SAT Reading & Writing · Text Structure and Purpose
For most of the twentieth century, a particular species of deep-sea fish was known only from a handful of damaged specimens hauled up in…
For most of the twentieth century, a particular species of deep-sea fish was known only from a handful of damaged specimens hauled up in fishing nets, leading researchers to assume it was exceptionally rare. A 2019 expedition using deep-diving submersibles observed dozens of healthy individuals in their natural habitat within a single dive, suggesting the species may simply live at depths that most fishing and research methods rarely reach.
Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?
Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?
Answer and explanation
Answer: D: To suggest that an assumption about a species' rarity may have reflected limitations in how it was studied instead of its true abundance
The passage's structure moves from an old assumption (rarity) to a new observation (many healthy individuals) to a proposed reinterpretation (the old assumption reflected sampling limits, not true scarcity). D matches that arc exactly. A is directly contradicted by the finding of many healthy individuals. C blames researchers for a technology that didn't yet exist in their era, which the passage doesn't do. B overgeneralizes from one species to a sweeping claim about all deep-sea species that the passage never makes.
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