Brief psychotherapy requires far fewer hours and costs far

Question

Brief psychotherapy requires far fewer hours and costs far less money than traditional psychoanalysis and so  will hopefully prove to be an effective treatment for many of the large amount  of people currently seeking therapy.

A. will hopefully prove to be an effective treatment for many of the large amount
B. will prove hopefully to be an effective treatment for many of the large amount
C. hopefully will prove to be an effective treatment for many of large number
D. will, it is hoped, prove to be an effective treatment for many of the large number
E. will, it is hoped, prove to be an effective treatment for many of the large amount

chetan2u · Accepted Answer

hi  SonaliT ,

firstly , yes hopefully used in this fashion is almost always wrong..
pure grammatical reason is that hopefully is an adverb but if you read the sentence , it does not modify anything .. 
the sentence is "C. hopefully will prove to be an effective treatment for many of large number"...
here hopefully is actually replacing 'it is hoped'....
the correct usage of hopefully is " he hopefully waited for his result"..
although the word hopefully is actually used in conversation very often as 'it is hoped'... in written english too, it has started being accepted but not in GMAT as of now...

agdimple333 · Answer

A,B and E are out because of use of 'amount' in amount of people..

Of C and D... i think both are grammatically correct.

C uses 'hopefully' which is not very preferred to use in GMAT..
Even D has passive construction.

i will go with D.

sguptashared · Answer

OMFG, how in this world can the OA be D? I mean what is "it is hoped" doing in between will and prove? Looks like a comma splice. How can this be correct?

metallicafan · Answer

+1 D

People is a countable noun. We need "number", not "amount". A, B, and E out.
The idiom is "THE...number", not "number".

sguptashared · Answer

hmm "the" is definitely a very good catch. But what is your opinion about "It is hoped"?

crick20002002 · Answer

D is the correct answer, although i got it wrong.

Hopefully is almost always wrong in GMAT. "it is hoped" is preferred. The "it" here is a "placeholder it" and does not require an antecedent.

Crick

ctkrishnan · Answer

I chose D based on the amount and number idiom elimination...
But what is this placeholder "it" concept??? I mean how to recognize a placeholder pronoun from the usual pronoun which needs an antecedent???

varunmaheshwari · Answer

Got it wrong..
Even i have the same question. What is this placeholder "it" concept and y is Hopefully almost always wrong in GMAT??

WishMasterUA · Answer

Firstly I took A but then sow the incorrect "amount of people" and took D.

mehtakaustubh · Answer

I was struggling with C or D....good point...of "the number".
After considering this i will go with D

But i also have the same question  how to recognize a "placeholder pronoun"??

synfist · Answer

confused between C and D.
I would go with D

In D , "it is hoped" sounds awkward to me, but better than "many of large number of"

SonaliT · Answer

Can anybody cite some examples proving use of "hopefully" Wrong?
C is straightforward ,why go for complicated D...

deucebigalow · Answer

Hi,
In the original question both of the choices C, and D have "the number" 
Apparently the question was posted with "the" missing from C.

ParthSanghavi · Answer

Hi  DmitryFarber .

Could you please explain why (C) is wrong and (D) is correct?

Bunuel · Answer

KAPLAN OFFICIAL EXPLANATION:

D

People can be individually counted, so they come in numbers, as in (C) and (D). That means (A), (B), and (E), which all use  amount , are incorrect. And strictly speaking, the adverb  hopefully  cannot be used to mean "it is hoped." (Though most of us use it this way in eveiyday speech, standard written English has more rigorous requirements.) That knocks out (C).  Hopefully  can modify only a single verb or adjective-not an entire sentence-in this case, the verb prove. So (D) is correct, with "it is hoped" and "the large number (of people)".

Shreshtha55 · Answer

Isn't the "it" ambiguous in the para?

Posted from my mobile device

generis · Answer

Shreshtha55  , a belated welcome to GMAT Club!

No, "it" is not ambiguous. The phrase "it is hoped"

1) commonly replaces the adverb "hopefully," which is often misused in English.

HERE  is a good post on the mistaken use of hopefully .

Correct: The lost hiker thought he saw city lights ahead and looked hopefully towards the horizon.
Incorrect and common: Hopefully, the lost hiker will find the road.

2) The "it" in "it is hoped" does not mean much.
It is raining today.
What is raining? The weather? Weather does not rain.

Similarly, in "it is hoped", IT is a placeholder, or a "dummy" pronoun, or an antecedent.
 Please, do not worry about the terminology.

The pronoun IT does not need an antecedent. 
The pronoun IT is part of an idiomatic construction in English: It is _____

HERE  is a thread that deals directly with the issue.
There are good expert posts on the usage of IT (and  that  -- I have just used a similar construction with the word " There ").
Please read posts by the experts on  both  pages of that linked post.

I hope that helps.

Keshav1404 · Answer

Hi Experts,

I have a query, how the verb is linked.
According to me there are total 3 things about the psychotherapy.

Psychotherapy... (1) requires far fewer hours
 (2) costs far less money than traditional psychoanalysis
 (3) so will, it is hoped, prove to be an effective treatment for....

why we have linked all the three with the 'and' in a construction such as "Subject Verb1 and Verb2 and Verb3. This construction deviates from the basic usage. Otherwise we should have created the next independent clause with the use of Verb3 after "comma + and".

Please clarify.

Brief psychotherapy requires far fewer hours and costs far

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Brief psychotherapy requires far fewer hours and costs far

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