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A system-wide county school anti-smoking education program

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A system-wide county school anti-smoking education program [#permalink] New post 18 Nov 2012, 11:43
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A system-wide county school anti-smoking education program was instituted last year. The program was clearly a success. Last year, the incidence of students smoking on school premises decreased by over 70 percent.

Which of the following assumptions underlies the argument in the passage?

(A) Cigarettes are detrimental to one’s health; once people understand this, they will quit smoking
(B) The doubling of the price of a pack of cigarettes last year was not the only cause of the student’s altered smoking habits.
(C) The teachers chosen to lead the anti-smoking education program were the most effective teachers in the school system
(D) The number of cigarettes smoked each day by those students who continued to smoke last year did not greatly increase.
(E) School policy enforcers were less vigilant in seeking out smokers last year than they were in previous years

Please answer with explanations
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Re: A system-wide county school anti-smoking education program [#permalink] New post 18 Nov 2012, 20:46
gmatchase wrote:
A system-wide county school anti-smoking education program was instituted last year. The program was clearly a success. Last year, the incidence of students smoking on school premises decreased by over 70 percent.

Which of the following assumptions underlies the argument in the passage?

(A) Cigarettes are detrimental to one’s health; once people understand this, they will quit smoking
(B) The doubling of the price of a pack of cigarettes last year was not the only cause of the student’s altered smoking habits.
(C) The teachers chosen to lead the anti-smoking education program were the most effective teachers in the school system
(D) The number of cigarettes smoked each day by those students who continued to smoke last year did not greatly increase.
(E) School policy enforcers were less vigilant in seeking out smokers last year than they were in previous years

Please answer with explanations

IMO B
Anti smoking pro--->success-->decrease in incidences of smoking on "school premises"

1)Doesn't show program's effect,general take,out of context
2)had this been false that is doubling of price was the reason,argument would have failed.correct assumption.CORRECT
3)had it been the case that teachers chosen are not effective even then it would not have dented the argument
4)"incidences" of smoke is the concern and not number of smoke.
5)had the enforcers been equally vigilant(not more) argument would not have dented.
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Re: A system-wide county school anti-smoking education program [#permalink] New post 19 Nov 2012, 09:37
Hi, So here is my thought process behind this....

A system-wide county school anti-smoking education program was instituted last year. The program was clearly a success. Last year, the incidence of students smoking on school premises decreased by over 70 percent.

So argument is an anti smoking education programme caused a drop in smoking in school.

Which of the following assumptions underlies the argument in the passage?

So what do we need to assume for the argument to be true, but is not mentioned above.

(A) Cigarettes are detrimental to one’s health; once people understand this, they will quit smoking No, you don't need to assume this. It's out of context in this passage - you could easily hold this argument with knowing this
(B) The doubling of the price of a pack of cigarettes last year was not the only cause of the student’s altered smoking habits. Yes this does seem like something I need to know, as if there was this price rise, without knowing the results, we could easily assume this was the only reason for the decline.
(C) The teachers chosen to lead the anti-smoking education program were the most effective teachers in the school system No, we don't need to know this. Even less effective teachers could have an effect.
(D) The number of cigarettes smoked each day by those students who continued to smoke last year did not greatly increase.Not for me. I can easily hold the argument without knowing this or not.
(E) School policy enforcers were less vigilant in seeking out smokers last year than they were in previous yearsNo. This actually weakens the argument if true. The reason for the drop could be simply a drop in catching people, not a drop in smoking

Please answer with explanations
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Re: A system-wide county school anti-smoking education program [#permalink] New post 30 Nov 2012, 00:58
gmatchase wrote:
A system-wide county school anti-smoking education program was instituted last year. The program was clearly a success. Last year, the incidence of students smoking on school premises decreased by over 70 percent.

Which of the following assumptions underlies the argument in the passage?

(A) Cigarettes are detrimental to one’s health; once people understand this, they will quit smoking
(B) The doubling of the price of a pack of cigarettes last year was not the only cause of the student’s altered smoking habits.
(C) The teachers chosen to lead the anti-smoking education program were the most effective teachers in the school system
(D) The number of cigarettes smoked each day by those students who continued to smoke last year did not greatly increase.
(E) School policy enforcers were less vigilant in seeking out smokers last year than they were in previous years

Please answer with explanations



Ya i agree B is preferable here...
By negating B
The doubling of the price of a pack of cigarettes last year was the only cause of the student’s altered smoking habits.
This weakens argument...

How come this actually be assumption for this....
This argument is Cause --> Effect relation

Cause -> school anti-smoking education program
Effect -> incidence of students smoking on school premises decreased by over 70 percent. (success)

But Option B acts as strengthener... Which states some other cause will not lead to effect...
Am i right???

