Expression: Revising Sentences for Economy, Clarity, Coherence and Tone

This is the first chapter of the Humanities and Social Sciences (XH) paper for Section XH0.2 of XH0 Reasoning and Comprehension, the part every XH candidate answers. It answers the heading “Section XH0.2: Expression — Questions on stylistic and rhetorical aspects of a short passage including corrections or modifications of particular sentences.” This is not a grammar or vocabulary test. The sentences you are asked about are usually already grammatical; what is wrong with them is a matter of style and rhetoric — they are wordy, unclear, badly ordered, unparallel, or pitched in the wrong tone — and your task is to choose the revision a careful editor would prefer. This chapter teaches the editor’s five virtues: economy, clarity, coherence, parallelism and emphasis, and appropriate tone. Every worked question puts the sentence or short passage inside the stem, so the reader needs nothing from outside it.

1. What Expression tests: style, not grammar

A good sentence does its work with the least effort from the reader. Two sentences can carry the same information, break no rule, and yet differ sharply in quality: one is crisp, ordered and clear, the other is padded, tangled or flat. Expression questions reward the first. They ask you to modify a sentence so that it says the same thing better — more economically, more clearly, in a more logical order, or in a tone that fits its purpose. The content stays fixed; the craft is what changes.

🎯 Why ‘is it grammatical?’ is the wrong question here
Most of the options you will choose between are all grammatical. If you pick by hunting for a grammar mistake, you will often find none and guess. Pick instead by asking which version an editor would keep: the one that wastes no words, points to one meaning, flows in order, and keeps a steady tone. That is a judgement of effectiveness, not of correctness.

A reliable routine makes these questions quick. Read the whole passage or sentence once to hear how it sounds, then name the fault: is it wordy, unclear, mis-ordered, unparallel, or off in tone? Only then read the revisions, and test each against two things — does it keep every part of the original meaning, and does it cure the fault you named? The winning revision does both; a tempting loser usually fixes the fault but quietly drops or adds meaning.

  • Economy (concision): say it in fewer words without losing meaning.
  • Clarity: let the sentence point to exactly one meaning, with every pronoun and reference pinned down.
  • Coherence: order ideas so each follows from the last, with connectives that name the real relation.
  • Parallelism and emphasis: match the form of matched ideas, and put the weight where it belongs.
  • Tone: keep the register steady and suited to the audience and purpose.

2. Economy: cut what the reader does not need

Wordiness comes in a few repeating shapes. Deadwood phrases say in several words what one word says (‘due to the fact that’ is just ‘because’). Redundancy pairs a word with its own meaning (‘a new innovation’, ‘collaborate together’, ‘final outcome’). Nominalisation buries a verb inside a noun and then needs a weak verb to prop it up (‘reach a decision’ for ‘decide’). The cure is the same each time: find the one word that carries the meaning and let it do the work alone.

Wordy phrase and its concise form
Wordy phraseConcise form
due to the fact thatbecause
at this point in timenow
in the event thatif
a large number ofmany
has the ability tocan
in order toto
⚠️ Concision is not amputation
The shortest option is not automatically the best. A revision that drops a real qualification — turning ‘the drug helps some patients’ into ‘the drug helps’ — has not become concise, it has changed the claim. Economy means removing words that carry no meaning, never words that carry meaning you were asked to keep.

3. Clarity and precision: point to one meaning

A clear sentence can be read only one way. The commonest enemy of clarity is the unanchored reference: a pronoun (it, they, this, she) that could point to two different things, or a modifier placed where it attaches to the wrong word. ‘The manager told the client she was late’ leaves open who was late. The fix is to re-anchor — name the noun, move the modifier, or recast the sentence so the reference can land on only one place.

Precision also suffers when a verb is hidden inside a noun and the sentence fills with abstraction. ‘The implementation of the reduction of costs was carried out by the team’ is correct but lifeless; ‘the team cut costs’ names who did what. Prefer a strong verb and a named actor over a chain of nouns joined by ‘of’. A reader should never have to decode which noun is really the action.

