In this section, you are asked what the word, usually highlighted refers to in the reading. Thus we may say, are basically similar to vocabulary questions because they require you to state what a word or phrase highlighted in the passage refers to. Reference words are usually pronouns, for example,

1-   Subject pronoun: it, they

2-   Object pronoun: it, them

3-   Demonstrative pronoun: these, those, this, that

4-   Possessive adjectives: its, their

However, there are other reference words that might be used to refer to a specific subject in the passage, for example, the former, the latter, one, ones, another, other, others. Instead of defining the reference word highlighted, you are required to state what it refers to in the passage. The answer is what that word refers to or replaces in the passage. Usually, the correct answer is before the reference word, though sometimes it might come after. Though such questions types are rare of recent, nevertheless, it is important to know how to go about them when they come. You do not need to comprehend the whole passage to get the correct answer, just read the sentence in which the highlighted word is, then the sentence before and after it. Let us look at some examples.

Example 1.

Economic contact between Native Americans and Europeans can be traced back to the English and French fishermen off the coast of Canada in the 1500s. They traded guns and other weapons for beaver fur.  The first explorers to trade with the Native Americans were Giovanni da Verrazano and Jacques Cartier in the 1520s and 1530s. In Verrazano's book, he notes, "If we wanted to trade with them for some of their things, they would come to the seashore on some rocks where the breakers were most violent while we remained on the little boat, and they sent us what they wanted to give on a rope, continually shouting to us not to approach the land."

Question: The word 'They' in paragraph 3 refers to?

A.      Native Americans

B.      Beavers

C.      Europeans

D.      Traits and characteristics

C is the correct answer. It is referring to who traded guns and other weapons for beaver fur which was the Europeans.

Example 2

All environmental factors cause the body physical stress, but they also cause mental stress, which can be equally influential if not more so. Scientific studies with mice have shown that mental stress can cause hormone imbalances that result in epigenetic changes. In one experiment, mice were restrained, which raised their stress levels and triggered higher levels of  N6-methyladenine (6mA) in their brains, which resulted in  epigenetic changes. In another experiment, mice were given water with corticosterone, the mouse equivalent of the human stress hormone cortisol, for four weeks. This put them into a heightened state of stress and caused them to have fewer methyl groups on gene Fkbp5, which increased protein production. The different epigenetic markers lasted for weeks after they stopped receiving corticosterone, which suggests long-term change.”

1.      The word “This” in the passage refers to

(A) experiment

(B) corticosterone

(C) cortisol

(D) stress

Answer Explanation

The correct answer is (B) corticosterone. The sentence is describing the effect that the artificially administered hormone had on mice. The other answer choices all appear in the paragraph, but they are not what directly affected the mice.

Example 3

Part of a passage: The astrological nature of the Mayan use of astronomical data explains in part why so few written records exist of that data. The Mayans believed that the passage of the sun continued throughout the night, only, then, it was traveling through the underworld. This was believed to be a perilous journey, with many demonic figures lurking in the darkness, waiting to ambush the sun to prevent it from returning to the sky at dawn. .

Question: The word it in the passage refers to

A.   night

B.   sun

C.   passage

D.   data

Explanation: (B) is the correct answer. The sentence is describing the path taken by the sun. The other answer choices, though they are all words that appear in the paragraph, do not refer to things that are traveling.

From the above, all the answer choices given in the question can be replaced by the pronouns highlighted however, some are not clearly connected the pronoun in question and thus can be ruled out. At times when you look at the words after the question word, you can tell which answer is purely wrong for example, let us look at the last example, “Mayans believed that the passage of the sun continued throughout the night, only, then, it was traveling through the underworld. When you look at the answers and the whole sentence, we can tell that surely the passage, data and night cannot have been traveling. Look at this, ‘the passage of the sun continued’ meaning it was the sun traveling.