Question

What is the meaning of the bolded word?
Despite rising costs of living, her spending is anything but frugal.
A. Abundant
B. Generous
C. Restrained
D. Thoughtful

Answer 1

option c

Answer 2

c is the correct answer

Answer 3

You can deduce the meaning of a word from the rest of the sentence (good to know for standardized SAT-style tests where you haven't memorized a word).

In this case, the question says "DESPITE rising costs of living, her spending is anything but [frugal]." Or, written differently, her spending is NOT frugal (whatever that means, right?) despite rising costs of living.

If costs of living are going up, what would most people do with their money: spend a lot or stop spending so much? Is she doing the logical thing, which would be to stop spending so much? (Answer: no.) From that logic you can deduce the meaning of the word "frugal" by writing out a sentence such as this one: "Her spending is not _______ even though costs are going up." Try the different words in the blank. The only one that makes sense is "restrained": "Her spending is not restrained even though costs are going up." (Frugal means to be careful with one's money, thrifty, etc., by the way.)

I wrote out this long answer because I wanted to show you how to use context to understand a word that you don't recognize. I have learned a *lot* of the more complex words that I know purely through context.