A quick test for a buried verb: look for an abstract noun ending in -ment, -tion, -ance or -al sitting next to a weak verb such as make, carry out or is. ‘Make a decision’ hides ‘decide’; ‘carry out an investigation’ hides ‘investigate’; ‘is in agreement’ hides ‘agrees’. Freeing the verb usually shortens the sentence and names the actor at the same time, so it serves economy and clarity together.

⚠️ Ambiguity hides in short, smooth sentences
An ambiguous sentence often reads perfectly well — that is why it is dangerous. ‘They criticised the manager and the supervisor who ignored the warnings’ sounds fine until you ask whether one person or two ignored the warnings. When a stem states the intended meaning, pick the revision that allows that meaning and no other.

4. Coherence: order the ideas and connect them truly

A coherent passage moves in a line a reader can follow. Two habits build it. The first is order: background before the event, cause before effect, general claim before its examples. The second is old-to-new: each sentence should begin with something already known and end with the new point, which the next sentence then picks up. A paragraph whose sentences are individually clear can still be incoherent if they are shuffled out of this order.

Connectives name the relation between sentences, and the wrong one misleads. ‘However’ and ‘yet’ promise a contrast; ‘therefore’ and ‘so’ promise a consequence; ‘moreover’ and ‘also’ promise an addition in the same direction; ‘for instance’ promises an example. If the content after ‘therefore’ is not a consequence of what came before, the connective has told the reader a lie. Choosing the connective that matches the actual logic is a rhetorical decision, not a grammatical one.

🎯 A connective is a promise to the reader
When a reader sees ‘but’, they brace for a turn; when they see ‘therefore’, they expect the payoff of what went before. Keep the promise. A sentence joined by ‘moreover’ that actually contradicts the previous one forces the reader to re-read and repair the logic themselves, which is exactly the work good writing does for them.

5. Parallelism and emphasis

Ideas that play the same role should wear the same grammatical form. A series reads cleanly when its members match — ‘to analyse, to write, and to present’ — and jars when they do not — ‘to analyse, writing, and the presentation of’. The same holds after correlative pairs: ‘not only … but also’ and ‘either … or’ demand the same shape on each side. Parallelism is not a rule for its own sake; it lets the reader see at a glance that the items belong together.

Emphasis is the art of making the reader feel which idea matters most. The end of a sentence is its strongest position, so put the point you want remembered last. The main clause outranks a subordinate one, so a fact you want foregrounded belongs in the main clause, not tucked into a ‘which’ phrase. A cleft (‘It was the delay, not the cost, that sank the plan’) spotlights one element by framing the whole sentence around it. Choosing where to place the weight is a rhetorical choice the Expression section tests directly.

🧠 The end of the sentence is the loud position
Readers tend to remember best what they read last. If a revision moves the key idea to the end of the sentence, it usually reads as more emphatic; if it buries that idea in the middle or in a trailing aside, the emphasis leaks away. When a question asks which revision stresses a given point, look for the one that saves that point for last or frames the sentence around it.
⚠️ Emphasis must not rewrite the facts
A cleft or a reordering that spotlights one element improves the sentence only if the element it stresses is the one the writer meant to stress and the rest of the claim survives intact. A revision that emphasises the wrong part, or that slips in ‘only’ or ‘the main’ where the original had neither, has distorted the sentence rather than sharpened it.

6. Tone and register

Register is the level of formality a piece keeps. A research summary, a public notice and a friendly note sit at different levels, and each should stay at its own. The usual fault the section tests is a break in register: a single colloquial phrase (‘kind of works’, ‘out of luck’, ‘reckons’) dropped into otherwise formal prose, or a stiff, pompous phrase in a plain one. The repair is to replace the offending phrase with one at the level of its neighbours, not to make the whole passage grander.

