During the past year, Pro-Tect Insurance Company’s total payouts on ca

You should go dig the forum "New to this forum". I think, this stuff is useful. For example, you know what is "consideration", what is "evidence"....
There are some tips useful too.

For the boldface, the first and the key is "Should find out exactly what is the [main] conclusion"

I go to the New to Verbal Forum, copy and past here!

Principle: something fundamental that we do not question. This would be somewhat stronger than a fact because it is not specific to a limited number of cases but instead, apply to a broader range of scenarios(and often deeper in meaning). For instance, you will not talk about the principle that crime is increasing in large cities. Instead, it is a fact which applies to large cities. However, you will talk about the principles of Physics or the fundamental principles of Human Rights. I believe principles convey a stronger connotation than mere facts.

Fact: something taken as true at face value (stats, historical events)

Evidence: what is used to support a conclusion (examples, stats, historical events). Although these may include facts, it is usually stronger than facts because they are direct elements needed for the conclusion to stand whereas facts are not necessary for the latter to stand

Pre-evidence: This is a bit of a stretch. It will not often be on the test but it seems very similar to "background" information as described below.

Background: Elements needed to put the evidence into context but which, as stand alone pieces of information, might not constitute what is called an evidence necessary to arrive at a conclusion. For instance, blood tests performed on one thousand persons may reveal that 35% of those persons were HIV infected. However, the background information could be that the test was performed in more underinformed regions of the world where AIDS knowledge is at a minimum. As you can see, the fact that the test was performed in more underinformed regions is not in and of itself an evidence because it does not allow us to come to a conclusion. Instead, the 35% stats, as a stand-alone piece of info, is what will lead us to the conclusion we want. However, the background info is also crucial and cannot be omitted; it is required background info.

Consideration: Something which was taken into account or given some thought before arriving to the conclusion.

Premise: This is usually a required statement to arrive at a conclusion. Evidence and facts want to prove something to you whereas premises are there to logically lead you to a conclusion. The best example of premises is the ones included in syllogisms. For instance, you can say that(premise1) when it rains, you go outside. Then, it rains(premise2). You have to be outside(conclusion).

Assumption: Unstated information which will link the argument to a logical conclusion. Without this, the argument falls apart.

Conclusion: Self-explanatory

Inference: Something that might not be explicitly stated or proved. For instance, you may say that 95% of GMAT test-takers have over 340. We can reasonably infer that Anthony will get more than 340 on his GMAT based on the fact given. I think the main difference b/w an inference and a conclusion is that the former might not be the final line of an argument. For instance, there could be facts/evidence given, an inference in b/w, and then the conclusion. An inference can be an intermediate step before the conclusion which will sum up the whole passage. Also, a conclusion seems to be stronger because it is based on stronger facts/evidence. As in my previous example, we can reasonably infer that Anthony got 340+ on his GMAT but we cannot conclude that he got 340+. See the nuance?

Responding to a pm:

I don't think you have the correct OA here. Could someone please post a screenshot of the actual question and OA.

The goal is: "protecting itself against continued large payouts"
Strategy 1: reduce the number of car-theft policies it carries
Strategy 2: offer a discount to holders of car-theft policies whose cars have antitheft devices

So (A) fits.

(C) is incorrect.
If statement 1 is viewed as a consideration to support adopting a certain strategy, what is this "certain strategy"? This consideration actually supports the "alternative strategy" only.
The "alternative strategy" of course is "offer a discount to holders of car-theft policies whose cars have antitheft devices".
But (C) talks about two different strategies.
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I have really trouble with these kind of questions.

How should I attack these kind of questions? Consideration, Judgment, strategy and etc... So difficult to figure the answer out in 2 min.

I get confused!

[quote="zoltan"]I have really trouble with these kind of questions.

How should I attack these kind of questions? Consideration, Judgment, strategy and etc... So difficult to figure the answer out in 2 min.

I get confused! [/quote

How should I attack these kind of questions? Consideration, Judgment, strategy and etc... So difficult to figure the answer out in 2 min.
Thats teh whole purpose of this thread. For bold face CRs thi sis teh strategy I use:
1. I pick one of the bold statements- Usually the one I understand clearly.
2. I go through the answers choices and eliminate choices which donot adhere to the statement. For example the statement could serve as an evidence, assumption or conclusion in the argument. I use this knowledge as the basis to eliminate answer choices.
3. I repeat step 2 with other statement.

Most of the times this approach works for me.


Gmatnub, Sinha, sondeso...do you guys want to explain your approach too?

Tricky question. I would opt A, though some other options also looks quite tempting.

The argument is talking about two strategies to reduce the payout:
1st, by changing the car-theft policies, which is not possible
2nd, by encouraging policyholders to install anti-theft device
Based on this the argument is giving the conclusion to opt for 2nd strategy.

Please note, this is not the main conclusion. Rather the main conclusion is in the last line "Thus, because cars with antitheft devices are rarely stolen, Pro-Tect’s plan is likely to reduce its annual payouts."

