American schoolchild.

  1. after the 18th century

  2. before the 18th century

  3. even during the stone age

  4. in the 18th century
Reveal answer Fill a bubble to check yourself
A Correct answer
Explanation

But the name was used only in the 18th century. 

Multiple choice

Directions: Answer the following question with the appropriate information given in the passage. Choose the correct option 1 - 4 from the given options. Which of the following is true about sandwich?

Directions: Read the passage carefully and answer the question that follows:

Time for Snacks

A sandwich is, in its basic form, slices of meat, cheese, or other food placed between two slices of bread. This way of eating must be as old as meat and bread. But the name was used only in the 18th century for John Montagu, 4th Earl of Sandwich, who had sliced meat and bread brought to him at the gaming table so that he could continue to play as he ate. He was a gambler who did not want to be disturbed even for eating. His famous name was easy to remember and it was given to the slices of bread with a stuffing in between.
Soon it was fashionable to serve sandwiches in the European continent, and the word was introduced into the French language. Since that time the sandwich has been included in every cuisine of the West because of its simplicity of preparation, endless variety, and the ease with which it could be taken anywhere.
Any type of roll or bread and any type of food that can be conveniently so eaten can go into a sandwich, hot or cold. British tea sandwiches are made with thin-cut bread filled with fish paste, cucumber, watercress, or tomato. Scandinavian smorrebrod are served open-faced, with skillfully prepared toppings of fish, sliced meats, and salads. In France, hollowed-out rolls are a popular base.

The United States made complex sandwich formulas, two of the most successful being the club sandwich of sliced chicken or turkey, bacon, lettuce, and tomato, and the Reuben of corned beef, Swiss cheese, sauerkraut and Russian dressing served grilled on black bread. Hot sandwiches, notably the hamburger on a bun, now found everywhere, are a very important food of the American diet, and with the peanut butter and jelly sandwich, the mainstay of the American schoolchild.

  1. It is eaten hot.

  2. It is convenient to make and carry.

  3. It is always a roll.

  4. It can be shapeless at times.

Reveal answer Fill a bubble to check yourself
B Correct answer
Explanation

Since that time the sandwich has been included in every cuisine of the West because of its simplicity of preparation, endless variety and the ease with which it could be taken anywhere. 

Multiple choice

Directions: The passage given below is followed by four alternative summaries. Choose the option that best captures the essence of the passage. Key in the number of the option you choose as your answer.

All art is the expression of experience in some medium. The experience is clothed in forms which appeal through the senses. Sculpture has for its medium stone and marble, painting colors, music sounds and poetry words. The relation between the experience and the medium is closer in some than in others, in poetry than in music, in painting than in sculpture. By means of the work of art, the experience is released afresh, in the spectator or the auditor. The enjoyer becomes a secret sharer of the creator’s mind.

  1. Medium galore in umpteen forms that connect the spectator’s or auditor’s mind to that of the creator.

  2. Expressions and experiences are harboured in forms that get shared by all.

  3. Diffusion of experiences is possible through forms that manifest in medium.

  4. The enjoyer vicariously partakes the same joy as that of the creator.
Reveal answer Fill a bubble to check yourself
C Correct answer
Explanation
  1. Not true. There are many media possible; however, they do not cause any connection between the creator’s and spectator’s or auditor’s mind.
    1. Not true. These are not shared by all – only by audience / spectators.
    2. True. This captures the essence. Experiences can be conveyed through forms that reveal themselves in different media.
    3. Not true. The enjoyer only shares the experiences of the creator, which may give him joy. However, this option does not explain how this happens.
Multiple choice

Directions: The passage given below is followed by four alternative summaries. Choose the option that best captures the essence of the passage. Key in the number of the option you choose as your answer.

Most often today, the difference between a company and its competitor is the ability to execute. If your competitors are executing better than you are, they are beating you here and now, and the financial markets won’t wait to see if your elaborate strategy plays out. So, leaders who can’t execute don’t get free runs anymore. Execution is the great unaddressed issue in the business world today. Its absence is the single biggest obstacle to success and the cause of most of the disappointments that are mistakenly attributed to other causes.

