SAT Reading Vocab - High Academic Register

Absolved

Declare someone free from guilt, obligation, punishment.

Synonyms: Relieve, Exempt, Excuse
Usage: A police investigation yesterday absolved the acused of all blame in the incident.

Abstruse

Difficult to understand, obscure.

Synonyms: Perplexing, involuted, cryptic
Usage: The professor’s lectures were so abstruse that students ended up getting confused rather than clear on the concept.

Accentuate

To make more noticeable or prominent

Synonyms: underscore, emphasize, highlight
Usage: Organizations tent to advertise themselves by accentuating the positives they can offer

Accretion

Growth or increase by the gradual accumulation of additional layers of matter.

Synonyms: accumulation, accrual, augmentation
Usage: The fund was increased by the accretion of new shareholders.

Acquiesce

Accept something reluctantly but without protest.

Synonyms: permit, allow, tolerate
Usage: He has gradually acquiesced to the demands of the opposition.

Adroit

Clever or skillful.

Synonyms: adapt, deft, competent
Usage: it would be far more politically adroit to do this and it would ensure that these unfortunate individuals are decently treated.

Affinity

A natural liking for and understanding of someone/something.

Synonyms: chemistry, connection, empathy

Usage: His affinity for chocolates has led him to develop tooth cavities.

Agglomeration

A mass or collection of things, an assemblage

Synonyms: cluster, clump, accumulation

Usage: I believe that the vast agglomerations in our comprehensive schools have proved destructive of individuality.

Alacrity

Brisk and cheerful readiness

Synonyms: enthusiasm, zeal, eagerness
Usage: The SAT exam is an interesting challenge and students usually respond to it with alacrity

Ambidextrous

Able to use right and left hands equally well

Synonyms: equipoised, two-handed, lacking lateral dominance
Usage: Quatelli says the master was ambidextrous, that he sketched with his right hand while he wrote with his left - simultaneously.

Ameliorate

To make something bad or unsatisfactory better

Synonyms: amend, reform, rectify
Usage: The labor union’s attempts to ameliorate the working conditions had little effect.

Amorphus

Without a clearly defined shape or form

Synonyms: structureless, indeterminate, unstructured
Usage: The offense was amorphous in nature and so it would be difficult to prosecute.

Anachronism

A thing belonging to a period other than in which it exists, especially a thing that is consipicuously old fashioned

Synonyms: obsolete, vintage, antiquated

Usage: The town is a throwback to medieval times, an anachronism that has survived the passing years.

Anomalous

Deviates from what is standard/normal/expected

Synonyms: abnormal, atypical, exceptional
Usage: He is in an anomalous position as the only part-time worker in the firm

Anthromorphic

Having human characteristics

Synonyms: humanlike, humanoid, anthropoid

Usage: It is anthromorphic, they argue, to say that other creatures experience feelings like compassion, even when their behaviour appears - to our human eyes - to be impelled by it.

Appease

Pacify or placate someone by acceding to their demands

Synonyms: conciliate, propitiate, reconcile
Usage: their acknowledgement of responsibility has done nothing to appease her anger

Appraise

Assess the value or quality of

Synonyms: evaluate, estimate, gauge
Usage: The painting was appraised at 5 million dollars by the insurance company

Apprise

Inform or tell

Synonyms: intimate, notify, update
Usage: He came to apprise us of the fact that the work had been completed

Assuage

Make an unpleasant feeling less intense; to satisfy

Synonyms: mitigate, alleviate, gratify
Usage: To assuage his sister’s grief, he took her for a holiday

Attenuate

Reduce the force, effect, or value of

Synonyms: Reduced, impaired, enervated
Usage: Storm suggests hopefully that a planetary crisis, such as climate change, might attenuate nationalism

Attest

Provide or serve as clear evidence of

Synonyms: certify, corroborate, substantiate
Usage: As any serious gamer will attest, online experiences can have real-life consequences

Attrition

The process of reducing something’s strength or effectiveness through sustained attack or pressure

Synonyms: enfeebling, attenuation, weakening

Usage: No other army in the world would choose to sustain such an attrition rate

Augment

Make greater by adding to it/increasing

Synonyms: supplement, amplify, elevate

Usage: I will not augment difficulties by protesting against them as this would only lead to wasted time and energy

Auspicious

Conducive to success; favourable

Synonyms: propitious, promising, opportune

Usage: This is called the shahi snan and marks the most auspicious - and the most crowded - days of the fair.

Austere

Severe or strict in manner or attitude

Synonyms: stern, frosty, stringent

Usage: a monk chooses to live an austere life because of his beliefs

Banal

So lacking in originality as to be obvious and boring

Synonyms: hackneyed, platitudinous, vapid
Usage: the experts banal interpretation of the match made for a post match show that saw ratings drop to an all time low.