A. The first rules out a certain strategy for achieving a goal; the second presents the strategy that was adopted instead and whose effectiveness the argument assesses. -Correct
B. The first is a judgment made in support of a certain conclusion; the second is that conclusion. -First is not a judgment to support 2nd, rather both are different strategies.
C. The first has been used as a consideration to support adopting a certain strategy
for achieving a goal; the second reports a decision to adopt an alternative strategy. -Both are different strategies, without any relation.
D. The first provides evidence in favor of adopting a certain strategy for achieving a
goal; the second reports a decision to pursue an alternative goal. -Both are different strategies, without any relation.
E. The first is a consideration offered against adopting a certain strategy for
achieving a goal; the second is the main conclusion that the argument is seeking
to establish. -2nd is a sub-conclusion, and not the main conclusion. Rather the main conclusion is in the last line.

Brand new here (this forum and the accompnaying community are great BTW) but thought I would chime in. C is wrong because of two words:

1.) "support" - If the "certain strategy" is to reduce the number of car-theft policies it carries, the first is then a consideration against adopting that strategy, not in support of it.

2.) "alternative" - Alternatively (no pun intended), if you interpret the first as a consideration in "support" of the "certain strategy" of offering discounts for customers who install anti-theft devices (which, at least to me, seems plausible), then the decision would not be for an alternative strategy.

Hope the questions keep coming - this is great practice.

(C) is wrong.

There are two strategies discussed:
Reduce policies
Offer discount

Note that (C) uses "first supports CERTAIN STRATEGY"
Which is this strategy? It supports "offers discount" because it says reducing policies is not possible.

(C) also says "second adopts an alternative strategy"
Now which strategy is this? Second adopts "offers discount" only. It does not adopt an alternative strategy. It adopts the same strategy that first supports.

(A) is correct. Look here: during-the-past-year-pro-tect-insurance-company-s-total-64492.html#p1441546
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Hm, it seems that the GMAT is obsessed with the Pro-Tect Insurance Company: https://gmatclub.com/forum/pro-tect-ins ... 59429.html. Very similar passage, different question format.

This is a tough question, but I'm wondering where the discrepancies in the OA are coming from. Maybe the GMATPrep software is saying one thing, but a Word or pdf file that's floating around on the internet is saying another? I'm not sure.

In any case... what's going on in this passage, and how can we distinguish between A and C? Well, I always like to start these boldfaced questions by making sense of the structure of the passage. In this case, there's a clear conclusion in the passage, for whatever that's worth:



The conclusion references Pro-Tect's plan. Great. So what, exactly, is Pro-Tect's plan?



Hm, and that plan happens to be the second boldfaced statement. Cool, now we can compare the second half of (A) and (C). (A) is clear as a bell -- that second boldfaced statement is clearly "the strategy that was adopted" and, based on our glimpse of the conclusion, it is also the strategy "whose effectiveness the argument assesses." (C) isn't terrible, but I'd argue that if we think about the purpose of the passage, the second boldfaced statement is clearly the main strategy being assessed -- not really an "alternative strategy," as (C) suggests.

And what about the first boldfaced statement? Again, (A) is clear as a bell: the statement clearly "rules out a certain strategy for achieving a goal." (C) again isn't completely awful, but it's far less connected to the main point of the passage: it's hard to argue that (C) is a "consideration to support adopting a certain strategy," because it doesn't seem to support anything in particular -- it just rules out a different strategy.
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That's a huge question, Mo2men! We'll say a lot more about those sorts of issues in the next few weeks and months.

The short answer is that I've never been convinced that it's all that important to learn a whole ton of terminology for GMAT CR. Sure, you should definitely be able to very precisely identify a conclusion when you read the passage, but I don't think that labeling the rest of the passage with words like "premise" or "consideration" or "judgment" or "intermediary conclusion" is necessarily helpful if you're just trying to understand a nice, normal passage (weaken, strengthen, paradox, assumption, etc.).

And sure, those terms appear in the boldfaced CR questions, but they don't necessarily have super-technical definitions that you need to memorize. In this particular example, "judgment," "evidence," and "strategy" are everyday words with fairly standard definitions. "Consideration" isn't necessarily a word we use all the time, but it doesn't have any special definition here, either: it's just a thought or fact or idea that you're using to make form sort of decision. Nothing too technical.

Of course, everybody learns differently, and for a lot of GMAT test-takers, it's super-helpful to dive into this sort of terminology (conclusion, premise, evidence, etc.). I meet quite a few people who find the breakdowns in PowerScore or e-GMAT or MGMAT useful; I probably meet far more people who don't find the terminology useful at all, but again, everybody is different.

Bottom line: if you want to take a shot at one of those resources, go for it! Again, tons of people find them helpful. But for a really large number of successful GMAT test-takers, the terminology itself isn't worth studying. You just have to get really, really good at comprehending passages, understanding how the argument is structured, and picking up on the nuances of language in the question.

