SAT Reading Strategy

Strengthen and Weaken Arguments on the SAT

How to Evaluate Evidence Like a Pro

Track the author’s logic, locate evidence quickly, and sharpen your reasoning.

9 Min Read

Reading Skill

Evidence-First

5 Practice Qs

Anchor every answer in the exact line that proves it. If you cannot point to the words, it is not the answer.

Read the question, then scan for the line that directly supports a choice.
Match wording, not vibe: synonyms are fine, new ideas are not.
If two answers feel close, eliminate the one with any extra claim.

Rather than simply asking you to locate evidence, the SAT Reading and Writing section tests whether you can evaluate it. In particular, these questions ask you to determine whether a given fact supports an argument or quietly chips away at it.

This skill, distinguishing evidence that strengthens from evidence that weakens, shows up on nearly every SAT. It's the kind of question that separates a good score from a great one. And the good news? It's not about being a faster reader or knowing more vocabulary. It's about learning to trace the logical connection between a claim and the evidence offered for or against it.

If you've already practiced identifying claims in passages and selecting the best evidence for a given conclusion, you're ready for this next step. Think of those skills as the foundation. Now we're building the floor above: not just finding evidence, but judging its direction.

By the end of this lesson, you'll have a repeatable strategy you can use on every strengthen/weaken question you encounter, on the SAT and beyond.

What Is This Skill?

Imagine a scientist presents a hypothesis: "Exercise improves memory." Now imagine two different studies land on her desk. One shows that people who exercise daily perform 30% better on recall tests. The other shows that the memory benefits disappear when researchers control for sleep quality. The first study strengthens her hypothesis. The second weakens it.

That's exactly what the SAT is asking you to do. You're not the scientist, you're the evaluator. You read a claim, you look at a piece of evidence, and you decide: does this push the argument forward, or does it push back?

Three Terms You Need to Know

Claim: The argument or position being made. On the SAT, this is usually stated in the text or in the question stem. Example: "Urban green spaces reduce stress in city residents."

Evidence that strengthens: Information that makes the claim more believable or more likely to be true. It provides direct support. Example: "A study found that residents living within a quarter mile of a park reported 40% lower cortisol levels than those without nearby green spaces."

Evidence that weakens: Information that makes the claim less believable or introduces doubt. It doesn't have to prove the claim wrong, just make you less confident in it. Example: "When researchers accounted for income levels, the stress differences between residents near and far from parks became statistically insignificant."

Identify the Claim
Before you look at any answer choice, make sure you know exactly what the argument is. Read the question stem carefully. Sometimes the claim is stated there; sometimes you need to locate it in the text. Underline it mentally or physically. Ask yourself: What, specifically, is being argued?
Note the Direction
Is the question asking you to strengthen or weaken? This seems obvious, but under time pressure, students sometimes pick an answer that does the opposite of what's asked. Circle or underline the word "strengthen" or "weaken" in the question. Know what you're looking for before you start evaluating.
Predict Before You Look
Before reading the answer choices, take a moment to think: What kind of evidence would strengthen this claim? What kind would weaken it? You don't need a specific prediction, just a general sense. If the claim is "pollution causes asthma," strengthening evidence might show a direct link between pollutant exposure and asthma rates. Weakening evidence might show that asthma rates are the same in high- and low-pollution areas. This mental prediction acts as a filter and helps you resist traps.
Evaluate Each Choice Against the Claim
For each answer, ask two questions: Does this directly relate to the specific claim? and Does it push the claim in the right direction? If the answer to either question is no, eliminate it. Be strict. The SAT rewards precision.
Pick the Most Direct Connection
If you're torn between two choices, go with the one that has the most direct logical link to the claim. Indirect evidence is weaker than direct evidence. A controlled experiment beats a correlation. A specific mechanism beats a vague association.

Metacognitive Checkpoints

As you work through these steps, pause and ask yourself:
- Am I evaluating the evidence, or am I reacting to whether I agree with the claim?
- Is this answer choice actually about the claim, or is it just about the same general topic?
- Did I check the direction, strengthen vs. weaken, before I chose?
Time Management

Aim to spend about 60 to 90 seconds on each strengthen/weaken question. Most of that time should go to Steps 1 through 3, understanding the claim, noting the direction, and forming a prediction. If you've done that work well, evaluating the answer choices should be quick. If you find yourself rereading answer choices multiple times, pause and go back to the claim. The problem is almost always that you've lost sight of the argument.

