LSAT vocabulary: Science passages

RC science passages love these words. They describe how studies are built, what the results mean, and where the argument is weak.

All example sentences are original, written for this page. They are not from real LSAT passages.

The twelve words

empirical

based on observation or experiment rather than theory alone
"The committee wanted empirical evidence, not just the researcher's confident predictions."

phenomenon

something observed to happen, especially something notable
"The sudden drop in nighttime temperatures was a phenomenon the team had not expected."

anomaly

something that breaks the expected pattern
"One test result was an anomaly, so the lab reran the experiment to check it."

mitigate

to make less severe or harmful
"Planting trees along the river was meant to mitigate the flooding."

correlate

to show a mutual relationship between two things
"The study found that sleep hours correlate with test performance, though it proved no cause."

variable

a factor that can change in an experiment
"The researchers kept every variable the same except the water temperature."

extrapolate

to extend known data to predict unknown cases
"It is risky to extrapolate from one small trial to the whole population."

negligible

so small it can be ignored
"The difference between the two measurements was negligible."

robust

strong and unlikely to break under scrutiny
"The finding held across three separate trials, which made it unusually robust."

replicate

to repeat a study to check its results
"Other labs tried to replicate the experiment and got the same outcome."

mechanism

the process by which something works
"Scientists agreed the drug worked but disagreed about the mechanism."

paradigm

the accepted model or framework in a field
"The new theory challenged the old paradigm about how the disease spreads."

Self-check: fill in the word

Each sentence is missing one word from the list above. Guess first, then open the answer.

1. The results were so consistent across labs that the finding was clearly ____.

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   robust

2. One reading did not fit the pattern; it was an ____ the team decided to investigate.

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   anomaly

3. The engineers added a backup system to ____ the risk of failure.

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   mitigate

4. It is hard to ____ from a study of twenty people to a country of millions.

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   extrapolate

5. The change in weight was so tiny it was practically ____.

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   negligible

6. Two labs tried to ____ the study, and both succeeded.

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   replicate