  1. A proper execution of a strategy even in parts can turn the financial markets in a business’s favour.

  2. Execution has the power to offer a competitive advantage, the fact, though, remains obscured by more recognisable causes.

  3. The changed business scenario has placed new demands before the leaders of today – execution of the entire strategy.

  4. The increased importance of execution is reflected in the fact that the lack of it is widely acknowledged for a business’s failure.
Reveal answer Fill a bubble to check yourself
B Correct answer
Explanation
  1. Not true. There is no guarantee that proper execution shall make financial markets favour a business. This is not what the author says.
    1. True. “Execution is the great unaddressed issue in the business world today” makes the option clear.
    2. True, however, what makes execution a determinant of success or failure is better structured in option 2.
    3. Not true. There may still be other causes to a business’s failure.
Multiple choice

Directions: The passage given below is followed by four alternative summaries. Choose the option that best captures the essence of the passage. Key in the number of the option you choose as your answer.

Helvetius, amongst many false positions and licentious reveries, observes with much justice, that the education of man begins at his birth, and is carried on during the whole course of his life. The lowest mechanic, though he may not have distinct and accurate science, has yet such a store of geography, of natural history, of mechanics, and other parts of knowledge, that were his mind to be emptied of it, the wretched vacancy would amaze us.

  1. Helvetius fairly discerns education to be part of the knowledge the human mind amasses while living.

  2. Education is an evolving subject and begins at birth.

  3. Workers with lowly jobs would have gained more knowledge from their work than by studying accurate science.

  4. Helvetius rightly places education on the pedestal of experience.
Reveal answer Fill a bubble to check yourself
D Correct answer
Explanation
  1. True, however, the essence is not the wisdom of Helvetius or his wise discernment but his view or perspective on education.
    1. True. This is what Helvetius says, however, this option does not put education in the right perspective. According to Helvetius, education is more a matter of experience from one’s routine interactions of life and less a matter of science.
    2. Not true. This cannot be said.
    3. True. This captures the essence of the paragraph. According to Helvetius, education is more a matter of experience from one’s routine interactions of life and less a matter of science.
Multiple choice

Directions: The passage given below is followed by four alternative summaries. Choose the option that best captures the essence of the passage. Key in the number of the option you choose as your answer.

In the past, businesses got away with poor execution by pleading for patience. “The business environment is tough right now” is one typical excuse; or “Our strategy will take time to produce results”. But the business environment is always tough, and success is no longer measured over years. A company can win or lose serious market share before even it realises what has hit it.

  1. Business environment today has evolved dramatically warranting prompt execution.

  2. Business environment today hard presses employees to get positive results.

  3. Time had never in the past been as important and determinant in the business environment as it is today.

  4. The excuses of the past have lost both their relevance and significance in today’s tough business environment.
Reveal answer Fill a bubble to check yourself
C Correct answer
Explanation
  1. Not true. Business environment has not evolved and become tough. It was always tough.
    1. True, however, the emphasis here is on employees; their role is not the essence of the paragraph.
    2. True. The last line makes it clear that time is of great importance and no longer can patience be an excuse.
    3. Not true. The business environment had always been tough. Only the result or success has become a thing that doesn’t take much time to unfold or realise as it was in the past.
Multiple choice

Directions: The passage given below is followed by four alternative summaries. Choose the option that best captures the essence of the passage. Key in the number of the option you choose as your answer.

A dream pictures earthly beauty to our eyes in a truly heavenly splendour and clothes dignity with the highest majesty. It shows us everyday fears in the ghastliest shape and turns our amusement into jokes of indescribable pungency. And sometimes when we are awake and still under the full impact of an experience like one of these, we cannot but feel that never in our life has the real world offered us its equal.