Same-topic trap: The choice stays on the topic but doesn't affect the claim.
Irrelevant detail trap: The information is true but unrelated to the argument.
Too-weak-to-matter trap: The evidence is too small or indirect to move the claim.

Practice Strengthen and Weaken Arguments with SAT-Style Questions

Note: The passages below are original, SAT-style constructions for practice; any names or details are fictionalized.

Now let's put the strategy to work. Each question below includes a short passage and an SAT-style question. Use the five steps: identify the claim, note the direction, predict, evaluate, and choose the most direct connection. After you select your answer, read the explanation carefully, it will name the specific trap type so you know what to watch for on test day.

Question 1

Passage

A recent longitudinal study tracked 2,000 bilingual children over a decade and found that those who regularly used both languages scored significantly higher on tasks measuring cognitive flexibility and problem-solving than their monolingual peers, even after controlling for socioeconomic status.

easy

A researcher claims that bilingualism enhances cognitive development in children. Which of the following, if true, would most strengthen the researcher's claim?

Question 2

Passage

Proponents of universal basic income (UBI) argue that providing unconditional cash payments to all citizens reduces poverty and stimulates local economies. A pilot program in one midwestern city distributed $500 per month to 125 randomly selected low-income residents for two years.

easy

Which of the following findings from the pilot program, if true, would most weaken the proponents' argument that UBI stimulates local economies?

Question 3

Passage

In a public address, ecologist Lila Moreno argued that the widespread use of synthetic pesticides was causing irreversible damage to wildlife populations and ecosystems. Chemical industry representatives dismissed her claims as emotional and unscientific.

medium

Which of the following, if it had been available at the time, would most strengthen Moreno's argument about the effects of synthetic pesticides?

Question 4

Passage

Literary scholars have long argued that Shakespeare's late romances, The Winter's Tale, The Tempest, and Pericles, represent a deliberate artistic shift toward themes of forgiveness and reconciliation, reflecting the playwright's mature philosophical outlook. These plays, written between 1608 and 1611, share structural patterns that differ markedly from his earlier tragedies.

medium

Which of the following, if true, would most weaken the scholars' claim that the shift in Shakespeare's late works was a deliberate artistic choice?

Question 5

Passage

A team of marine biologists has proposed that rising ocean temperatures are the primary driver of declining coral reef health worldwide. Their hypothesis is based on a correlation between average sea surface temperatures and rates of coral bleaching observed across 40 reef sites over the past two decades.

medium

Which of the following, if true, would most strengthen the marine biologists' hypothesis?

Key Takeaways for Strengthen and Weaken Arguments

Strengthening and weakening are about direction, not truth. Your job is to determine which way the evidence pushes the argument, not whether the argument is ultimately correct. Ask yourself: am I tracing logic, or am I inserting my own judgment?
Same topic does not mean same direction. The most tempting wrong answers are related to the subject of the claim but push the argument the wrong way. Before you commit to an answer, ask: does this actually support or undermine the specific claim?
Prediction is your best defense against traps. Spending a few seconds thinking about what strong or weak evidence would look like, before reading the choices, dramatically reduces the power of distractors. Can you articulate what kind of evidence you're looking for before you start reading options?
Go for the most direct link. When two choices both seem reasonable, the correct answer is almost always the one with the clearest, most specific connection to the claim. Vague or indirect evidence is the hallmark of a trap. Is the evidence you chose directly connected to the claim, or does it require extra assumptions to get there?

Conclusion: The Core Rule for Strengthen and Weaken Arguments

Learning to evaluate whether evidence strengthens or weakens an argument is one of the most valuable skills you can develop, not just for the SAT, but for every class, conversation, and decision that involves weighing information. Scientists do it when reviewing research. Lawyers do it when building cases. Journalists do it when verifying sources. And now you have a systematic way to do it too.

The five-step strategy works because it slows down the one moment that matters most: the moment before you choose. By identifying the claim, noting the direction, and predicting what strong evidence would look like, you give yourself a framework that catches traps before they catch you.

Every time you practice this skill, you're not just preparing for a test, you're training yourself to think more carefully about the arguments you encounter every day. That's a skill that compounds long after the SAT is behind you.

About the Instructor

Thomas Meli

Founder, Deep Test Prep

"Viewing the SAT as a transformative rite of passage, my approach builds self-awareness, sharpens critical thinking, and fosters a love of learning that supports students far beyond test day."

With over 20 years of teaching and 500+ hours of training in compassionate communication, Thomas uses scientifically proven methods to help students target and achieve their SAT goals.