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mavelous
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A medical journal used a questionnaire survey to determine whether 05 Jul 2023, 06:03
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afra94
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The magazine sent a survey to its readers.
Of those who answered back (survey participants), 62% supported the change.

Magazine decided to implement the change.

So based on the opinion of a sample, the magazine assumed that the opinion among the population will be the same and hence decided to implement the change. We need to support this line of thinking which means we need to give some data that supports that the sample does represent the population.

(A) Of the readers who received questionnires, 90 percent returned them.

This option tells us that 90% of the magazine's readership was the sample size i.e. 90% people participated in the survey. Now think about this - does it matter whether 90% participates or 80% participate or 40% participated? The number of people that participated are our sample. We don't know whether the absolute number is large or small. If the magazine's readership has very few people, 90% may be a small sample size. If the magazine has a large readership base, 40% may be a large enough sample size too.
So this option doesn't really provide any support to the authenticity of the survey result.

(B) Other journals have based format changes on survey results.

Irrelevant. We don't know whether the journals were similar and whether their decisions turned out to be suitable.

(C) The percentage of surveyed readers who like the format change was almost the same as the percentage of the entire potential readership who would like format change.

Correct. This says that the sample was an accurate representation of the entire population. If that is the case, then we can expect 62% of the entire potential readership to like the change. It certainly sounds good for the plan.

(D) It was determined that the new format would be less costly than the old format.

Cost is not being discussed here. We are discussing increase in readership.

(E) Ninety percent of the readers who were dissatisfied with the old format and only 50 percent of the readers who like the old format returned their questionnaires.

This weakens the result of the survey and is hence not the answer.

Assuming 100 people responded to the survey, 62 liked the new format while 38 liked the old format.
This option (E) tells us that the 38 people who liked the old format were only 50% of the total who liked the old format. So actually 76 people liked the old format.
Also it tells us that the 62 people who liked the new format were 90% of all total who liked the new format so about 69 people liked the new format.

Hence, in reality more people liked the old format better and the change may not be good for the magazine. Just that fewer people who liked the old format responded.

Answer (C)

For option C, Could you please explain why we do not consider the possibility that only say 20% of the survey takers actually returned the survey? Does that not mean that we do not know what the remaining 80% voted for?.
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this was may problem with C as well, I've been getting these LSAT questions wrong recently due to vague language.


we know that 62% of those who returned the questionnaire supported that change
"percentage of surveyed readers who like the format change" - *those who returned the questionnaire* is not the same as *total surveyed*.
This is not mentioned in answer C specifically (onlyA mentions 90% response rate)
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A medical journal used a questionnaire survey to determine whether 20 Nov 2023, 10:28
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I need some insight on my reasoning for eliminating option A.

My thought was since those surveyed were already people who were the magazine readers and liked the change doesn't mean that the general population at whom the plan is targeted might like the change as well. The Magazine readers, since being familiar with the existing format might find the new changes impressive but for those that do not have any prior knowledge of the what the existing format is might not know whether the change is for the better or worse and may have no impact of increasing the viewership.

I understand that since we don't know the sample size we can't say the impact is a better reason to eliminate A. But the above reasoning was my way to eliminate A.

Some Insight might be helpful. Thanks in advance.
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A medical journal used a questionnaire survey to determine whether 22 Jan 2024, 03:37
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Between A and C, I choose C and Not A.

Reason: In A, it says to "all the readers" the survey was sent, and if you share the survey with just a cohort of the group who are already reading the journal, the results would be skewed as they are already reading the journal, so any change in the format won't affect the readership.

However, If we read C, it clearly states that entire Readership this may or may not be the existing readership so this would be better answer as compared to A.
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A medical journal used a questionnaire survey to determine whether 07 Jan 2025, 11:04
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Hi MartyMurray KarishmaB

In the choice C: The percentage of surveyed readers who like the format change was almost the same as the percentage of the entire potential readership who would like format change-->We don't know the the actual number of surveyed readers who liked the format,we only know the percentage of those who returned the survey.
How can we compare this with the actual potential readers ?

Kindly help
Thanks !
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A medical journal used a questionnaire survey to determine whether 08 Jan 2025, 00:43
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Hi MartyMurray KarishmaB

In the choice C: The percentage of surveyed readers who like the format change was almost the same as the percentage of the entire potential readership who would like format change-->We don't know the the actual number of surveyed readers who liked the format,we only know the percentage of those who returned the survey.
How can we compare this with the actual potential readers ?

Kindly help
Thanks !
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In option (C) "surveyed readers" means the ones who returned the forms. A company sends out the form to all its readers and if 500 return the form, it means there are 500 surveyed readers. All readers are not surveyed readers.
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