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We use comparisons to make important decisions every day. Whether we are choosing a career to work toward, a school to attend, a product to buy, or a political figure to elect, we narrow our choices and examine them side-by-side. Indeed, making important decisions involves both comparing and contrasting at least two choices that are in the same category.Comparing means examining how things are similar, while contrasting means looking at the ways things differ. For instance, if you wanted to choose which of two schools to attend, you would need to compare the similarities and contrast the differences of the two educational institutions. When making such a decision, you are evaluating based on comparison and contrast .

It’s safe to say that every one of us has had to compare or contrast two subjects or topics to gain insights about them, and we are compelled to do so on a regular basis. For example, we often compare or contrast two personal experiences, two bosses, two teachers, or two friends in order to make better sense of our world and even to justify our belief systems.

In college, students often contrast or compare two books, two stories or poems, two songs, or two paintings. When students engage in such comparative thinking, they are gaining insights about these topics. It is important, however, to realize that when writing a simple comparison/contrast paper, students either compare or contrast topics, typically not both. In other words, though you will often consider both the similarities and differences among subjects, when you write your essay for this module, you will discuss either the subjects’ similarities (thereby writing a comparison paper) or their differences (thus writing a contrast paper). In this module, students will learn how to construct a comparison or contrast essay in order to evaluate, gain insight, or to make a choice. ⁽¹⁾