Eating saltwater fish may significantly reduce the risk of heart attac

Question

Eating saltwater fish may  significantly reduce the risk of heart attacks and also aid for  sufferers of rheumatoid arthritis and asthma, according to three research studies published in the  Journal of Medicine .

(A) significantly reduce the risk of heart attacks and also aid for

(B) be significant in reducing the risk of heart attacks and aid for

(C) significantly reduce the risk of heart attacks and aid

(D) cause a significant reduction in the risk of heart attacks and aid to

(E) significantly reduce the risk of heart attacks as well as aiding

https://www.nytimes.com/1985/05/09/us/heart-risk-termed-lower-with-fish-in-diet.html

Eating fish once a week may  significantly reduce the risk of heart attack and  may even be beneficial to those suffering from rheumatoid arthritis and asthma, researchers said Wednesday.

aid for, aid to, aiding <-- what's correct here?

egmat · Accepted Answer

Hi bagdmba,

This is in response to the question you asked in the thread: various-functions-of-verb-ing-words-158049.html#p1258698

Eating saltwater fish may significantly reduce the risk of heart attacks and also aid for sufferers of rheumatoid arthritis and asthma, according to three research studies published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

The phrase “aid for” is a noun phrase which means “help for”. For example:
UN’s aid for Somalia children reaches them on time.

But in this sentence "aid" must be parallel to “reduce” and hence, must be a verb to become grammatically parallel to “reduce”. When “aid” is used as verb, we cannot use preposition after it.

o UN aids Somalia children by providing them with food and medicines.

Now, the manner in which “aid” is used in this sentence makes it illogically parallel to the risk of heart attacks: - i.e. eating saltwater fish may significantly reduce two things

o The risk of heart attack
o Aid for sufferers of arthritis – illogical implying that actual “aid” for arthritis patients may be reduced.

Thus, it is very important to use words in their correct form, otherwise meaning can be thoroughly distorted. In this sentence, we were able to infer the intended logical meaning. Based on this understanding, we should select the answer that communicates the logical meaning.

PoE:

(A) significantly reduce the risk of heart attacks and also aid for: Incorrect for the reasons stated above.

(B) be significant in reducing the risk of heart attacks and aid for: Incorrect. As in choice A, this choice also communicates illogical meaning. In this choice is means in reducing “the risk…” and (in reducing) “aid for…”.

(C) significantly reduce the risk of heart attacks and aid: Correct answer.

(D) cause a significant reduction in the risk of heart attacks and aid to: Incorrect.
1. As in choice A, this choice also communicated illogical meaning. There are two possible lists here. But each is illogical.

a. List 1- eating saltwater fish cause a significant reduction in
i. the risk of heart attack and
ii. aid to sufferers

b. List 2- eating saltwater fish cause
i. a significant reduction in the risk of heart attack and
ii. aid to sufferers

2. Cause aid to sufferers is awkward and wordy. We say – provide aid to sufferers, not cause aid to sufferers.

(E) significantly reduce the risk of heart attacks as well as aiding: Incorrect. “aiding” is verb-ing of “aid” which not parallel to “reduce”.

Hope this helps. :-)

Thanks.
Shraddha

Thanks. Shraddha

DmitryFarber · Answer

Yes, the basic sentence core is "Eating fish may reduce the risk and aid sufferers." The subject is singular (eating fish is one activity), so if we didn't have "may," we'd say "Eating fish reduces the risk and aids sufferers." However, with "may" (as with any modal verb, such as  will  or  should ), we use the bare infinitive--the "to" form without the word "to."

Notice that in the examples below, the verb changes whether we she (singular) or they (plural), but not if we precede it with a modal verb.

She eats lots of vegetables.
They eat lots of vegetables.
She should eat lots of vegetables.
They should eat lots of vegetables.

She is the greatest singer in North America.
They are the greatest singers in North America.
She may be the greatest singer in North America.
They may be the greatest singers in North America.

simonsanchez · Answer

It has to be  C 
You cannot "aid  for  sufferers", so A & B are out bc 'aid' is an active verb in this case.
You cannot "aid  to  sufferers" so bye-bye D.
And E has agreement issues btw "reduce" and "as well as aiding"
 C  it is by POE and by the fact that  reduce  and  aid  both act as active verbs in their respective clauses.
BTW, because  may  is part of the actual sentence, it should be "may significantly reduce" and not "may significantly reduces", to answer  trahul4 's question.

whamberto · Answer

I have chosen C for this question:

A. "Aid for" is not correct here - it seems to be acting as a noun that is parallel to risk. This makes no sense.

B. Same as A. If "aid" was used as a verb, it wouldn't be parallel to "reducing," so this answer choice is incorrect in either case.

C. This is the correct answer. The verb "aid" is parallel to reduce and the meaning of the sentence is clear.

D. Again, "aid to" seems to act as a noun that is parallel to risk, but this meaning doesn't make any sense. Also, "cause a significant reduction in the risk..." seems wordy - this could definitely be more concise.

E. We have a parallelism error here - reduce and aiding are not parallel.

HarishLearner · Answer

"Eating saltwater  fish  may significantly..."

How can we know if  fish  used in the above sentence is singular or plural?

pqhai · Answer

Hi HarishLearner

"Fish" is both singular and plural . We do not say "fishes". (may be we can see "fishes" in old bible, but it's rare.)
Example: I have 3 fish. (not 3 fishes).
Other example: deer, beer, etc.

