A question about one author’s response to another tests how you connect their claims and reasons. Read the question to find who answers whom, then put each text’s point in a few words. Ask whether the responding author rejects the argument as wrong or unsupported, limits the claim, or applies it to a new case. Check the reason: it must come from that author’s evidence and answer the argument being challenged. A response may agree with an author yet use a reason the author never gives.
Hints
- Hint 1
Pin down Text 1’s claim about digital reading. Its last sentence gives the view that Text 2’s author is being asked to answer.
- Hint 2
Look at what Text 2 says the built-in tools do. How does that compare with the effect Text 1 says digital reading has on readers?
Step-by-step
Connect the response to the author’s reason
Step 1Find the argument being answered
Read the question for who answers whom: the author of Text 2 answers the argument in Text 1. What is that argument and its reason? Print supports focus better than digital reading because a book’s weight and texture slow readers down, while digital formats invite skimming and distraction.
- Step 2
Find Text 2’s reason
What does Text 2 show about modern e-readers? Readers can mark passages, check unfamiliar words, and enlarge text for comfort. The author says These features can deepen engagement with the material, so the tools can help readers work more closely with a text.
- Step 3
Compare the claims and test the reasons
Does that support Text 1’s claim that digital formats invite skimming and distraction? No, so Text 2 challenges that broad claim. Readers should alternate adds a plan neither author suggests, while weight and texture shifts to a point Text 2 never discusses. Inevitable distractions treats screen problems as unavoidable, which doesn’t fit Text 2’s point that newer designs have addressed many of the concerns.
- Step 4
Match the features and the strength
Digital reading tools points to features that print lacks, which Text 2 calls interactive experiences that paper alone cannot provide. The phrase can actually promote matches can deepen engagement, so the choice describes a possible benefit without claiming that digital reading always beats print. Choice D.