A transition question with phrase choices tests how the next sentence uses the ideas before it. Cover the choices and shrink the sentences around the blank to their main points. If the new sentence has two parts, trace each part back to the earlier text, then decide how it connects to that text. A phrase’s meaning must match what the earlier sentences say and how the new sentence uses it. Smooth wording alone doesn’t make its claim true.
Hints
- Hint 1
Start with the findings of the multi-facility analysis, rather than the earlier individual reports. What did it find overall, and what did it find for programs with the least starting diversity?
- Hint 2
Split the final sentence at but. What claim does each half make about mate choice’s genetic cost?
- Hint 3
Trace each of those claims to its evidence. Then check whether each transition’s literal meaning tells the truth about how the sentence uses that evidence.
Step-by-step
Match the conclusion to its evidence
Step 1Shrink the overall finding
Start with the multi-facility analysis, which accounted for each program’s starting diversity. The blank introduces a conclusion about that analysis, so cover the choices and shrink its findings rather than the earlier reports. What happened overall? Mate choice retained nearly as much genetic diversity overall as assigned mating did, which means the genetic cost was small overall.
- Step 2
Connect the subgroup finding to the conclusion
What happened in the programs that began with the least diversity? There, assigned mating retained substantially more diversity, so mate choice came with a much larger genetic cost. Split the conclusion at but it also identifies conditions: the overall finding weakens a broad claim of high cost, while the subgroup finding shows where a high cost can occur. Each half of the conclusion draws on a different finding, so neither finding by itself gives the full judgment.
- Step 3
Identify how the conclusion uses the results
How does that judgment relate to the results? It uses both findings as support rather than rejecting either, so the conclusion sums up both results. Contrary to both results means against both findings, which would falsely turn this summary into a disagreement.
- Step 4
Test each phrase’s claim
On the basis of the overall result alone means using only the overall finding, so it leaves out support for the high-cost conditions. On the basis of the subgroup result alone means using only the subgroup finding, so it leaves out support for weakening the broad claim. Taken as a whole means considering all the findings together, which gives the final sentence the evidence its two claims need. Choice C.