  1. Dreams help envision the good and bad of life in their weirdest forms.

  2. A dream often enhances the effects of everything corporal through a somewhat strangely idealistic interpretation.

  3. Life’s experiences in their utmost manifestation nearest to reality can only be sensed in one’s dreams.

  4. A dream tends to have a deep understanding of real-life experiences, thereby pushing the limits of a sane and sober mind.
Reveal answer Fill a bubble to check yourself
B Correct answer
Explanation
  1. Not true. The forms cannot be said to be weird but exaggerated.
    1. True. The very first sentence with words “truly heavenly” and “clothes dignity with the highest majesty” would be a strange idealistic interpretation.
    2. Not true. These won’t be nearest to reality (refer last sentence of the paragraph).
    3. Not true. A dream only enhances the effects of real-life experiences. No way can it be said that it has deep understanding of them. Also, pushing the limits of a sane and sober mind is out of context.
Multiple choice

Directions: The passage given below is followed by four alternative summaries. Choose the option that best captures the essence of the passage. Key in the number of the option you choose as your answer.

To exist is to be something, to possess a specific identity. This is the Law of Identity: A is A. Facts are facts, independent of any consciousness. No amount of passionate wishing, desperate longing or hopeful pleading can alter the facts. Nor will ignoring or evading the facts erase them: the facts remain, immutable. Reality — that which exists — has no alternatives, no competitors, nothing “transcending” it. To embrace existence is to reject all notions of the supernatural and the mystical, including God.

  1. To exist is to discount all notions of worldly and unworldly interventions that tend to change a fact.

  2. To exist is to become a fact that acknowledges itself in nothing more or less than being itself.

  3. All reality is fact and is far removed from everything unworldly.

  4. That which exists cannot change despite importunities to God.
Reveal answer Fill a bubble to check yourself
B Correct answer
Explanation
  1. Existence does not mean that one should discount or deny all ideas that tend to cause a change.
    1. True. The fact remains as is, nothing more or less than itself.
    2. True. All reality is fact and removed from anything that transcends it. However, this option cannot be called the essence of the paragraph, as it focuses only on one aspect of existence.
    3. True, but again it does not capture the essence. It does not explain what existence means.
Multiple choice

Directions: The passage given below is followed by four alternative summaries. Choose the option that best captures the essence of the passage. Key in the number of the option you choose as your answer.

One principle of life drives man. This principle is physical sensibility. What produces in him this sensibility? A feeling of love for pleasure, and of hatred for pain? It is from both these feelings joined together in man and always present in his mind that is formed what one calls in him the feeling of self-love. This self-love engenders the desire for happiness; the desire for happiness that for power; and it is this latter that in turn brings forth envy, avarice, ambition and generally all the artificial passions, which, under different names, are only a disguised love of power in us and applied to the various means of obtaining it.

  1. Ambitions and passions naturally orient man’s life towards self-indulgence.

  2. Happiness is a function of power that cannot be achieved if one is an altruist.

  3. Envy, avarice, ambition and passions are innate and help man navigate through life.

  4. The pursuit of power that elicits from self–love is paradoxical in that it only makes man more vulnerable.
Reveal answer Fill a bubble to check yourself
D Correct answer
Explanation
  1. Not true. Ambitions or passions do not direct man’s life.
    1. Not true. It is not explained in the paragraph that an altruist cannot be happy.
    2. True; however, the essence is that every man is driven by self-love and self-love excites all artificial passions.
    3. True and best captures the essence. The pursuit of power is paradoxical as this yearning for power makes one more vulnerable to one's passions.
Multiple choice

Directions: The passage given below is followed by four alternative summaries. Choose the option that best captures the essence of the passage. Key in the number of the option you choose as your answer.

With two hands, how can you receive the abundance which God can bestow on you with His infinite hands? And why do you cling to petty things? If He starts drawing everything from you with His infinite hands, how much can you grab? He will suck everything if He wants. So there is no use clinging to small things, and also no use craving too much as if we are poverty-stricken, uncared for. Nothing of the kind. We have become poverty-stricken due to our own making.

