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Nearly all adults in the community of Amaretti, including pregnant wom

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Nearly all adults in the community of Amaretti, including pregnant wom [#permalink] New post   Updated on: 20 Apr 2019, 04:15
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Nearly all adults in the community of Amaretti, including pregnant women, engage in ritual fasting throughout December and January. A recently completed study has revealed that, on the annual cognitive tests given to Amaretti's first-graders in each of last ten years, nearly 25% of the students scoring in the top fifth of the class, but only about 2% of those scoring in the bottom fifth, were born in November. Because pregnancy lasts nine months, only the mothers of children born in November would not have fasted during the entire pregnancies; therefore, the ritual fasting must have detrimental effects on developing babies.

which of the following ,if true, most weakens the argument?

A. No comparable data are available for students who were in first grade in Amaretti more than 10 years ago.

B. First-grade students who are absent from school when the cognitive tests are administered do not have the opportunity to take them at a latter time.

C. Each school grade in Amaretti is composed of students born between November 1 of a certain year and October 31 of the following year.

D. In Amaretti, non-cognitive birth defects, such as physical deformities , occur at a much lower rate among babies born in November than among babies born in other months

E. In typical year in Amaretti, between one-fourth and one-fifth of all babies are born in November.

From Thursday with Ron —— 20, 02, 2014
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C

Originally posted by MartinTao on 13 Apr 2019, 00:37.
Last edited by MartinTao on 20 Apr 2019, 04:15, edited 1 time in total.
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DClifelonglearner
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Nearly all adults in the community of Amaretti, including pregnant wom [#permalink] New post   Updated on: 22 Apr 2019, 21:01
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neha283 wrote:
DClifelonglearner wrote:
neha283 wrote:
Can someone explain the last 2 lines of this passage clearly? i faltered in assessing the answer choices because of this.
TIA!


Hi,

"A recently completed study has revealed that, on the annual cognitive tests given to Amaretti's first-graders in each of last ten years, nearly 25% of the students scoring in the top fifth of the class, but only about 2% of those scoring in the bottom fifth, were born in November."

-- It says that:
1. Every year for the last 10 years, a cognitive test has been held.
2. The test takers were 1st grade students.
3. Based on the performance of the test takers, a study has been done.
4. The study revealed that --> (Nearly 25% OF the students scoring in the TOP 1/5th of the class) AND (About 2% OF the students scoring in the BOTTOM 1/5th of the class) were born in November.

Because pregnancy lasts nine months, only the mothers of children born in November would not have fasted during the entire pregnancies; therefore, the ritual fasting must have detrimental effects on developing babies.

-- This mentions that:
1. Pregnancy lasts for 9 months.
2. Only the mothers of children born in November would not have fasted during the entire pregnancies. Why is it so? Consider this -> The fasting ritual is practiced in December and January. Pregnancy lasts 9 months and the baby is born after the completion of 9 months. And if the months of December and January should not fall DURING the pregnancy, the only way this can happen is if it (pregnancy) starts in February. Pregnancy would last till the end of October, or November. The baby would then be born in November.
Hence ONLY the mothers of children born in November didn't fast during the entire pregnancy.

The conclusion is that fasting causes a detrimental effect in the cognitive abilities of the children whose mothers fasted during pregnancy.

We can eliminate some of the options:

A --> can be eliminated since it says about data before 10 years.
B --> It doesn't mention the number of students being absent during the tests - it can be 1 student, or more. B is eliminated.
D --> Talks about physical deformities of children. Eliminated.


Hi,

Thank you for the detailed explanation, the passage is more clear now. However, option (C) tells us about the birth duration of its students which is year round, how does it weaken the claim that most students must be born in november since fasting causes a detrimental effect in the cognitive abilities of the children whose mothers fasted during pregnancy. ?

Thanks again!


Let's first consider option E: Every year, approximately 1/4th to 1/5th of all babies are born in November. We would have considered this option had the question mentioned that 25% of the bottom 1/5th scorers were also born in November; but that is not the case. Option E is eliminated.

Option C: It states that the students in the class are born between November 1 and October 31 of the next year. This means that the students born in November are the eldest compared to the rest. Therefore, this could be a reason that they have superior cognitive abilities compared to the rest of the class. This is the correct option.

Answer - C.