Tone must also fit the purpose. A sentence meant to report a finding should be neutral and exact; one meant to persuade may be warmer; one meant to warn must be plain and firm. A revision that is elegant but wrong in tone — jokey in a safety notice, or sentimental in a data table’s caption — is not an improvement. Judge tone against the audience the passage addresses and the job it is doing.

A colloquial phrase and its formal equivalent
ColloquialFormal equivalent
find outdetermine
kind of / sort ofsomewhat
a lot ofmany / much
deal withaddress

Key takeaways

  • Expression tests effectiveness, not correctness: the choices are usually all grammatical, so pick the revision an editor would keep — economical, clear, coherent, well emphasised and even in tone.
  • Cut deadwood, redundancy and nominalisation, but never cut a real qualification; the shortest option is wrong if it has quietly changed the claim.
  • Clarity means one meaning only: anchor every pronoun and modifier, and prefer a strong verb with a named actor over a chain of abstract nouns.
  • Coherence is order plus true connection: arrange ideas cause-before-effect and old-to-new, and let each connective name the real relation it signals.
  • Match the form of matched ideas (parallelism), and place the idea that matters in the main clause or at the sentence’s end, where emphasis lives.
  • Keep register steady and fit it to audience and purpose; repair a break in tone by levelling the one offending phrase, not by inflating the whole passage.

Practice questions (18)

Attempt each one before opening the answer. Every explanation names the tempting wrong option as well as the right one, because that is where marks are lost.

  1. A report contains this sentence: “At this point in time, the members of the committee were all in agreement with one another that the budget needed to be revised.” Which revision keeps the meaning but is the most concise?

    1. The committee members agreed that the budget needed revision.
    2. At this time, the committee members were in agreement that the budget needed to be revised.
    3. The members, being all in agreement, felt that the budget was in need of being revised.
    4. The budget needed to be revised, and about this the committee members were in full agreement.
    Show answer

    Answer: A — The committee members agreed that the budget needed revision.

    The crisp revision keeps every element — who agreed, and about what — while dropping 'at this point in time', 'with one another' and 'needed to be revised' padding. The others retain deadwood such as 'at this time', 'being all in agreement' or 'about this … in full agreement', so they say the same thing in more words.

  2. A report contains the sentence: “The engineers will collaborate together to produce a new innovation for the coastal project.” Which of the following parts of the sentence are redundant, so that cutting them loses no meaning?

    1. ‘together’, which repeats what ‘collaborate’ already means
    2. ‘new’, because an innovation is new by definition
    3. ‘coastal’, which tells the reader which project is meant
    4. ‘the engineers’, which names who will do the work
    Show answer

    Answer: A — ‘together’, which repeats what ‘collaborate’ already means; B — ‘new’, because an innovation is new by definition

    ‘Collaborate’ already means to work together, and an ‘innovation’ is by definition new, so ‘together’ and ‘new’ add nothing. ‘Coastal’ tells the reader which project is meant, and ‘the engineers’ names the doers, so cutting either would lose information.

  3. The writer means that the manager, not the client, felt nervous. Which revision of “When the manager met the client, she was nervous” states this without ambiguity?

    1. She was nervous when the manager met the client.
    2. The manager was nervous when she met the client.
    3. When the manager and the client met, she was nervous.
    4. The manager met the client, and she was nervous during the meeting.
    Show answer

    Answer: B — The manager was nervous when she met the client.

    Making ‘the manager’ the subject and letting ‘she’ refer back to it fixes the nervous person as the manager with no other reading. Leading with ‘She’ before the manager is named leaves the pronoun hanging. Rewording the original as ‘the manager and the client met’, or adding a trailing ‘she’ after ‘the manager met the client’, keeps the same two-way ambiguity the original had, since ‘she’ can still be either woman.

  4. Read the passage. “The town library once lent only books. Today it also lends tools, seeds and musical instruments. ____ Its membership has tripled in a decade.” Which sentence, placed in the gap, best keeps the passage coherent?

