CAT 2025 Lesson : Analogies - Common Relations

1. Common Relations

Understanding the relationship between the pair (or triplet) of words is the most important aspect. Please read the two words carefully to infer the relationship. The most common relationships are covered below.

1.1 Cause & effect

Here one event (cause) leads to another (effect). Such a relationship comes up in several questions. The question itself will have two words that signify a cause and an effect (e.g. rain : drenched, spendthrift : penniless), and you will be asked to choose the words which have a similar connect from the options.

Examples

Cause	Effect
Eclipse	Darkness
Fire	Heat
Heat	Sweat
Rain	Wet/drenched
Storm	Destruction of property
Food	Satisfaction
Sleep	Rested
Travel	Tired/jet lagged
Tectonic plate shift	Earthquake/tsunami
Smoking/bad habit	Disease
Water	Hydration
Meritocracy	Progress, upliftment
Bureaucracy/red tape	Corruption/delays

Cause	Positive Effect	Negative Effect
Factories	Manufacturing, jobs	Pollution
Greenhouse gas	Warmth, life	Global warming
Cars	Transportation, convenience	Traffic, pollution
Material	Robust, long lasting (if strong)	Fragile, breakable (if weak)
Kind ruler	Prosperity	Crime (if laws are not strict)
Diversity	Innovation, ideas	Miscommunication
Globalisation	Increased trade, access to international capital, access to markets, specialisation	Dependence on other countries, job losses, economic disparity
Democracy	Freedom, quality of life, respect for law, accountability	Corruption, inefficient administration, vote bank politics, suppression of minorities
Dictatorship	Efficient administration, low crime rates, lower corruption, stable government	Abuse of power, tyranny, lack of justice,negative impact of wrong policies, reduced checks and balances

1.2 Degree of intensity

Sometimes, both words could be similar, but not synonyms – they might differ in the degree of intensity. Knowing the degree of a word is then imperative to choosing the correct alternative. This is a common type of question which occurs in Analogy questions, typically as a test of your vocabulary with difficult words.

The degree could be:
- Increasing (e.g. warm : scalding; cold : freezing). Scalding is more intense than warm; freezing is more intense than cold.

- Decreasing (e.g. fever : cold; tree : shrub). A cold is less serious than a fever; a shrub is usually smaller than a tree.

We can classify adjectives and adverbs as Positive, Comparative and Superlative (e.g., rich, richer, richest). Some examples are provided below. Please read through the Parts of Speech lesson for more examples. However, you will probably get different words (e.g., angry : furious instead of angry : angrier).

Positive	Comparative	Superlative
Angry	Angrier	Angriest
Big	Bigger	Biggest
Beautiful	More beautiful	Most beautiful
Good	Better	Best
Much	More	Most

Examples of intensity:

Aspect	Lower degree	Higher degree
Anger	Angry, irate, piqued	Enraged, infuriated, furious, livid, apoplectic, seething, incensed
Amount	Very	Extremely
Big	Large, sizeable, substantial	Huge, massive, mammoth, immense, colossal
Beauty	Pretty, charming, enticing, alluring, elegant	Radiant, bewitching, dazzling, gorgeous, angelic, exquisite, divine
Destruction	Dismantle, Demolish	Raze, Wreck
Happiness	Cheerful, contented, delighted, joyful, lively, merry, chirpy	Jubilant, overjoyed, exultant, intoxicated, on cloud nine
Heat	Warmth, sultry, hot, sweltering, tropical	Fiery, burning, blazing, blistering, piping, scalding, scorching
Irritation	Irritated	Exasperated
Importance	Weighty, substantial, significant	Colossal, life-altering
Sadness	Upset, gloomy, pessimistic, , sorrowful, sombre, doleful, dejected, melancholic, mournful, downcast, lugubrious, grieving	Bereaved, heartbroken, down in the dumps, disconsolate, despondent, suicidal, morbid
Wealth	Rich, affluent, well-off, prosperous, well-heeled	In clover, flush, loaded, filthy rich, rolling, stinking rich