Hope it's clear.

cuhmoon · Answer

Hi,

Had a q regarding this question. Eating saltwater fish --> This phrase is singular.. The verb following this should be singular too.. How come reduce is a plural verb here.. Also, how does the presence of the word "May" make the verb plural?

Can someone please explain this?

Thanks!!

adkikani · Answer

GMATNinja   sayantanc2k   VeritasPrepKarishma

I think fundamentally verb 'aid' is not followed by any preposition.
Is my understanding correct?

DmitryFarber · Answer

The verb "aid" is not usually followed by a prepositional modifier, although I wouldn't rule out "aid in" in some cases: "Local firefighters will aid in the search for the missing child."

Of course, when "aid" is used as a noun, it is often followed by a prepositional modifier, as in "provide aid to the needy."

HasnainAfxal · Answer

(A) significantly reduce the risk of heart attacks and also  aid for

(B) be significant in reducing the risk of heart attacks and  aid for 
 
(C) significantly  reduce  the risk of heart attacks and  aid

(D) cause a significant  reduction  in the risk of heart attacks and  aid to

(E) significantly  reduce  the risk of heart attacks as well as  aiding

anujpal · Answer

(A) significantly reduce the risk of heart attacks and also aid for

(B) be significant in reducing the risk of heart attacks and aid for

(C) significantly reduce the risk of heart attacks and aid

(D) cause a significant reduction in the risk of heart attacks and aid to

(E) significantly reduce the risk of heart attacks as well as aiding

Only C is parallel structure with reduce || to aid (use of modal verb may/will/should mandate the use of plural verb). So, ans is C.

CrackverbalGMAT · Answer

The easiest way to knock off the answer choices in this question is to realize that ‘ for’  is unnecessary in this question.

The second point we need to keep in mind is that ‘ reduce ’ and ‘ aid ’ are  parallel  verbs.

Now, let’s scan the options:

(A) significantly reduce the risk of heart attacks and also  aid for

(B) be significant in reducing the risk of heart attacks and  aid for

(C) significantly  reduce  the risk of heart attacks and  aid

(D) cause a significant  reduction  in the risk of heart attacks and  aid to

(E) significantly  reduce  the risk of heart attacks as well as  aiding

Eliminate Options A, B, D, and E.  
  
Option C  is the best choice.

Hope this helps!

swapnils10 · Answer

Can we eliminate on the basis of "Significantly" Vs "Significant"

GMATNinja · Answer

"Significantly" is not an inherently better word to use than "significant." It all depends on the context of the sentence.

Here are two versions back-to-back:

"Eating saltwater fish may  significantly  reduce the risk of heart attacks..." 
"Eating saltwater fish may cause a  significant  reduction in the risk of heart attacks..."

Both of these are just fine! Maybe the second version is a bit less direct, but that's not a strong reason to eliminate an answer choice. Subtle differences in clarity should be considered ONLY if there are absolutely no other issues with the sentence.

Luckily, there are very strong reasons to eliminate the incorrect answer choices in this question -- the parallelism is completely off in (A), (B), (D), and (E), leaving (C) as the only possible answer.

For more on this approach to sentence correction questions, check out  this  article.

I hope that helps!

AnirudhaS · Answer

OE:
 Diction; Parallelism 
The word aid can be a noun or a verb; here it should be a verb that is
parallel to the verb reduce. If aid were a noun, it would parallel risk and
so would mean illogically that eating fish reduces aid for sufferers as
well as the risk of heart attacks.
A. Aid for seems to be a noun, parallel to the noun risk, indicating that
eating saltwater fish reduces aid for sufferers.
B. Aid for seems to be a noun, parallel to the noun risk, indicating that
eating saltwater fish reduces aid for sufferers.
C.  Correct.  In this sentence, aid is used as a verb, parallel to the verb
reduce. Sufferers is the direct object of aid; no preposition is
needed.
D. Aid to is incorrectly used as a noun, suggesting that eating saltwater
fish reduces aid to sufferers.
E. While this sentence conveys the correct meaning, it lacks the
parallel structure found in the correct answer.
 The correct answer is C.

saby1410 · Answer

Can you explain why option D is wrong

Posted from my mobile device

GMATNinja · Answer

The problem is the parallelism. Let's first take a look at the parallelism in the correct answer choice (C):

Here, "reduce" and "aid" are parallel verbs (the word "significantly" is a modifier that doesn't really affect the parallelism). And each part of the parallel list works with what comes BEFORE the list:

1) Eating saltwater fish may significantly  reduce  the risk of heart attacks.
2) Eating saltwater fish may  aid  sufferers of rheumatoid arthritis and asthma.

Notice that in (D), we have " aid to  sufferers of rheumatoid arthritis and asthma..." But it doesn't make any sense to say, "Eating saltwater fish may  aid to  sufferers of rheumatoid arthritis and asthma.

Maybe you could interpret (D) as saying "eating saltwater fish may cause (1) a significant reduction in the risk of heart attacks and (2) aid to sufferers of rheumatoid arthritis and asthma." But the phrase "may cause... aid to sufferers" doesn't make any sense.

The parallelism in (D) could also be interpreted like this: "Eating saltwater fish may cause a significant reduction in (1) the risk of heart attacks and (2) aid to sufferers of rheumatoid arthritis and asthma..." This of course changes the meaning entirely, making it sound as though eating saltwater fish might actually REDUCE aid to sufferers.

It's unclear what's parallel to what in (D), and none of the possible interpretations make much sense. The parallelism in (C) is much better, and that's why it's our winner.

I hope that helps!

VerbalBot · Answer

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Eating saltwater fish may significantly reduce the risk of heart attac

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