UPDATE: You can find this blog and others about idioms in our new GMAT Idiom eBook!
What is the proper way to use the word “consider”? Considering that this very word may appear on the GMAT Sentence Correction, you should be prepared for its related idioms!
Idiom #1: consider + noun + noun
1) Many Magoosh users consider my friend Chris an authority on the GRE.
2) I consider Ted Williams the greatest baseball hitter of all times.
Both of those use this idiom correctly. The structure of this idiom is
[subject] “considers” A B
The noun A is the person or thing you are evaluating, and B is the rank or level or station or etc. to which you are assigning them. In sentence #1:
A = my friend Chris
B = an authority on the GRE
In sentence #2
A = Ted Williams
B = the greatest baseball hitter of all times
Idiom #2: consider + noun + adjective
3) I consider Margarette very intelligent.
4) Many unfairly consider New York City unfriendly.
5) The analysts considered tech industry stocks unlikely to rise before the new year.
This idiom is similar to the first, and all three of those use this idiom correctly. The structure of this idiom is
[subject] “considers” A B
Again, the noun A is the person or thing you are evaluating, and B is the adjective, the quality, which the subject ascribes to A. In sentence #3:
A = Margarette
B = very intelligent
In sentence #4:
A = New York City
B = unfriendly
In sentence #5:
A = tech industry stocks
B = unlikely to rise before the new year
Keep it simple
Notice, this is a very clean, simple idiom. On the Sentence Correct, the GMAT loves to give incorrect version of the form:
In 99.9% of cases, all of those are wrong. All of those may sound more “dignified”, more “formal”, than the simplicity of “someone considers A B”, but in this case, the simple answer is 100% correct, and all these variants with extra words will be incorrect on the GMAT Sentence Correction. Keep it simple! The only exception to this rule is if one of the more complex options above is your only choice, and all other alternative choices are flawed. It’s rare that this happens, but I do know of one instance offhand: in the 2017 GMAT official guide, question #747 has the pattern “consider A to be B” in every answer choice. Again though, this is very rare. So think of the above, more complicated options as wrong by default.
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