I took almost 6 mins to answer this question. However I arrived at the answer after eliminating all other options. Even then I didn't fully understand the meaning of option C. But later on I had to re-read the question and the option several times to understand it.

Hope this helps!!

Originally posted by DClifelonglearner on 14 Apr 2019, 00:08.
Last edited by DClifelonglearner on 22 Apr 2019, 21:01, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Nearly all adults in the community of Amaretti, including pregnant wom [#permalink] New post   13 Apr 2019, 09:18
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neha283 wrote:
Can someone explain the last 2 lines of this passage clearly? i faltered in assessing the answer choices because of this.
TIA!


Hi,

"A recently completed study has revealed that, on the annual cognitive tests given to Amaretti's first-graders in each of last ten years, nearly 25% of the students scoring in the top fifth of the class, but only about 2% of those scoring in the bottom fifth, were born in November."

-- It says that:
1. Every year for the last 10 years, a cognitive test has been held.
2. The test takers were 1st grade students.
3. Based on the performance of the test takers, a study has been done.
4. The study revealed that --> (Nearly 25% OF the students scoring in the TOP 1/5th of the class) AND (About 2% OF the students scoring in the BOTTOM 1/5th of the class) were born in November.

Because pregnancy lasts nine months, only the mothers of children born in November would not have fasted during the entire pregnancies; therefore, the ritual fasting must have detrimental effects on developing babies.

-- This mentions that:
1. Pregnancy lasts for 9 months.
2. Only the mothers of children born in November would not have fasted during the entire pregnancies. Why is it so? Consider this -> The fasting ritual is practiced in December and January. Pregnancy lasts 9 months and the baby is born after the completion of 9 months. And if the months of December and January should not fall DURING the pregnancy, the only way this can happen is if it (pregnancy) starts in February. Pregnancy would last till the end of October, or November. The baby would then be born in November.
Hence ONLY the mothers of children born in November didn't fast during the entire pregnancy.

The conclusion is that fasting causes a detrimental effect in the cognitive abilities of the children whose mothers fasted during pregnancy.

We can eliminate some of the options:

A --> can be eliminated since it says about data before 10 years.
B --> It doesn't mention the number of students being absent during the tests - it can be 1 student, or more. B is eliminated.
D --> Talks about physical deformities of children. Eliminated.
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Re: Nearly all adults in the community of Amaretti, including pregnant wom [#permalink] New post   13 Apr 2019, 06:30
Can someone explain the last 2 lines of this passage clearly? i faltered in assessing the answer choices because of this.
TIA!
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Re: Nearly all adults in the community of Amaretti, including pregnant wom [#permalink] New post   13 Apr 2019, 07:40
GMATNinja, GMATNinjaTwo - Can you help explain how does C weaken the argument?

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Re: Nearly all adults in the community of Amaretti, including pregnant wom [#permalink] New post   13 Apr 2019, 13:20
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DClifelonglearner wrote:
neha283 wrote:
Can someone explain the last 2 lines of this passage clearly? i faltered in assessing the answer choices because of this.
TIA!


Hi,

"A recently completed study has revealed that, on the annual cognitive tests given to Amaretti's first-graders in each of last ten years, nearly 25% of the students scoring in the top fifth of the class, but only about 2% of those scoring in the bottom fifth, were born in November."

-- It says that:
1. Every year for the last 10 years, a cognitive test has been held.
2. The test takers were 1st grade students.
3. Based on the performance of the test takers, a study has been done.
4. The study revealed that --> (Nearly 25% OF the students scoring in the TOP 1/5th of the class) AND (About 2% OF the students scoring in the BOTTOM 1/5th of the class) were born in November.

Because pregnancy lasts nine months, only the mothers of children born in November would not have fasted during the entire pregnancies; therefore, the ritual fasting must have detrimental effects on developing babies.

-- This mentions that:
1. Pregnancy lasts for 9 months.
2. Only the mothers of children born in November would not have fasted during the entire pregnancies. Why is it so? Consider this -> The fasting ritual is practiced in December and January. Pregnancy lasts 9 months and the baby is born after the completion of 9 months. And if the months of December and January should not fall DURING the pregnancy, the only way this can happen is if it (pregnancy) starts in February. Pregnancy would last till the end of October, or November. The baby would then be born in November.
Hence ONLY the mothers of children born in November didn't fast during the entire pregnancy.