    1. However, very few residents have ever visited the library.
    2. The musical instruments are kept in a room on the second floor.
    3. That wider offer has evidently drawn in many new users.
    4. Libraries were first established in the cities of the ancient world.
    Show answer

    Answer: C — That wider offer has evidently drawn in many new users.

    The gap needs a sentence that links the widened offer to the rise in membership that follows, and the sentence about the wider offer drawing in new users does exactly that. The claim that very few residents visit clashes with the tripled membership, the room on the second floor is a detail that leads nowhere, and the history of ancient libraries changes the subject.

  5. Arrange these four sentences into the most coherent paragraph. P: The result was a market flooded with cheap cloth. Q: Before the mill came, each village wove its own cloth by hand. R: The new mill could make in a day what a weaver made in a month. S: Within a decade, hand-weaving had all but vanished. Which order is best?

    1. R, Q, S, P
    2. Q, P, R, S
    3. P, Q, R, S
    4. Q, R, P, S
    Show answer

    Answer: D — Q, R, P, S

    The coherent line is: the prior state (Q, hand-weaving), the change (R, the fast mill), its immediate result (P, cheap cloth floods the market), and the long-run consequence (S, hand-weaving vanishes) — background, cause, result, consequence. Orders that put the result or the consequence before the cause break the cause-before-effect flow.

  6. Which revision of “The course teaches students to analyse data, how to write reports, and the presentation of findings” makes the three items parallel?

    1. to analyse data, to write reports, and to present findings
    2. analysing data, how to write reports, and the presentation of findings
    3. to analyse data, writing reports, and presenting the findings clearly
    4. the analysis of data, to write reports, and presenting the findings
    Show answer

    Answer: A — to analyse data, to write reports, and to present findings

    The clean version puts all three items in the same 'to + verb' form, so they match. Each other version mixes forms — an '-ing' phrase with a 'how to' clause and a noun phrase, or a noun phrase with an infinitive and an '-ing' phrase — so the items no longer wear the same shape.

  7. Which revision of “Due to the fact that the road was closed, we were forced to make the decision to take a detour” is best for economy without changing the meaning?

    1. Owing to the fact that the road was closed, we decided to take a detour.
    2. Because the road was closed, we had to take a detour.
    3. Since the road closure had happened, taking a detour was the decision that we made.
    4. The road being closed, we were in the end forced into the making of a detour.
    Show answer

    Answer: B — Because the road was closed, we had to take a detour.

    ‘Because … we had to take a detour’ replaces ‘due to the fact that’ with ‘because’ and ‘were forced to make the decision to take’ with the plain ‘had to take’, keeping the sense of compulsion. The others keep the deadwood (‘owing to the fact that’, ‘the road closure had happened’, ‘the making of a detour’) and the needless ‘decision’ machinery.

  8. An editor shortens wordy phrases in a report. Which of the following replacements shorten the phrase while keeping its meaning exactly?

    1. ‘due to the fact that’ replaced by ‘because’
    2. ‘in the event that’ replaced by ‘if’
    3. ‘a few of the participants’ replaced by ‘the participants’
    4. ‘many of the patients’ replaced by ‘the patients’
    Show answer

    Answer: A — ‘due to the fact that’ replaced by ‘because’; B — ‘in the event that’ replaced by ‘if’

    ‘Because’ and ‘if’ are exact single-word equivalents of the two wordy phrases, so both replacements shorten without changing meaning. Dropping ‘a few of’ or ‘many of’ removes the quantity and turns a claim about some into a claim about all, so those two replacements change the meaning.

  9. A formal public notice begins: “Applicants must submit the form by Friday.” It then continues with the sentences listed below. Which of the sentences break the formal register of the notice?

    1. If you don’t, you’re basically out of luck.
    2. Late submissions will not be considered.
    3. The committee reckons this deadline is pretty generous.
    4. Queries may be addressed to the office.
    Show answer

    Answer: A — If you don’t, you’re basically out of luck.; C — The committee reckons this deadline is pretty generous.