  1. Greed has no bounds and so does the feeling of self-pity induced by deprivation.

  2. The notions of greed and privation contrived by us are delusional.

  3. God has his own ways to make us experience richness and poverty.

  4. We deserve to feel rich and impoverished as long as we long for material things.
Reveal answer Fill a bubble to check yourself
B Correct answer
Explanation
  1. Not true. The author has talked about both greed and self-pity; however, has not mentioned whether these have any limits or not.
    1. True. This captures the essence of the paragraph. The ideas of greed and need are within us and these are misleading.
    2. Not true. This is not meant by the paragraph. God, though, wants us to be free from greed and self-pity.
    3. Not true. Nowhere in the paragraph has attachment or detachment to material things talked of or the outcomes thereof (rich or poor).
Multiple choice

Directions: The passage given below is followed by four alternative summaries. Choose the option that best captures the essence of the passage. Key in the number of the option you choose as your answer.

It is, however, necessary for the idea of perfection to be proposed, that we may have some object to which our endeavours are to be directed; and he that is most deficient in the duties of life makes some atonement for his faults if he warns others against his own failings, and hinders, by the salubrity of his admonitions, the contagion of his example.

  1. The best and the worst can be calibrated on the yardstick of perfection.

  2. Perfection as an idea is worthwhile to conceive both as a coveted goal and a cause to be protected and professed.

  3. Perfection is indispensable to the direction of human efforts either on the positive side to gain success or on the negative side causing utter failure.

  4. The ones conscious of one’s duties and those deficient in the same could have never compared their endeavours in absence of the notion of perfection.
Reveal answer Fill a bubble to check yourself
B Correct answer
Explanation
  1. True. This is possible according to the paragraph, the reason or conception of the notion of perfection is not made clear by the option.
    1. True. The words “our endeavours are to be directed” and “… salubrity of his admonishments…” makes it clear that perfection is a desired goal and a cause that needs to be protected by the ones who have failed to achieve perfection.
    2. Not true for negative side causing utter failure.
    3. Not true. The essence of the paragraph is not in comparing the endeavours of the conscious and the deficient.
Multiple choice

Directions: The passage given below is followed by four alternative summaries. Choose the option that best captures the essence of the passage. Key in the number of the option you choose as your answer.

In popular culture, the tale of the emperor’s new clothes raises to the level of common wisdom the alliance of power and error. Duped by flattery into believing that he has purchased an exquisite new outfit, which appears invisible and is indeed non-existent, the emperor proudly parades it in front of his admiring subjects who submissively refrain from calling attention to the conspicuous point that he is wearing no clothes at all. Although he does not allude directly to this story, Helvetius seems to have its message frequently in mind as he writes about despotic power. This power keeps people from thinking and serves only the pleasure of the present moment for one person or possibly a small group of people as in the case of priests or clergy and not the future of all.

  1. Absolute power engenders self-ruination.

  2. Despots make a mockery of themselves before the public as they wield absolute power.

  3. Power gets abused when it becomes the sole preserve of the potentate.

  4. Thinking does get compromised when the elite only use power to seek momentary pleasure.
Reveal answer Fill a bubble to check yourself
D Correct answer
Explanation
  1. Not true. This cannot be inferred from the passage.
    1. Not true in every case.
    2. True. Power is abused by the despot to self-serve, however, “how” and “why” are not captured in this option, hence, not the answer.
    3. True. The word “elite” captures the exclusive group of people who command influence or power or wealth. The “how” and “why” are captured in this option, hence, the answer.
Multiple choice

Directions: The passage given below is followed by four alternative summaries. Choose the option that best captures the essence of the passage. Key in the number of the option you choose as your answer.

Many addictions aim to increase arousal. This is the all-powerful feeling that might come from cocaine, amphetamines, the first few drinks of alcohol, shoplifting, sexual acting out, videogames, or gambling. This omnipotent feeling, however, is eventually undermined when the addict realizes that a dependency has been formed. A feeling of fear replaces the feeling of being all powerful – fear of losing the source of addiction and fear that others will find out how powerless the person actually is. Negative experiences always accompany the positive feelings the addict is seeking.