The conclusion is that fasting causes a detrimental effect in the cognitive abilities of the children whose mothers fasted during pregnancy.

We can eliminate some of the options:

A --> can be eliminated since it says about data before 10 years.
B --> It doesn't mention the number of students being absent during the tests - it can be 1 student, or more. B is eliminated.
D --> Talks about physical deformities of children. Eliminated.


Hi,

Thank you for the detailed explanation, the passage is more clear now. However, option (C) tells us about the birth duration of its students which is year round, how does it weaken the claim that most students must be born in november since fasting causes a detrimental effect in the cognitive abilities of the children whose mothers fasted during pregnancy. ?

Thanks again!
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Re: Nearly all adults in the community of Amaretti, including pregnant wom [#permalink] New post   13 Apr 2019, 17:18
It is because kids born in november are always the oldest in the class.
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Re: Nearly all adults in the community of Amaretti, including pregnant wom [#permalink] New post   16 Apr 2019, 11:41
I am still stuck between C and E. Not so sure, why and how we can reject E. Can someone please explain in detail, how we can reject E?
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Re: Nearly all adults in the community of Amaretti, including pregnant wom [#permalink] New post   16 Apr 2019, 12:10
Hi arorni

DClifelonglearner explains it well.Ron Purewal also more or less says the same thing said by DClifelonglearner

This question is tackled very well by Ron purewal. My answer is very heavily borrowed from Ron's analysis of this problem(The first time I solved this problem I marked E)

Ron Purewal says, and rightly so, that weaken, strengthen or assumption answer choices have to, in a way , explain the question.Lets see the options now.

E - Incorrect.
This option doesn't explain the fact that 2% of students in the bottom fifth were born in November.Though 25% of the top fifth goes with the option.If 1/5th of babies were born in November then normally 1/5th of both the top performing and bottom performing students will comprise of those born in November.

C - Correct.
This option hits the nail on the head.This basically says the reason November kids do well is because they are the oldest in the class and not because their mothers fasted. Gives an alternate reason.

Hope it's clear...
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Re: Nearly all adults in the community of Amaretti, including pregnant wom [#permalink] New post   16 Apr 2019, 12:26
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Hi arorni

DClifelonglearner explains it well.Ron Purewal also more or less says the same thing said by DClifelonglearner

This question is tackled very well by Ron purewal. My answer is very heavily borrowed from Ron's analysis of this problem(The first time I solved this problem I marked E)

Ron Purewal says, and rightly so, that weaken, strengthen or assumption answer choices have to, in a way , explain the question.Lets see the options now.

E - Incorrect.
This option doesn't explain the fact that 2% of students in the bottom fifth were born in November.Though 25% of the top fifth goes with the option.If 1/5th of babies were born in November then normally 1/5th of both the top performing and bottom performing students will comprise of those born in November.

C - Correct.
This option hits the nail on the head.This basically says the reason November kids do well is because they are the oldest in the class and not because their mothers fasted. Gives an alternate reason.

Hope it's clear...


Thanks a lot.. I got it now...
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Re: Nearly all adults in the community of Amaretti, including pregnant wom [#permalink] New post   16 Apr 2019, 12:29
arorni wrote:
I am still stuck between C and E. Not so sure, why and how we can reject E. Can someone please explain in detail, how we can reject E?


First, try to understand the meaning of both the options C and E.

Next, try finding out which of these 2 options better explain the following fact:
" 25% of top 1/5th scorers AND 2% of bottom 1/5th scorers were born in November".

You'd then understand why E should be eliminated and C is our answer.

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Re: Nearly all adults in the community of Amaretti, including pregnant wom [#permalink] New post   16 Apr 2019, 13:03
Can someone please explain how "e" is wrong...

Also I didn't understand the meaning and how to link this with argument...


Thanks in advance

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Re: Nearly all adults in the community of Amaretti, including pregnant wom [#permalink] New post   19 Apr 2019, 02:14
rakeshtewatia0105 wrote:
Can someone please explain how "e" is wrong...

Also I didn't understand the meaning and how to link this with argument...


