Identifying supporting details

Writers use supporting details to strengthen their claims, add relevant information, and provide examples that make a passage more persuasive. On most tests, you’ll see three or four questions that ask you to identify these details.

The key thing to remember is that supporting detail questions also test whether you understand the passage’s main idea. You can’t choose the best supporting details unless you first know the author’s main point.

Best practices for supporting detail questions

• Read the passage quickly to identify the main point.
• Predict which details support the main point before you look at the answer choices.
• Watch out for answer choices that include details not mentioned in the passage or that don’t relate to the main point.
• Match the answer you predicted to the answer choices.

Supporting detail questions can be phrased in several ways. For example:

• The passage states that X would be true if…
• Which of the following statements most effectively supports the author’s claim?
• What is the most appropriate substitute for word X in the passage?
• According to the passage, which of the following is NOT true?
• According to the passage, all of the following are true EXCEPT…
• Which finding, if true, best supports the writer’s claim?
• Which finding, if true, would most weaken the author’s claim?

For example:

A Tale of Two Cities is widely acclaimed as Charles Dickens’ best novel. Its iconic first paragraph introduces a series of contrasts that illustrate the human tendency to take extreme positions. What begins as a dramatic statement - “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times” - becomes ironic by the end, almost as if Dickens were having trouble taking his own words seriously. For example, the second phrase, “…it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness…” could be seen as a serious reference to the state of human knowledge at the end of the eighteenth century, but by the time Dickens says “we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way,” astute readers will sense that he is laughing a little at all the stark extremes that he has just listed.

Which quote from the first sentence of the novel would best support the writer’s point?

a. “…it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of despair…”
b. “…it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness…”
c. “…it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair…”
d. “…we had everything before us, we had nothing before us…”
e. “…we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way…”