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Question Type: Reference

Let’s move on to talk about reference questions. Reference questions are a pretty rare type of question that asks about a word or phrase. Specifically, what that word or phrase refers to. This is like a definition, a vocabulary questions but, it’s a little different because it’s not about the dictionary definition of a meaningful word, instead it’s about what a specific phrase means in the context of the passage.

For example, you might see a pronoun. It, they, that, those, their, them, or any other similar word, he, she. Now we’re not asking about the definition of it, that’s not vocabulary but we do want to know what it refers to. What is, it? Who are, they?

That’s what a reference question asks, they’re pretty rare. You may only see one of these on your test, it’s possible that you’ll see two or three, but they are not super common. Now, in order to answer them correctly, you have to find, in the text, the reference, find the logical replacement. So, if I say, for example, Allen likes cake, and then in the next sentence, I say, He, then.

I want to cross out he and put in Allen here. And does it still make sense? Is he Allen? Or maybe that’s not true. And maybe it’s actually Bob who was back here, and I should cross off he and try Bob and does that make sense?

Of course, as usual my example is over simplified on the TOEFL it’s more difficult than this. So let’s see a more realistic example. The phrase, this type of procreation, refers to. Okay, and we know this is a reference question because A, refers and B, this.

Now we don’t have a simple pronoun like he or she, but we do have an adjective pronoun here and that word tells us that this phrase refers to a previous sentence. Let’s take a look at the passage and see what it does refer to. Our sentence with the phrase is, the term for this type of procreation is vegetative reproduction but that doesn’t tell us the answer.

We need to look earlier, so what does this type of procreation refer to? Is it about reproducing asexually, creating genetically identical offspring, or something different? Maybe it’s from something earlier, that is being born from two parents. Well we know that this should be vegetative reproduction by this sentence and that vegetative reproduction is what causes clonal colonies, the topic of this whole passage.

So this type of procreation should relate to creating clones, or creating new genetically identical copies of the original plant. Let’s see if we can find anything like that in our answer choices. Becoming genetically identical. Well, this sounds really good, becoming genetically identical, is procreation becoming?

No, it is creating, not becoming. So that’s not right. How about reproduction by cloning? Cloning sounds good, is reproduction the same as procreation? Yes, it is. So this sounds great.

Let’s keep it. Birth to a pair of parents. Well, this would be sexual reproduction. And in these plants, we are talking about just one parent creating clones. So that’s not right, producing individual sets of genes. Okay, producing is correct with procreation and individual sets of genes doesn’t really make sense because we are creating or producing more plants, not genes.

So that relationship is mixed up and that’s incorrect. So then our answer is B, reproduction by cloning.