Predicting Methods of Paragraph Development

Read the following main-idea sentences carefully. Then decide which of the following methods of paragraph development explained in Chapters 3 and 4 you would predict the writer to use in support.

• facts and statistics
• example/illustration
• comparison
• contrast
• definition
• cause-effect
• contrast
• classification
• analysis
• process (informative)
• process (directive)
• analogy

1		The number of home computers sold has declined in recent months.
2		There is a strong correlation between the crime rate in inner cities and the number of liquor stores.
3		An examination of President George W. Bush's speeches reveals an ambivalence on America's policies with regard to terrorist attacks .
4		Several economic repercussions resulted after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks against New York's World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
5		The term "user friendly" as applied to computers means several different things, depending on one's level of experience.
6		To use your computer's spell-check function, follow these simple steps.
7		Violent crime rates in New York City have gone down dramatically in recent years.
8		Customers at the bank where I work as a teller can be put into three groups.
9		One way to understand the structure of the human eye is to compare it to a camera.
10		One crucial difference in America's participation in Afghanistan and in the Vietnam War was the kind of terrain we were fighting on.
11		Meeting the parents of one's boyfriend or girlfriend is like a job interview, only more stressful.
12		The SAT now allows students to use calculators in the math portion of the test, which will affect their performance and scores.
13		Some species of dogs are particularly well suited to the limited space afforded by apartments.
14		Before we decide whether sexual harassment has occurred, we must first be sure that we understand the meaning of the phrase.
15		The World Wide Web has significantly altered the way we locate and retrieve information.