Attribution and Interpretation

Objective: Understand attribute and choose it accurately in context.

attribute (verb): To regard something as caused by, produced by, or belonging to a particular source. Context sentences 1. The gardeners attribute the seedlings' rapid growth to the warmer greenhouse. 2. Several critics attribute the unsigned essay to a novelist who used similar imagery. 3. We should not attribute every disagreement to personal hostility.

Objective: Understand ascribe and choose it accurately in context.

ascribe (verb): To explain something by assigning it to a particular cause, source, or motive. Context sentences 1. The villagers ascribe the bridge's survival to the mason's careful design. 2. Readers sometimes ascribe modern political views to characters from distant eras. 3. The committee refused to ascribe the missing records to negligence without further evidence.

Objective: Understand impute and choose it accurately in context.

impute (verb): To assign blame, a fault, or a motive to someone, often without sufficient evidence. Context sentences 1. It would be unfair to impute dishonesty to a student merely because her explanation is awkward. 2. The editorial tried to impute selfish motives to everyone who opposed the proposal. 3. We cannot impute the department's errors to its newest employee without examining the records.

Objective: Understand construe and choose it accurately in context.

construe (verb): To understand or interpret words, actions, or evidence in a particular way. Context sentences 1. Some readers construe the final scene as a promise of reconciliation. 2. The director hoped no one would construe her silence as approval. 3. Different committees may construe the same policy differently.

Objective: Understand misconstrue and choose it accurately in context.

misconstrue (verb): To interpret someone's words, actions, or intentions incorrectly. Context sentences 1. Please do not misconstrue my request for evidence as a personal attack. 2. Without the preceding paragraph, readers may misconstrue the narrator's joke as a serious accusation. 3. Visitors sometimes misconstrue the guide's brief answers as impatience.

Objective: Understand conflate and choose it accurately in context.

conflate (verb): To combine or treat distinct things as though they were one, obscuring important differences. Context sentences 1. The essay tends to conflate popularity with artistic quality. 2. If we conflate temporary residents with permanent residents, the housing analysis becomes misleading. 3. The debate grew confused when speakers began to conflate criticism of the plan with hostility toward its supporters.

Objective: Understand misconceive and choose it accurately in context.

misconceive (verb): To form an incorrect understanding or idea of something. Context sentences 1. Students may misconceive probability if they expect every short sequence to reflect the long-term average. 2. Readers who overlook the narrator's limited knowledge can misconceive the structure of the novel. 3. It is easy to misconceive the project's scope before reviewing its full requirements.

Objective: Understand generalize and choose it accurately in context.

generalize (verb): To draw a broad conclusion from particular examples or observations. Context sentences 1. We should not generalize about an entire school from one classroom visit. 2. The researcher hoped to generalize from the trial results to a larger population. 3. After reading several travel diaries, Maya began to generalize about the hardships of the journey.

Objective: Understand analogize and choose it accurately in context.

analogize (verb): To compare different things by identifying a relevant similarity in their relationships or structure. Context sentences 1. Teachers sometimes analogize an electrical circuit to a loop of flowing water. 2. The essay will analogize the city's growth to the branching of a tree. 3. We can analogize the archive's index to a map that helps visitors locate unfamiliar places.

Objective: Understand equate and choose it accurately in context.

equate (verb): To regard or present two things as equal in meaning, value, status, or effect. Context sentences 1. The admissions panel should not equate expensive activities with intellectual curiosity. 2. Some residents equate the old theater with the identity of their town. 3. The scoring rules equate one completed project with two shorter assignments.