Historical thinking skills · AP U.S. History, AP World History: Modern
Comparison
Comparison: Explaining similarities and differences between historical developments, societies or time periods, and the reasons for them.
By the CollegePrepRoom editorial team · Updated · How we write and check these pages
What it means
Comparison asks how two things are alike and different, and why. A list of similarities and differences is description; explaining the reasons behind them is analysis. Comparisons can be across places (two empires), across time (two reform movements) or across groups.
AP World History uses comparison heavily because the course covers many regions in the same period.
Example
The Ottoman and Mughal empires both ruled diverse populations, but the Mughals, governing a large Hindu majority, relied more on alliances with local elites, which shaped their policies of religious tolerance under rulers such as Akbar.
On the exam
Comparison is one of the three reasoning skills used in LEQs and often appears in SAQs.