Thanks in advance

Posted from my mobile device


If E is true, then the percentages of those children born in Nov. who score the top fifth and the bottom fifth will both be around 25%.
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Re: Nearly all adults in the community of Amaretti, including pregnant wom [#permalink] New post   19 Apr 2019, 02:33
The Option B directly attacks the validity of the survey. Whereas, Option C makes a huge jump in assumption that older kids have better cognitive abilities. I went with B. Kindly tell on what grounds we can eliminate B.
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Re: Nearly all adults in the community of Amaretti, including pregnant wom [#permalink] New post   19 Apr 2019, 22:36
ravi546 wrote:
The Option B directly attacks the validity of the survey. Whereas, Option C makes a huge jump in assumption that older kids have better cognitive abilities. I went with B. Kindly tell on what grounds we can eliminate B.


Option B just mentions students who skip the test can't reappear for it.
But it doesn't mention the number of students who skipped. It can be 0, or 5, or 10, or any number. So we can't say for sure whether this fact actually affects conclusion.
Because if 90% of the students of a class skipped then definitely the conclusion comes into question. However, if none of the students, or just 1 student skipped then it doesn't really affect the conclusion.
So option B is very vague.

Hope this helps!!
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Re: Nearly all adults in the community of Amaretti, including pregnant wom [#permalink] New post   19 Apr 2019, 23:06
DClifelonglearner wrote:
ravi546 wrote:
The Option B directly attacks the validity of the survey. Whereas, Option C makes a huge jump in assumption that older kids have better cognitive abilities. I went with B. Kindly tell on what grounds we can eliminate B.


Option B just mentions students who skip the test can't reappear for it.
But it doesn't mention the number of students who skipped. It can be 0, or 5, or 10, or any number. So we can't say for sure whether this fact actually affects conclusion.
Because if 90% of the students of a class skipped then definitely the conclusion comes into question. However, if none of the students, or just 1 student skipped then it doesn't really affect the conclusion.
So option B is very vague.

Hope this helps!!

Don't you think that older kids are more intelligent is a huge assumption to make? I feel that attacking the validity of the survey results is better than assuming something.
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Re: Nearly all adults in the community of Amaretti, including pregnant wom [#permalink] New post   20 Apr 2019, 02:49
ravi546 wrote:
DClifelonglearner wrote:
ravi546 wrote:
The Option B directly attacks the validity of the survey. Whereas, Option C makes a huge jump in assumption that older kids have better cognitive abilities. I went with B. Kindly tell on what grounds we can eliminate B.


Option B just mentions students who skip the test can't reappear for it.
But it doesn't mention the number of students who skipped. It can be 0, or 5, or 10, or any number. So we can't say for sure whether this fact actually affects conclusion.
Because if 90% of the students of a class skipped then definitely the conclusion comes into question. However, if none of the students, or just 1 student skipped then it doesn't really affect the conclusion.
So option B is very vague.

Hope this helps!!

Don't you think that older kids are more intelligent is a huge assumption to make? I feel that attacking the validity of the survey results is better than assuming something.


IMO questions which are not from OG can always be debated. Moreover we don't know the official explanation of why C is the best answer in this case. Verbal experts in this forum have time and again reiterated that we shouldn't really worry too much on questions other than OG ones. So we can always come up with our own interpretations and logic on why an option could be better than the other.

Having said that, I'd like to mention my line of reasoning:
I eliminated E because it didn't mention the specific number of students, if at all any, who would have missed the tests. If there were no students who missed then there would have been no impact at all on the conclusion. However, if majority of students missed then the conclusion is shaken. To mark this option as the correct answer we'd have to assume that majority students missed - to me this was far fetched. Hence I eliminated this option.

When I first solved this question I didn't understand option C at all! I purely marked it because I had eliminated the other 4 options with conviction and guessed that C must be the best answer.

I tried finding Ron Purewel's answer explanation to this question but couldn't find it.
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Re: Nearly all adults in the community of Amaretti, including pregnant wom [#permalink] New post   20 Apr 2019, 04:13
Hi DClifelonglearner,
You can get it in Thursday with Ron —— 20, 02, 2014.
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Re: Nearly all adults in the community of Amaretti, including pregnant wom [#permalink] New post   01 Dec 2021, 00:12
None of the options give a proper answer. We need an expert comment on this.
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Re: Nearly all adults in the community of Amaretti, including pregnant wom [#permalink] New post   29 Jun 2022, 10:10
C says November born children are older than others, but how can we relate that older means smarter!! (as nothing such is mentioned in the argument)
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Re: Nearly all adults in the community of Amaretti, including pregnant wom [#permalink]
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