  1. An addict’s intention is only stimulation and not dependency.

  2. The falseness in the potency of some substances and activities reflects on an addict.

  3. An addict’s dependency is derived from his misunderstanding of the hidden potential of an addictive substance.

  4. The potentate is eventually enfeebled by indulgence in addictive substances or activities.
Reveal answer Fill a bubble to check yourself
B Correct answer
Explanation
  1. Neither stimulation nor dependency is the intention; it is the sense of feeling all-powerful. This power may come through stimulation or arousal. The last sentence makes it clear that an addict seeks positive feelings, i.e. power.
    1. True. An addict eventually comes to realise the falseness in the induced power by anything that stimulates. This eventually takes a toll on the addict, as the addict becomes fearful.
    2. The author does not talk about the hidden potential of addictive substances.
    3. It is not correct to say that a powerful person gets weakened by indulging in addictive substances. Instead, a person thinks that he has become powerful by indulging in addictive substances.
Multiple choice

Directions: The passage given below is followed by four alternative summaries. Choose the option that best captures the essence of the passage. Key in the number of the option you choose as your answer.

There is no escaping this basic truth. Indeed, challenges help us to grow. The normal process is to perceive a problem and then bring our emotional and thinking abilities into play in order to solve the problem. We can draw on our own legacy of experiences, and we can find support from our life partners, friends, the community, society’s body of knowledge, and spiritual sources. Faced with a problem, we experience some anxiety – and this uncomfortable feeling motivates us to solve the problem in order to find our balance again. In the process, we become more flexible and more adept at dealing with problems in the future. As we mature, we discover that problems are not insurmountable – and we get better at problem-solving.

  1. Man’s vast resource of his abilities, experiences and relationships is often drawn on as problems become more daunting.

  2. Challenges form the fabric of man’s life; an escape from them is a delusion.

  3. Problems get less challenging in that they themselves condition man in dealing with them better.

  4. Problem solving is a process that is best learnt.
Reveal answer Fill a bubble to check yourself
C Correct answer
Explanation
  1. True, man’s vast resource is drawn on as problems become daunting; however, this is not the message that the author wants to convey. It is the conditioning of man that problems / challenges do that ready man to face more challenges in a better manner.
    1. The author does not talk about escaping the problems.
    2. True. It is the conditioning of man that problems / challenges do that ready man to face more challenges in a better manner.
    3. True. Problem solving is a process that is learnt. However, the way man learns this is the message or essence of the passage captured in option 3.
Multiple choice

Directions: The passage given below is followed by four alternative summaries. Choose the option that best captures the essence of the passage. Key in the number of the option you choose as your answer.

In the notion of consequences, the Utilitarian includes all of the good and bad produced by the act, whether arising after the act has been performed or during its performance. If the difference in the consequences of alternative acts is not great, some Utilitarians do not regard the choice between them as a moral issue. According to Mill, acts should be classified as morally right or wrong only if the consequences are of such significance that a person would wish to see the agent compelled, not merely persuaded and exhorted, to act in the preferred manner.

  1. Acts that produce consequences of no significant difference tend to have minimal moral repercussions.

  2. Mill tried to distinguish “moral” acts through the outcomes of performance or during the process of performance.

  3. An urge to force an agent to toe a particular line causes his actions to fall in the realm of moral appraisal.

  4. It is the consequences ensuing from an action that determine the moral basis of the agent.
Reveal answer Fill a bubble to check yourself
C Correct answer
Explanation
  1. Not true. If two acts are identical in terms of their consequences, it cannot be said that they have no moral repercussions. The topic, here, is whether the act is morally right or wrong.
    1. True. This is what Mill did. However, the essence is not captured, as “why” and “how” are not captured by the option.
    2. True. This captures the main point of the paragraph. Whenever an agent is forced to act in a particular manner, the act needs to be evaluated from a moral standpoint.
    3. Not true. If the consequences are identical, then the moral basis need not be determined.