Inference Questions: What the Text Implies
TOEFL Reading Inference questions ask you to identify what the author implies or suggests, though the claim is not directly stated. These are among the hardest question types because incorrect options are often factually plausible — they are wrong because they go beyond what the text logically supports. The two-step inference technique: Step 1 — Locate the referenced paragraph and re-read it fully. Step 2 — For each option, ask: 'Does accepting all claims in this paragraph force me to conclude this option is true?' If the option requires any assumption beyond what the paragraph states, eliminate it. The correct inference must be the inevitable logical conclusion of the stated information. Common traps: options that are too extreme ('the author believes this is the most important factor in history'), options that contradict one sentence while matching another, and options that use vocabulary from the passage but distort the meaning. The TOEFL does not reward clever inferences — only direct logical consequences of what is written.