Also Can anyone brief about D... i felt D gives space for answer as well....
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Re: A system-wide county school anti-smoking education program [#permalink] New post 30 Nov 2012, 05:31
I got B at the first glance. But I don't think that the answer can be such easy. Finally, I went to E which is actually convincing. If, enforcers were more serious to look for smokers, the incident number would increase and vice verse.
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Re: A system-wide county school anti-smoking education program [#permalink] New post 08 Apr 2013, 08:53
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gmatchase wrote:
A system-wide county school anti-smoking education program was instituted last year. The program was clearly a success. Last year, the incidence of students smoking on school premises decreased by over 70 percent.

Which of the following assumptions underlies the argument in the passage?

(A) Cigarettes are detrimental to one’s health; once people understand this, they will quit smoking
(B) The doubling of the price of a pack of cigarettes last year was not the only cause of the student’s altered smoking habits.
(C) The teachers chosen to lead the anti-smoking education program were the most effective teachers in the school system
(D) The number of cigarettes smoked each day by those students who continued to smoke last year did not greatly increase.
(E) School policy enforcers were less vigilant in seeking out smokers last year than they were in previous years

Please answer with explanations


Responding to a pm:

First step is to analyze the argument.

Premises:
- A system-wide county school anti-smoking education program was instituted last year.
- Last year, the incidence of students smoking on school premises decreased by over 70 percent.

Conclusion: The program was clearly a success.

Ok, so the conclusion seems a little far fetched, isn't it? Just because the anti-smoking program was instituted last year and the incidence of smoking decreased last year, doesn't necessarily mean that the program was responsible for the decrease. Right? There could another cause. We are assuming that the program was responsible for the decrease.

Look at the options now.

Option (B) The doubling of the price of a pack of cigarettes last year was not the only cause of the student’s altered smoking habits.

We are assuming that the program was the cause of the student's altered smoking habits i.e. some other thing was certainly not the ONLY cause. If there is a confusion, try to negate it.

The doubling of the price was the only cause of the student’s altered smoking habits.

Now our conclusion just cannot hold. If doubling the price was the ONLY cause, the program cannot be responsible for the decrease. Hence (B) is the assumption.

Notice that (E) is not the assumption.
(E) School policy enforcers were less vigilant in seeking out smokers last year than they were in previous years.
If we negate it, we get

School policy enforcers were not less vigilant in seeking out smokers last year

Our conclusion can still hold. The school policy enforcers were the way they are every year or perhaps they were more vigilant, either way, it is still possible that the program is responsible for the decrease in smoking.
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Re: A system-wide county school anti-smoking education program [#permalink] New post 08 Apr 2013, 13:37
I think this is a classic example of Passive assumption. Answer must be B.
The question is rightly tagged, its sub 600

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Re: A system-wide county school anti-smoking education program [#permalink] New post 09 Apr 2013, 21:05
VeritasPrepKarishma wrote:
gmatchase wrote:
A system-wide county school anti-smoking education program was instituted last year. The program was clearly a success. Last year, the incidence of students smoking on school premises decreased by over 70 percent.

Which of the following assumptions underlies the argument in the passage?

(A) Cigarettes are detrimental to one’s health; once people understand this, they will quit smoking
(B) The doubling of the price of a pack of cigarettes last year was not the only cause of the student’s altered smoking habits.
(C) The teachers chosen to lead the anti-smoking education program were the most effective teachers in the school system
(D) The number of cigarettes smoked each day by those students who continued to smoke last year did not greatly increase.
(E) School policy enforcers were less vigilant in seeking out smokers last year than they were in previous years

Please answer with explanations


Responding to a pm:

First step is to analyze the argument.

Premises:
- A system-wide county school anti-smoking education program was instituted last year.
- Last year, the incidence of students smoking on school premises decreased by over 70 percent.

Conclusion: The program was clearly a success.

Ok, so the conclusion seems a little far fetched, isn't it? Just because the anti-smoking program was instituted last year and the incidence of smoking decreased last year, doesn't necessarily mean that the program was responsible for the decrease. Right? There could another cause. We are assuming that the program was responsible for the decrease.

Look at the options now.

Option (B) The doubling of the price of a pack of cigarettes last year was not the only cause of the student’s altered smoking habits.

We are assuming that the program was the cause of the student's altered smoking habits i.e. some other thing was certainly not the ONLY cause. If there is a confusion, try to negate it.

The doubling of the price was the only cause of the student’s altered smoking habits.

Now our conclusion just cannot hold. If doubling the price was the ONLY cause, the program cannot be responsible for the decrease. Hence (B) is the assumption.

Notice that (E) is not the assumption.
(E) School policy enforcers were less vigilant in seeking out smokers last year than they were in previous years.
If we negate it, we get

School policy enforcers were not less vigilant in seeking out smokers last year

Our conclusion can still hold. The school policy enforcers were the way they are every year or perhaps they were more vigilant, either way, it is still possible that the program is responsible for the decrease in smoking.



Thank you so Much Karishma :)...Its clear now !
Re: A system-wide county school anti-smoking education program   [#permalink] 09 Apr 2013, 21:05
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