    ‘You’re basically out of luck’ and ‘reckons … pretty generous’ are casual and clash with the formal notice. The sentence barring late submissions and the one directing queries to the office are properly formal, so they keep the register.

  10. Which revision of “The implementation of the reduction of costs was carried out by the finance team” is the most direct?

    1. The reduction of costs was implemented by the finance team.
    2. Cost-reduction implementation was undertaken by the finance team.
    3. The finance team cut costs.
    4. The finance team carried out the implementation of the cost reduction.
    Show answer

    Answer: C — The finance team cut costs.

    Turning the buried verbs ('implementation', 'reduction') back into one plain verb and naming the actor gives 'The finance team cut costs' — a named actor doing a clear action. The others keep the nominalisations and the passive 'was … by' or 'carried out the implementation of', so they stay abstract and indirect.

  11. Which revision of “The policy aims not only to reduce traffic but also the improvement of air quality” corrects the faulty parallelism after ‘not only … but also’?

    1. not only to reduce traffic but also improving air quality
    2. not only reducing traffic but also to improve air quality
    3. to not only reduce traffic but also the improvement of air quality
    4. not only to reduce traffic but also to improve air quality
    Show answer

    Answer: D — not only to reduce traffic but also to improve air quality

    A correlative pair must take the same form on each side; 'to reduce … to improve' matches infinitive to infinitive. The version pairing 'to reduce' with 'improving', the one pairing 'reducing' with 'to improve', and the one pairing a verb with the noun phrase 'the improvement of' all leave the two sides mismatched.

  12. Choose the word that best fills the gap so the logic holds: “The experiment failed three times. ____, the team refused to abandon it.”

    1. Nevertheless
    2. Therefore
    3. For instance
    4. In addition
    Show answer

    Answer: A — Nevertheless

    Refusing to give up despite three failures is a turn against expectation, which a concessive contrast word marks. 'Therefore' would make giving up the expected consequence of failing, the opposite of what follows; 'for instance' would make the refusal an example of failing; 'in addition' would add it as a similar point. Only the contrast word fits.

  13. Combine “The library extended its hours. The library did this to help students during the exams” into a single sentence with no redundancy. Which is best?

    1. The library extended its hours, and the library did this to help students during the exams.
    2. The library extended its hours to help students during the exams.
    3. To help students during the exams, the library, which extended its hours, did exactly this.
    4. The library, helping students during the exams, extended its hours to help those students.
    Show answer

    Answer: B — The library extended its hours to help students during the exams.

    The clean combination states the action once and its purpose once, with no repeated subject or verb. The others repeat 'the library did this', fold in a clumsy 'which … did exactly this', or say 'help … students' twice, so each carries redundancy the single clean sentence avoids.

  14. The writer wants to emphasise that it was the delay, rather than the cost, that caused the project to be cancelled. Which revision places that emphasis best?

    1. The project was cancelled, and the delay and the cost were both involved in this.
    2. The cost, along with the delay, led to the cancellation of the whole project.
    3. It was the delay, not the cost, that caused the project to be cancelled.
    4. Cancellation of the project followed the delay, which was one factor among several others.
    Show answer

    Answer: C — It was the delay, not the cost, that caused the project to be cancelled.

    The cleft 'It was the delay, not the cost, that …' frames the whole sentence around the delay and explicitly rules the cost out, which is exactly the emphasis wanted. The others either give delay and cost equal billing, foreground the cost, or demote the delay to one factor among many, so none puts the stress where the writer intends.

  15. A formal research abstract contains the sentence “We found out that the drug kind of works, but not for everyone.” Which revision best suits the formal register while keeping the finding?

    1. We figured out that the drug sort of works, though not for all of the people.
    2. It turns out the drug works a little bit, but honestly not for everybody at all.
    3. The drug kind of works for a lot of people, but clearly not for every single one.
    4. The findings indicate that the drug is somewhat effective, though not for all.
    Show answer

    Answer: D — The findings indicate that the drug is somewhat effective, though not for all.

