Question 39·Hard·Rhetorical Synthesis
While researching a topic, a student has taken the following notes:
- Urban heat islands create significantly hotter microclimates than nearby rural areas.
- A research team recorded surface temperatures in 25 city parks and their surrounding neighborhoods during summer afternoons.
- Parks whose tree canopy covered more than 60% of their area were as much as 5 °C cooler than adjacent streets.
- The temperature difference grew with increasing canopy density.
- The researchers recommend expanding urban tree cover to mitigate heat in cities.
The student wants to highlight the study’s main finding. Which choice most effectively uses relevant information from the notes to accomplish this goal?
For rhetorical synthesis questions with notes, start by identifying exactly what the question wants (main finding, purpose, recommendation, etc.), then label each note as background, method, result, or recommendation. The correct choice should draw mainly from the result notes, using the most important and specific information without adding unnecessary details. Eliminate answers that focus on how the study was done, general context, or future actions instead of what the study actually discovered.
Hints
Locate the type of information you need
Ask yourself: which bullet points in the notes tell you what the researchers found, rather than just giving background, describing what they did, or explaining what they recommend?
Focus on the key result, not the setup
Pay special attention to the bullets that mention specific temperature differences and tree canopy percentages—those are likely to relate to the study’s main finding.
Watch out for methods and recommendations
Be careful of answer choices that mainly describe how the study was done or what the researchers suggest doing; the question is asking for the study’s main result.
Check for both data and interpretation
Look for an option that not only includes the important data from the notes but also clearly shows what that data means for understanding urban heat.
Step-by-step Explanation
Identify what the question is asking for
The question says the student wants to highlight the study’s main finding. That means you should look for a choice that focuses on what the researchers discovered, not on background information, research methods, or recommendations.
Sort the notes by type of information
Go through the bullets and decide what kind of information each one gives:
- Bullet 1: General background about urban heat islands.
- Bullet 2: Description of what the researchers did (methods).
- Bullets 3 and 4: The results (what they actually found about temperatures and canopy density).
- Bullet 5: What the researchers recommend based on the study.
The main finding should come from bullets 3 and 4, because those are the key results.
Describe the study’s main finding in your own words
Using bullets 3 and 4, summarize the result:
- Parks with more than 60% tree canopy were up to 5 °C cooler than nearby streets.
- The temperature difference increased as canopy density increased.
So, the main finding is that denser tree canopy makes parks much cooler than surrounding streets, showing that tree cover helps with urban heat.
Eliminate choices that focus on background or methods
Now check each option against that idea:
- Choice A emphasizes that urban heat islands are hotter and mentions a goal of increasing tree cover. That’s background plus a goal, not the actual finding.
- Choice B only tells us what the researchers measured (methods), not what they discovered.
Both A and B fail to state the key result about how canopy density affects temperature, so they cannot be the best summary of the main finding.
Compare the remaining choices and select the best match
You should now compare the options that mention results:
- One option paraphrases that the cooling effect is strongest where canopy density is highest and then jumps to the recommendation, without giving the specific, striking result about parks with more than 60% canopy being up to 5 °C cooler than streets.
- Choice D clearly states that parks with more than 60% tree canopy can be up to 5 °C cooler than adjacent streets and interprets this as showing that dense tree cover effectively reduces urban heat.
Because it directly captures the most important quantitative result and its meaning, the correct answer is: Parks with more than 60% tree canopy can be up to 5 °C cooler than adjacent streets, indicating that dense tree cover effectively mitigates urban heat.