Archaeologist Erika Karuzas works with the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes of Montana to preserve culturally significant sites. In 2015...
GMAT Craft and Structure : (Structure) Questions
Archaeologist Erika Karuzas works with the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes of Montana to preserve culturally significant sites. In 2015 they decided that creating a new national trail connecting many of these sites would ________ their preservation efforts, because the US government provides some protections to national trails that aren't given to other areas.
Which choice completes the text with the most logical and precise word or phrase?
inspire
ignore
promote
reduce
Step 1: Decode and Map the Passage
Create Passage Analysis Table
| Text from Passage | Analysis |
|---|---|
| "Archaeologist Erika Karuzas works with the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes of Montana to preserve culturally significant sites." |
|
| "In 2015 they decided that creating a new national trail connecting many of these sites would _____ their preservation efforts," |
|
| "because the US government provides some protections to national trails that aren't given to other areas." |
|
Provide Passage Architecture & Core Elements
Main Point: Creating a national trail would help preservation efforts because national trails receive government protections that other areas don't get.
Argument Flow: The passage establishes that an archaeologist and Native American tribes work together on preservation, then presents their 2015 decision to create a national trail for a specific purpose, and finally provides the logical reason - government protections are available for national trails but not other areas.
Step 2: Interpret the Question Precisely
This is a fill-in-the-blank question asking us to choose the best logical connector. The answer must create the right relationship between what comes before and after the blank.
Step 3: Prethink the Answer
- The word must describe what creating a national trail would do to their preservation efforts
- Since the reason given is that national trails get government protections, the word should indicate a positive effect
- The logic is: government protections help preservation, national trail gets protections, so national trail would have positive effect on preservation efforts
- So the right answer should indicate that the national trail would help, support, or strengthen their preservation efforts
inspire
inspire
✗ Incorrect
- While creating a trail might inspire preservation efforts in some abstract way, this doesn't logically connect to the government protections reasoning
- The passage isn't about motivation or inspiration, but about practical benefits
ignore
ignore
✗ Incorrect
- This would mean the trail would cause them to ignore their preservation efforts, which makes no sense
- Completely contradicts the entire logic of the passage
promote
promote
✓ Correct
- Promote means to help advance or support something
- This creates perfect logical flow: government protections help preservation, national trail gets those protections, trail would promote preservation efforts
- Matches our prethinking perfectly
reduce
reduce
✗ Incorrect
- This would mean the trail would hurt their preservation efforts
- Contradicts the entire reasoning - why would they create something that reduces what they're trying to accomplish?