    ‘The findings indicate … somewhat effective, though not for all’ is neutral and exact, the register of an abstract, and preserves the finding, with ‘kind of’ turned into ‘somewhat’. The others keep casual phrasing — ‘figured out’, ‘sort of’, ‘a little bit’, ‘honestly’, ‘kind of’ — which clashes with the formal setting even though the facts are similar.

  16. The writer means that both the manager and the supervisor ignored the warnings. Which revision of “The report criticised the manager and the supervisor who had ignored the warnings” states that unambiguously?

    1. The report criticised the manager and the supervisor, both of whom had ignored the warnings.
    2. The report criticised the manager and the supervisor who had ignored all the warnings.
    3. The report criticised the manager, as well as the supervisor who had ignored the warnings.
    4. The report criticised the supervisor and the manager who had ignored the warnings as well.
    Show answer

    Answer: A — The report criticised the manager and the supervisor, both of whom had ignored the warnings.

    ‘… both of whom had ignored the warnings’ attaches the ignoring to the manager and the supervisor together, which is the intended meaning. The version with ‘all the warnings’ still lets the relative clause attach to the supervisor alone; ‘as well as the supervisor who …’ pins the ignoring on the supervisor only; and the reordered version again lets the clause modify just one person, the manager.

  17. Read the passage. “The committee reviewed fifty applications and shortlisted twelve. Honestly, a lot of the rest were pretty weak, and the committee was kind of disappointed. The twelve shortlisted candidates will be interviewed next week.” The middle sentence breaks the formal register of the passage. Which replacement for it restores the register without changing what it says?

    1. Honestly, a lot of the rest were pretty weak, and the committee was somewhat disappointed.
    2. Many of the remaining applications were rather weak, and the committee was somewhat disappointed.
    3. The committee wishes to record, with the deepest sorrow and the utmost regret, that most of the rest were wholly unworthy of consideration.
    4. Many of the remaining applications fell short of the required standard.
    Show answer

    Answer: B — Many of the remaining applications were rather weak, and the committee was somewhat disappointed.

    The plain, neutral replacement keeps both facts — many applications were weak, and the committee was disappointed — and keeps both hedges (‘pretty’ becomes ‘rather’, ‘kind of’ becomes ‘somewhat’), in a formal register. The version that keeps ‘Honestly’, ‘a lot of’ and ‘pretty’ is still informal. The version with ‘deepest sorrow’ is pompous and also changes the content by saying ‘most’ and ‘wholly unworthy’. The version that stops at ‘fell short’ drops the committee’s disappointment, so it no longer says what the original said.

  18. Read the passage. “Our town has lost three bakeries in five years. Rents have risen, footfall has fallen, and a supermarket has opened by the ring road. It is a sad thing, and we are very sad about it.” The writer wants to replace the last sentence with one that keeps a restrained civic tone, does not repeat the word ‘sad’, and ends on one concrete image. Which replacement does all three?

    1. It is truly, deeply, unspeakably tragic, and every one of us should be furious about it.
    2. It is a sad matter, and we are deeply saddened by what has happened to our high street.
    3. Each closure has also closed a counter where neighbours once stopped to talk.
    4. Bakeries, as a category of small business, are known to be vulnerable to commercial and demographic pressures.
    Show answer

    Answer: C — Each closure has also closed a counter where neighbours once stopped to talk.

    The replacement that says each closure has closed a counter where neighbours once stopped to talk is restrained, avoids ‘sad’, and ends on a concrete image. The overblown ‘truly, deeply, unspeakably tragic’ version avoids ‘sad’ but is vehement rather than restrained and has no concrete image. The version with ‘a sad matter’ and ‘deeply saddened’ repeats the word. The version about bakeries as a category of small business is restrained and avoids ‘sad’ but is an abstract generalisation, so it ends on no image.