Begrudgingly

Reluctantly or resentfully

Synonyms: belligerently, rudely, contemptuously
Usage: Later, however, they begrudgingly accepted his help

Buttress

A source of defence or support

Synonyms: strengthen, reinforce, fortify

Usage: the overwhelming evidence found at the burial site seemed to buttress their argument

Calibrate

Mark (a gauge/instrument) with a standard scale of readings

Synonyms: measure, compute, gauge
Usage: the age of the tree was calibrated from the carbon dating data

Candor

Quality of being open and honest

Synonyms: sincerity, truthfulness, frankness
Usage: The student’s analysis of his weak areas was done with such candor that it endeared him to his teachers.

Capacious

Having a lot of space inside, roomy

Synonyms: commodious, spacious, ample
Usage: Gabriel has long funneled his capacious intellect and empathy into music.

Capricious

Given to sudden and unaccountable changes of mood/behaviour

Synonyms: fickle, haphazard, erratic

Usage: The capricious nature of fate always results in hope, even in the most downtrodden in our society.

Catalyzing

Cause or accerate something by acting as a catalyst.

Synonyms: prompt, imbue, ferment

Usage: The new policies introduced by the government had a catalyzing effect on e-commerce.

Circumvent

To avoid by artfulness/deception or avoid by anticipating/outwitting

Synonyms: evade, dodge, avoid
Usage: Rahul circumvented the traffic jam by taking an alternate route

Clique

A small, close-knit group of people who do not readily allow others to join in

Synonyms: fraternity, crew, fellowship
Usage: At university, Rahul had fallen in with a clique of literature students

Coalesce

Come together to form a single mass or whole

Synonyms: combine, merge, amalgamate
Usage: Political parties in the opposition often coalesce to challenge the party in power.

Colloquialism

A word or phrase that is not formal or literary and is used in ordinary or familiar conversation

Synonyms: synonyms, dialectal, conversational vernacular
Usage: What people have suffered during the pandemic is “touch hunger,” a colloquial term for what social scientists call “affection deprivation” - a state in which individuals want or need more affection than they receive.

Concomitant

Naturally accompanying or associated

Synonyms: accompanying, accessory, auxillary
Usage: He sought high grades without the necessary concomitant of hard work.

Concur

Be of the same opinion; agree

Synonyms: accord, agree, synchronize

Usage: He said the mayor should not be reelected, and the voters concurred

Conjecture

An opinion / conclusion formed on the basis of incomplete information

Synonyms: presumption, hypothesis, speculation

Usage: Whether AI will take over the world in the future is pure conjecture

Convene

Come or bring together for a meeting/activity

Synonyms: muster, assemble, congregate
Usage: The army convened all the senior officials to discuss how to deal with the apparent terror threat.

Copious

Abundant in supply or quantity

Synonyms: ample, substantial, considerable
Usage: Students are expected to take copious notes while attending lectures

Corroborate

Confirm or give support to

Synonyms: confirm, verify, validate
Usage: My personal experience does not corroborate your faith in the essential goodness of people

Counterbalance

A weight that balances another weight

Synonyms: correct, counterveil, equalizer
Usage: her calm nature served as a natural counterbalance to his excitable personality

Defunct

No longer in effect/use; not operating or functioning

Synonyms: inoperative, unusable, obsolete

Usage: Measuring 30 feet long by 15 feet wide, the plane features a lifting body and innovative wings that enable it to land on a runway in the style of NASA’s now defunct space shuttle.

Demarcated

Set the boundaries or limits of

Synonyms: Seperate, divide, differentiate
Usage: The agents place their bounty in front of the garage in a spot demarcated by yellow cones

Detractor

A person who disparages someone or something

Synonyms: critic, attacker, denigrator
Usage: His detractors claim that his fierce temper makes him unsuitable for party leadership

Discern

Recognize or find out; distinguish (someone or something) with difficulty by sight or with the other senses

Synonyms: perceive, differentiate, recognize
Usage: Humans often discern between poisonous and harmless food through their sense of smell

Disconcerting

Causing one to feel unsettled

Synonyms: unnerving, perturbing, concerning
Usage: His message is deeply disconcerting for anyone who values democracy

Discrepancy

An illogical or surprising ack of compatibility between 2+ facts

Synonyms: inconsistency, disparity, deviation
Usage: The commission’s only comparison of redemption values and current land prices revealed a large discrepancy

Disparage

Regard / represent as being of little worth

Synonyms: Denigrate, depreciate, trivialize
Usage: Voters don’t like political advertisements in which opponents disparage one another

Disparate

Essentially different in kind, not able to be compared

Synonyms: contrasting, differing, diverse
Usage: Scott Elliott’s direction fails to fit all the seemingly disparate vocabulary of Shepard’s work into a coherent stage language.