I hope this helps! And again, we'll have a lot more to say about this in upcoming posts.
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Ooh, good question. One of the problems with the boldfaced questions is that we really don't have all that many official ones in the practice materials -- what, maybe a total of four or five in the OGs, plus a few more in the GMATPrep Question Pack? I haven't counted, but it's somewhere in that ballpark -- and that's not much. So I completely understand why you'd want to make the most of them, and maybe save them for a later stage of your studies.

Again, I'm not convinced that the terminology used in the boldfaced questions is all that technical, so I'm not sure that there's much that's worth memorizing. It's just that you don't want them to look totally unfamiliar, I guess. So you could spend some time in some of the books I mentioned above, and see if that helps. Or you can just deal with them when the time comes -- in theory, the terms are generally going to be things that you understand without any extra studying, it's just that they might feel a little foreign.

And here's the other option: try practicing with some official LSATs. They can be brutally difficult at times, but depending on your score goals, that might be a good thing for you. And something like 20-30% of the questions at least dabble in some "legalese" terminology that will feel a little bit like the boldfaced questions.

If you can kick butt on the LSAT CR (called "logical reasoning" on the LSAT) and RC, then the GMAT stuff will start to feel easier. And it should help a whole lot with the boldfaced questions -- we give most of our students an aggressive diet of LSAT practice, and very few end up having any troubles on the boldfaced CR when they get there.
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The question asks us what roles the bolded portions play in the argument as a whole -- in other words, why did the author include each bolded piece? How do they serve the bigger picture of the argument?

(A) captures these roles much better than (B) does. Sure, the second boldface has the word "therefore," but does it act as a conclusion in the bigger picture of the argument? Not really -- it just outlines Pro-Tect's plan, which the author then assesses in his/her actual conclusion.

And is the first boldface a "judgment," as written in (B)? Not so much -- it's presented as a fact, not as a judgment. And thinking again about the bigger picture, the author includes the first boldface to indicate that Pro-Tect can't just reduce the number of policies. (A) fits way better -- the author includes the first boldface in order to "rules out a certain strategy for achieving a goal."

I hope that helps!
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Thanks, Charles! Your reply is very helpful (as always).

You're correct that the passage never explicitly states that Pro-Tect "has adopted" the policy of offering a discount. However, it does tell us that Pro-Tect "has decided to offer a discount." And since they have "decided" on this policy, we know they "have adopted" it.
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Pro-Tect cannot reduce the number of car-theft policies it carries, so cannot protect itself against continued large
payouts that way.
Therefore, Pro-Tect has decided to offer a discount to holders of
car-theft policies whose cars have antitheft devices.

A. The first rules out a certain strategy for achieving a goal; the second presents the
strategy that was adopted instead and whose effectiveness the argument assesses.

C. The first has been used as a consideration to support adopting a certain strategy
for achieving a goal; the second reports a decision to adopt an alternative strategy.

Between A and C. I would go for C.
If Blue+Red was boldfaced, I would have chosen A. Because, then it 'rules out' the strategy.

Since it is not the case, first one is only a consideration.
OA pls.

During the past year, Pro-Tect Insurance Company’s total payouts on car-theft claims were larger than the company can afford to sustain.
(An observation or phenomenon)

Pro-Tect cannot reduce the number of car-theft policies it carries, so cannot protect itself against continued large payouts that way.
(a constraint or ruling out a non-pragmatic option)

Therefore, Pro-Tect has decided to offer a discount to holders of car-theft policies whose cars have antitheft devices.
(a stretegy that PT has decided to adopt -> supporting the main conclusion)

Many policyholders will respond to the discount by installing antitheft devices, since the amount of the discount will within two years typically more than cover the cost of installation. ( a prediction that, if true, will support the conclusion . The dependent clause is the justification for the success possibilities of the main conclusion )

Thus, because cars with antitheft devices are rarely stolen, Pro-Tect’s plan is likely to reduce its annual payouts.(main conclusion of the argument)

A) Matches the analysis
B) First is not a judgement and second is not a conclusion.
C) First part is correct; second is incorrect as no alternate strategy has been discussed.
D) First part is correct; second is incorrect as argument doesn't discuss "alternate goal".
E) First is a consideration not against any strategy; second is not a conclusion.

Hence A is the correct one.

the second statement says that a co. has decided to do the mentioned step ...thus C clearly mentions this part. while A says taht decision has already been adopted and its effectiveness is being analyzed....a minor but substantial difference between A and C
While the first part of options A and C define the first bold part clearly.

I think, A cannot be the right answer for the fact that the Insurance Company has only decided to offer a discount, not yet offered a discount. Option A rather says the company already adopted the strategy; A is certainly wrong!

Deciding a strategy can be considered equivalent to adopting it - what you mean is probably implementation. Option A does not mention that the strategy was implemented, only that it was adopted, and how effective the adoption will be is what the passage assesses. option A is alright.

Dear Charles,

In BF question, there is always terms such as consideration, judgment, evidence...etc. Where is the best source to describe each term and its location (premise or conclusion) inside argument? or what is your best advice to learn those terms?

Thanks