在英語四級的閱讀中，有一些信號詞是常出現的，這些信號詞都是有深刻含義的，下面就和小編一起來看看吧!
一、以下詞組提示下文所涉及的重要資訊
The main / important point / conclusion / reason….
The point to note here…
二、以下詞組提示了下文的結構框架
There are three major reasons…
三、but 和 however表示對比，常常用來提示重要資訊
例如：
The rising birth rate is not due to increased fertility, but to a sharp decline in the death rate.
四、在文中提問可以突出問題後的答案，提示讀者答案中有重要資訊
例如：
Why is a piped water supply so important? Disease due to contaminated water is a common cause of death in childhood.
五、有時，爲了保證讀者完全理解自己的觀點，作者會在文中反覆提出自己的觀點
例如：
Death control can be achieved autonomously. In other words, the death rate can be cut without anything else changing.
六、文章的結論通常是非常重要的，因此，讀者要在文中尋找提示結論的“信號詞”
例如：
Thereforethe result
In conclusionwe can conclude
One of the primary conclusions
七、舉例是爲了幫助讀者理解某一個觀點，因此，文中的例子不是瀏覽文章時的重要資訊
在閱讀過程中，以下詞組提示讀者下文是舉例部分資訊。
For example/instancelike
Such asthese include
To illustrateamong these are
有時，作者也會用破折號或括號來提示舉例資訊，例如：
The developing countries are dependent on cash crops – sugar, coffee, cacao, cotton.
Precipitating/violent/unexpected factors are those which reduce the food supply (droughts, floods, wars, epidemics)…
在段落瀏覽時，讀者在看到信號詞後，應不斷對下文資訊作出相應的判斷，例如：
The main reason for (提示：下文資訊重要) the reduction in the death rate in the developing world has been improved public health measures. For example, (提示：下文資訊不重要，僅僅是爲了用來證明前面的觀點) in Sri Lanka the death rate was halved over ten years by spraying the mosquitoes which carry malaria.
Why (提示：問題的'答案中有讀者應該關注的重點) is it so easy to cut the death rate in this way and yet so hard to reduce the birth rate? One answer (提示：這只是衆多答案中的一種，並不是最重要的。) is that public health measures can be very cheap. Anti-malarial spraying is inexpensive. But this is not the important point (提示：but後面的是非常重要的資訊).
For birth control programmes to be successful, a change in attitude is required, whereas death control can be achieved autonomously. In other words, (提示：這裏是作者想要強調的重要資訊) the death rate can be cut without anything else changing.