The November 2026 SAT included a vocabulary in context passage about the Campylopterus hemileucurus hummingbird. Native to Mexico and Central America, this strikingly beautiful bird features brilliant violet-purple feathers and a long-curved beak ideal for reaching nectar in large tubular flowers.
The passage begins by pointing out that hummingbirds are expected to choose flowers based on high-nectar volume. Although this premise seems logical, researchers found that nectar volume poorly predicted how often hummingbirds visited specific plants. Because the researchers couldn’t reliably link high nectar volume to hummingbird visits, the precise role of nectar volume is ELUSIVE or hard to pin down.
Although ELUSIVE is clearly the most precise and logical answer, a number of students selected EPHEMERAL. EPHEMERAL is a classic SAT word that means lasting for a very brief time. The passage discusses the difficulty of identifying the role of nectar volume, not how briefly that role exists in time.
ELUSIVE – difficult to find, catch, or achieve
EPHEMERAL – lasting for a very short period of time; brief
AP Literature Bonus Example
No 19th-century American novel captures the word ELUSIVE more powerfully than Herman Melville’s classic masterpiece Moby Dick. The giant albino sperm whale is the ultimate symbol of something that is impossible to catch or comprehend. Captain Ahab dedicates his life, his ship, and the lives of his crew to hunting down Moby Dick after the creature took his leg on a previous voyage. But Moby Dick remains ELUSIVE as he repeatedly vanishes into the ocean depths. To Captain Ahad, Moby Dick represents the unexplainable malice of the universe. To the narrator Ishmael, the creature represents the vast and ultimately ELUSIVE mysteries of nature.