rajeshs wrote:
Hi Mike,
I have written the question types that were not easy to identify. The right hand side of Vs is the right answer. The left hand side is my thought. Can you please help me spot the gap?
I believe that identification of the question type in CR and RC is half the war won.
Thanks, Rajesh
Dear Rajesh,
This is a very difficult post to which to respond. I do agree, that identifying the question stem, on either GMAT RC or CR, is a HUGE step in answering the question correct. That's absolutely true.
To some extent, it may be that your confusion as to what the stems are asking has to do with your proficiency in English. Once again, I ask you:
how much are you reading? If you were reading an hour a day, good sophisticated reading in English, I think it would resolve many of these questions.
See this post about identifying GMAT CR questions. The links lead to articles about individual question types:
https://magoosh.com/gmat/2012/save-time- ... questions/You seem to have great deal of confusion between "strengthener" questions and "inference" questions. Think about which way the support is going.
In a Strengthener question, correctly answered, the direction of support should go
from the statement
to the argument.
Statement ==> support ===> Argument
In an Inference question, the direction of support should go
from the argument
to the statement .
Argument ==> support ===> Statement
These prompts indicate Strengtheners, support going
to the argument:
Which one of the following, if true, would provide the most support for the conclusion in the argument above?
The argument above would be more persuasive if which one of the following were found to be true?
Which one of the following, if added to the passage, would make the conclusion logical?They are about improving the argument.
These prompts indicate Inference, support coming
from the argument:
Which of the following is best supported by the statements above?
The statements above, if true, most strongly support which of the following?
The statements above best support which of the following conclusions?
The statements above, if true, most strongly support which of the following? In all cases, it's the statement among the answer choices that is supported, not the argument. The argument gives support, and the answer choice receives it. That's how an inference question works.
It's important to recognize that an assumption is something inside an argument. It is the unstated link between the premise and the conclusion within an argument. In a way, "find the assumption" questions are not too different from "strengthener" questions, because one of the most effective ways to strengthen an argument is to provide support for its assumption. An argument with a strong, well-supported assumption is a strong argument. An argument with a weak or unsupported assumption is a weak argument.
The questions:
Which of the following is the conclusion toward which the author is probably moving?
Based on the passage above, the principal most likely believes which one of the following? are asking about something outside of the argument, so it is absolutely not asking for an assumption. A "conclusion toward which the author is probably moving" is more or less a definition of the word "inference." An inference could be described as a conclusion that the argument never reaches --- it would be a conclusion if the argument got there. That why this question ....
It is reasonable to assume that the author believes that .. ... is also an inference question. Any question that is asking us, the readers, to make an assumption is most certainly NOT asking for the assumption of the argument. Something that the author clearly believes but does not say is one way to say what an inference is.
An assumption is the very linchpin holding the entire argument together. Thus, a reasonable way to ask for the assumption of an argument is:
The validity of the argument depends on which one of the following? Paradox questions often ask you to explain something. They often have a prompt ask you to "resolve the discrepancy" or something similar. Sometimes, paradox questions ask you to "explain" the paradox.
Which of the following hypothesis best accounts for the findings of the experiment?Presumably, this question comes from a Paradox prompt. This is a subtle distinction. Assumptions account for logical conclusions: if the argument is purely verbal, then the assumption would provide support for the conclusion. BUT, if the argument describes
a factual situation, such as a scientific experiment, and the real world results don't make sense ---- i.e. a Paradox question --- then assumptions have nothing to do with making real world events make sense. We need an explanation for that.
To be honest, I don't think there's any meaningful difference between a "flaw" question and a "weakener" question. I lump both of them into the same category. I don't know that it is at all helpful to distinguish one from the other. In both cases, we are looking for something that weakens the argument.
The EXCEPT questions are their own category. Any of the other questions types (strengthener, weakener/flaw, assumption, inference, ...) can be presented in the EXCEPT format. Consider this question:
Which statement, if added to the author's argument, would make the argument logically correct?That's a strengthener question. We are trying to make the argument stronger. One answer choice will be a valid strengthener, and four other answer choices will not be strengtheners.
Now, consider your question:
Each of the following statements, if added to the author's argument, would make the argument logically correct EXCEPT: This is the EXCEPT version of the same strengthener question. In this question, four of the answer choices will be valid strengtheners --- and they will NOT be the correct answer. Only one of the answer choices is not a valid strengthener, and that's the correct answer to the EXCEPT question.
Similarly, we could change ...
Which of the following weakens the argument?
Which of the following is an assumption of the argument?
Which of the following is an inference of the argument?into their corresponding EXCEPT questions:
Each of the following statements weakens the argument EXCEPT:
Each of the following is an assumption of the argument EXCEPT:
Each of the following is an inference of the argument EXCEPT:Same idea --- anything that would be a correct answer in the original question is not a correct answer in the EXCEPT question.
Does all this make sense?
Mike
close
Updated on: 15 Oct 2019, 04:01
