Analogical Thought

00:01 This brings us to a type of thinking known as analogical thought.

00:06 We don't want to look for a direct similarity in a passage that can be identified in a question stem.

00:12 To answer these types of questions, we're going to need to distinguish the concepts of likeness, similarity and analogy.

00:21 We'll create a few analogies of our own and discuss the difference between abstract language and concrete logic.

00:29 So likeness, similarity analogy, how do you use these words in everyday life? Let's see if we can distinguish them based on how the test writers want us to do so.

00:41 Likeness would be the most broad word we could use to compare the information introduced in the question stem with the passage for reasoning beyond the text questions.

00:51 Similarity would be a direct and inherent commonality between the two things.

00:57 So if the passage mentioned one type of airplane, and then that same type of airplane were mentioned in the question stem that would be similarity.

01:08 But analogy is where the good stuff starts.

01:12 This emerges when we take two seemingly different things, but identify a common underlying feature between the two.

01:20 This might be like recognizing that both an airplane in the passage and the butterfly in the question stem have wings, even though they are very different concepts.

01:32 With that airplane-butterfly inspiration, let's create a few more analogies between form and function.

01:39 Obviously, many other types of analogy exist as well.

01:43 Let's think for a moment, both rooms and envelopes have corners.

01:49 Both sinks and rivers run.

01:53 Both doors and mouths open.

01:57 All very distinct concepts, but something in analogy between them.

02:02 Indeed, most of these examples form the cultural basis for riddles.

02:08 I always encourage you to dissect the CARS passage after you've taken it, and break it down into its constituent components to understand it a bit better.

02:16 See if you can spot the analogies between the passage and the information introduced for reasoning beyond the text questions when you perform this exercise.

02:27 At the root of what we've been discussing is logic.

02:31 Reasoning beyond the text questions will ask you to consider the significance or symbolism of something.

02:37 We want to operationalize an otherwise non-logical statement when possible.

02:44 We follow the directions based on the question stem, based on how we can understand how a passage is strung together.

02:52 We boil things down that are asked about in the passage into a concrete form of their abstract idea.

03:00 And then we can more easily work with that to apply towards an answer choice.

03:05 So for instance, if this airplane we've been referring to is something that symbolizes the modernization of our culture, then you need to boil that abstract language down into this concrete logic, and then apply that concrete logic to the answer choices.

03:23 You need to apply the significance of the airplane to the answers rather than simply the airplane itself.