Lesson: Analogies - 05

Analogies: Fill in simple sentence

The More Precisely You Define a Word-Pair Relationship, the Better you will be able to find the true answer. Don’t expect to solve every Analogy simply by plugging word pairs into simple sentences such as the following:

"________ is a type of ________."

"________ is a tool used to ________."

"________ is part of a ________."

Use simple sentences as a starting point, but be prepared to refine the word-pair relationship by fine-tuning you sentence so the relationship is more specific. Let’s follow this advice to help solve the following Analogy.

Video Lesson - Simple Sentence

Example

Example Solution

Explanation

The correct answer is (C). If you apply the sentence “A RESERVOIR is a place where you would find WATER” to the five choices, here’s what you end up with:

(A) A forest is a place where you would find lumber.

(B) A kitchen is a place where you would find an oven.

(C) A silo is a place where you would find wheat.

(D) A pipeline is a place where you would find oil.

(E) A zoo is a place where you would find an animal.

You can’t eliminate even one answer choice! So you need to revise your original sentence to express a more specific relationship. Try this sentence: “A RESERVOIR is a place where WATER is stored for later use.” Now let’s see which answer choices we can eliminate:

• Choice (A): Is a forest a place where lumber is stored for later use? Perhaps; but we don’t really think of lumber as being “stored” in a forest.
• Choice (B): Is a kitchen a place where an oven is stored for later use? Perhaps; but we don’t usually think of an oven as being “stored” in a kitchen.
• Choice (C): Is a silo a place where wheat is stored for later use? Yes. Choice (C) is a possible answer choice.
• Choice (D): Is a pipeline a place where oil is stored for later use? No; a pipeline delivers oil from one place to another (often between two places of storage).
• Choice (E): Is a zoo is a place where an animal is stored for later use? No; animals in a zoo are not “stored” there for later “use.”

Now you can easily eliminate choices (D) and (E), and you can also see that choice (C) provides a stronger analogy than either choice (A) or (B).

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