Bunuel wrote:
In a survey of freshmen at University X, two-thirds claimed never to have plagiarized while in high school. However, the survey may overstate the proportion of freshmen at University X who did not plagiarize in high school because ________.
Which of the following best completes the passage above?
A. some people who do not attend University X probably plagiarized in high school.
B. some people who plagiarized in high school may not do so in college.
C. some people who claimed to have plagiarized once may have done so many times.
D. at University Z, one half of the freshmen admitted to having plagiarized in high school.
E. some freshmen who did plagiarize in high school might have claimed on the survey that they did not do so.
KAPLAN OFFICIAL EXPLANATION:
E
The focus of this passage is the accuracy of a particular survey. Any answer choice that doesn't deal directly with the scope of the survey is out of scope of the question. We know
that two-thirds of the freshmen on the survey
claimed not to have plagiarized. We're asked to explain why the true proportion of those who did not plagiarize may-actually be lower. The correct choice will be the one that explains the inaccuracy of the survey results, and is within the scope of the passage.
(A) is out of scope; we're only concerned with students at University X who answered the survey. (B) is irrelevant to the argument; the survey is concerned only with how many students plagiarized in high school, not how many may plagiarize in college. (C) doesn't work because the survey asks only whether a student ever plagiarized, not how often. (D) tells us that the proportion of those who did not plagiarize is lower at another school, but that has no bearing on the proportion at University X as reported by the survey (E) is correct: It tells us that some plagiarizers might have denied doing so on the survey. If that's true, then the survey results are inaccurate and the actual proportion who did not plagiarize is lower than two-thirds.