<p>I wanted to elaborate a bit on xiggi’s point about inference.</p>
<p>When it comes to SAT questions, you almost have to take them at face value, and sometimes painfully so.</p>
<p>For instance, when the question asks you about analyzing the tone of paragraph 3, they really, really, really mean paragraph 3. I don’t have to look at any other paragraph to get the right answer (I answered “vehement,” which is the right answer, having not read anything other than paragraph 3 in that article notanengineer linked. I have no idea what the other paragraphs talk about).</p>
<p>Sometimes another answer might appear very attractive because you can twist it and justify it in your mind, but that should be a warning sign that the answer is probably wrong. The best answer always has <em>direct</em> evidence to support it. If you have to extrapolate, then it isn’t direct.</p>
<p>I think a key strength of good SAT test-takers is that they sometimes have to pick answers that they may be uncomfortable with, but are correct because of the evidence. There are plenty of questions where I might have thought answer A was more fitting overall based on context or outside knowledge/preconceptions, but answer C is what I’d have to force myself to bubble in because there was text to support it directly.</p>