A question about two texts tests how one author would respond to another’s claim. Read the question to find who answers whom and which claim they’re judging. When that claim links two effects, track what each text says about both. Then say how the author responds and why: does the responding author reject the claim, qualify it by adding limits, or extend it by taking it further? A choice can describe the author’s view correctly but use a reason neither text gives.
Hints
- Hint 1
What change in traffic does Parks expect, and how does she connect it to air quality? Trace both parts of her prediction.
- Hint 2
In Ortega’s findings, compare commuter traffic and total miles driven. Do those measures change in the same way?
- Hint 3
How strong is Ortega’s conclusion about the expected environmental gains? Use that conclusion to set the limits of his response to Parks.
Step-by-step
Compare the claim with Ortega’s findings
Step 1Identify both parts of Parks’s claim
Parks predicts that traffic during peak hours could drop by as much as 12 percent and that lower emissions will meaningfully improve air quality. What is Ortega being asked to judge? The question covers both traffic and emissions, so we need to test Parks’s link between fewer commutes and cleaner air.
- Step 2
Compare commuting with total driving
Does Ortega find that fewer commutes mean less driving overall? He reports that while commuter traffic declined, overall vehicle miles traveled remained nearly constant. Residents replaced office trips with midday errands and suburban leisure trips, so driving shifted rather than falling much. That weakens Parks’s emissions prediction, because those replacement trips still add to total driving.
- Step 3
Find Ortega’s view and its limits
How far does Ortega’s doubt go? He predicts that the environmental gains Parks predicts will likely be minimal without added policies, so he would accept fewer commutes but expect little environmental benefit. The response saying a drop in commuting proves cleaner air ignores that limit. The response with the only measures goes too far because his complementary policies work alongside remote work rather than replacing it.
- Step 4
Check the strength of the response
Increasing total emissions overall adds a rise, but the finding that overall vehicle miles traveled remained nearly constant doesn’t show one. What does unlikely to cut overall driving sufficiently say instead? It questions whether driving falls enough to deliver Parks’s predicted emissions benefit, without claiming that emissions rise. Choice D.