Cross Text Connections Pattern - Challenge the Claim

Identifying how Text 2 challenges or undermines Text 1's position

These questions give you two passages and ask how Text 2 pushes back on what Text 1 claims. Text 1 makes a point — maybe a conclusion, a theory, or a common assumption — and Text 2 provides evidence, reasoning, or a counterexample that weakens that point. Your job is to identify how the challenge works.

 

How to recognize it

The question will usually say something like "Based on the texts, how would the author of Text 2 most likely respond to Text 1?" or "How would [researcher in Text 2] most likely respond to the argument in Text 1?" Sometimes the question points to an underlined portion of Text 1 and asks how Text 2 challenges it specifically.

 

How to approach it

First, pin down what Text 1 is claiming. Then read Text 2 and ask: What does this text say that makes Text 1's claim weaker or less convincing?

Here's a real example:

Text 1: Transportation economist Mark Leland studied metropolitan areas that expanded major highways. Leland argues that adding lanes draws traffic off bottlenecks and reduces congestion citywide. Therefore, he concludes that highway expansions improve average travel times across the region.

Text 2: While smoother traffic is desirable, adding capacity can backfire. Ariella Gomez and Tom Rhee analyzed cities after new lanes opened and found that driving increased as more people chose to make trips or drive farther, a pattern known as induced demand. Over time, congestion levels returned and average travel times did not consistently decline.

The question asks: Based on the texts, how would Gomez and Rhee (Text 2) most likely respond to the research discussed in Text 1?

A) Only cities above a certain population should widen highways. B) Wider roads will cause drivers to switch to public transit, further reducing traffic. C) Cities that add lanes must also synchronize traffic signals to see benefits. D) Building more highway capacity does not necessarily reduce overall congestion or travel times.

Text 1 says: more lanes = less congestion = better travel times. Text 2 says: actually, more lanes = more driving (induced demand) = congestion comes back. The challenge is direct — Text 2's evidence contradicts Text 1's conclusion. That's choice D.

Choice A introduces a population threshold that neither text discusses. Choice B invents a claim about public transit that contradicts what Text 2 actually says (people drove more, not less). Choice C brings in traffic signals, a topic neither text mentions. The wrong answers all introduce ideas that sound relevant but don't appear in either passage.

 

Traps to watch for

• Answers that go too far. Text 2 might weaken Text 1's claim without completely destroying it. If Text 2 says "the effect isn't as strong as expected," an answer that says "Text 2 proves Text 1 is entirely wrong" overshoots.

• Answers that describe agreement instead of challenge. Sometimes an answer choice describes something both texts would agree on. The question is asking for the challenge, so look for the friction.

• Answers that focus on the wrong part. If the question points to a specific underlined claim, make sure the answer addresses that claim, not a different point from Text 1.

 

How the difficulty changes

 

Easier questions:

The challenge is straightforward — Text 2 flatly contradicts Text 1, and both passages use clear, everyday language.

Text 1: You're emailing a coworker to set up a time for a meeting. In joint scheduling, many people default to saying that any time is fine, believing that such flexibility will make them seem accommodating and pleasant to work with.

Text 2: Recent studies indicate that withholding a clear time preference doesn't improve others' impressions. Saying "any time works" increases the burden on the other person, often lengthening the decision process and lowering satisfaction with both the chosen time and the person who was vague.

Text 1 says people believe being flexible makes them look good. Text 2 says research shows the opposite — vagueness actually makes things worse. The challenge is unmistakable.

 

Medium questions:

The challenge involves a more nuanced pushback. Text 2 doesn't flatly contradict Text 1 but says the picture is more complicated than Text 1 suggests.

Text 1: Observations of wild bumblebees frequently show a strong preference for violet and blue blossoms even when nectar concentrations are equal across colors. These findings are often cited in support of the prevailing view that color preference in bees is largely innate and not shaped by immediate reward; in other words, attraction to color is not instrumental.

Text 2: While acknowledging that innate biases contribute to foraging, Lina Ortega and colleagues tested whether signaling greater reward would change bees' interest in a color. In an arena of artificial flowers, the team associated one color with higher sucrose concentration. Bees made more and faster visits to that color than when no color predicted a higher reward, indicating that associating a color with usefulness increased interest in it.

Text 1 says bees' color preferences are innate, not driven by reward. Text 2 acknowledges innate biases exist but shows that reward can shape color preference — bees visited a color more when it predicted better nectar. The challenge is subtle: Text 2 doesn't say innate preferences don't exist, just that they're not the whole story.

 

Harder questions:

The passages are more technical, and the challenge may be indirect — you have to infer how Text 2's evidence undermines a specific mechanism or assumption in Text 1.

Text 1: Geneticists have long wondered how several alleles at a single locus can remain common in a population when they appear to compete for the same selective advantage. According to conventional wisdom, one allele should eventually fix by outcompeting the rest. Yet in many species multiple alleles persist, and decades of modeling have not yielded a fully satisfying explanation.

Text 2: Population geneticist Lila Chen and colleagues connect this persistence to how and when alleles are expressed. Because many variants are recessive, conditionally expressed, or active only in specific tissues or life stages, they rarely face identical selective pressures at the same time. As a result, the alleles "interact" less directly than is often assumed. Therefore, says Chen's team, direct competition among alleles for fixation likely happens much less consistently than previously thought.

Text 1 says conventional wisdom predicts one allele should win — but many persist, and nobody knows why. Text 2 challenges the premise: alleles aren't actually competing head-to-head because they're expressed differently in different contexts. The "conventional wisdom" assumes direct competition, but Chen's team says that assumption is wrong. You have to understand the logic chain — the challenge targets the mechanism (direct competition), not just the outcome.

 

Your approach on test day

1. Read Text 1. Identify the specific claim being made: "Text 1 says ______."

2. Read Text 2. Ask yourself: "How does this weaken or contradict what Text 1 said?"

3. Check the answer choices. The correct one will accurately describe the nature of the challenge — not overstate it, not understate it, and not aim at the wrong claim.