Sentence equivalence problems are a new question type in the verbal reasoning section of the new GRE (as of August 2011). In this question type, you will be given a sentence with a missing word. You will choose two answers from a list of six answer options that give the sentence the same meaning (or as close as possible). Partial credit is not given for partially correct answers.
Sentence equivalence may be new to the block, but actually, it sounds a lot like another question type you’re probably already familiar with: sentence completion. You can (and will) use virtually the same strategies to solve these problems. The most important of these strategies is context clues, which is using other words in the sentence to help you figure out which word should go in the blank.
Let’s see an example.
Given the existence of so many factions in the field, it was unrealistic for Anna Freud to expect any sort of ——- opinion.
(A) freedom
(B) homogeneity
(C) reassessment
(D) consistency
(E) phrase
(f) training
In this problem, the most important part of the context is at the beginning of the sentence: “the existence of so many factions in the field.” The existence of many factions implies the existence of many opinions; therefore, wouldn’t it make sense to say that it would be unrealistic for Anna Freud to expect all these opinions to be exactly the same? Using this logic, we can identify (B) and (D) as the correct answer choices, because “homogeneity” and “uniformity” mean “the same thing.”
It is also important to remember with this type of question that while another answer choice may fit well, there must be another answer choice that gives the sentence the same meaning. Even if you find one answer choice extremely attractive, if no other answer choice means the same, then it cannot be correct.