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title: "Decoding Directive Words in Exam Answers | Model Diplomat"
description: "Decode the directive verbs that govern your marks: analyse, evaluate, examine, comment, and critically examine, and the distinct response architecture each one"
url: "https://modeldiplomat.com/learn/lessons/exam-answer-writing-decoding-directive-words-analyse-evaluate-examine-comment"
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Decoding directive words (analyse, evaluate, examine, comment)

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# Decoding directive words (analyse, evaluate, examine, comment)

Master the directive verbs that govern marks—analyse, evaluate, examine, comment, critically examine—and the distinct response architecture each demands.

## The directive word is a contract, not decoration

Every answer-writing paper—UPSC General Studies Mains, the CSS subjective papers, the BCS written examination, and the analytical sections of China's Shenlun (申论)—frames its questions around a controlling verb. That verb is the examiner's contract with you: it specifies the cognitive operation the marks reward. A candidate who writes a beautifully informed paragraph that *describes* when the question said *evaluate* has breached the contract and will be capped, regardless of factual richness. The UPSC's own moderation guidelines and the model answers released by toppers consistently show that demand-fidelity—answering exactly the operation asked—outweighs volume of content.

Directive words sort into a rough ladder of cognitive demand, echoing Bloom's taxonomy (Benjamin Bloom, 1956):

- **Describe / Discuss / Elaborate** — lower-order: lay out features, dimensions, multiple sides. 'Discuss' specifically demands a debate (for-and-against) ending in a reasoned position.
- **Examine** — investigate the components and their validity. You probe *whether* and *to what extent* a claim holds, scrutinising assumptions.
- **Analyse** — break the subject into constituent parts and show how they interrelate, causation and structure. You are dissecting, not judging.
- **Evaluate / Assess** — the highest common demand: weigh merits against demerits and deliver a measured verdict with criteria stated.
- **Comment** — offer your considered opinion with justification, but more briefly and freely than 'evaluate'; identify and react to the salient points.
- **Critically examine / Critically analyse** — the prefix 'critically' obliges a judgement: you must surface flaws, limits, counter-evidence and conclude with a balanced stance.

## Why the operations are not interchangeable

Consider one stem treated four ways. *'The 73rd Constitutional Amendment Act, 1992 decentralised power.'*

- **Analyse** it: dissect the mechanism—Articles 243 to 243-O, the three-tier panchayat structure, the State Finance Commission under Article 243-I, the 11th Schedule's 29 subjects—and show how these parts produce (or fail to produce) decentralisation.
- **Examine** the claim: test it. Did funds, functions and functionaries (the '3 Fs') actually devolve? Cite the variation across states—Kerala's People's Plan Campaign (1996) versus weak devolution elsewhere.
- **Evaluate** it: weigh achievements (reservation for women and SC/ST, regular elections via the State Election Commission, Article 243-K) against shortcomings (parallel bodies, fiscal dependence) and pronounce a verdict.
- **Comment** on it: state your reasoned opinion succinctly on whether the Amendment delivered.

Same syllabus node, four different answer skeletons, four different mark allocations. Misreading the verb is the single most common reason able candidates underperform on the GS papers and the CSS Essay. The verb dictates structure before content does.

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