Newspaper editors should not allow reporters to write the headlines

Newspaper Headlines

Step 1: Identify the Question

The words most strengthens in the question indicate that this is a Strengthen the Argument question.

Step 2: Deconstruct the Argument

© Ed shouldn’t let reporters write own HL

Clever HL have info not in story

Step 3: Pause and State the Goal

On Strengthen questions, the goal is to find an answer that will make the conclusion more likely. In this case, you are looking to support the idea that reporters should not write headlines for their own stories.

Step 4: Work from Wrong to Right

(A) This answer weakens the argument, suggesting that the reporter who wrote the story would be in a better position to write the headline because he knows what is newsworthy in the story.

(B) This information weakens the conclusion. A reporter is very likely to have sufficient understanding of the story, so he would be able to write the headline.

(C) It is unclear if this information relates to whether reporters should write their own headlines. Research about other reporters’ methods might help a reporter if those methods were better, but could also hurt story and headline quality if the other reporters also made errors, such as writing headlines that were too clever.

(D) In the context of this argument, knowledge about the story is actually bad because it results in writing headlines that include information not in the story. This answer suggests that people beyond the reporter may actually have this problem as well. If anything, this answer slightly weakens the argument because it suggests that even if a reporter does not write his own headline, the headline could still suffer the same problems if the person chosen to write it knows too much.

(E) CORRECT. The argument states that reporters write headlines with information not in the story. Although you might have recognized the problem with this type of headline (how would the average reader see it was clever or understand?), it is not clearly stated that this type of a headline is a problem. Maybe newspapers like having such headlines to attract clever readers or encourage readers to think more deeply about the subject. This answer establishes that the kind of headlines reporters were writing are, in fact, not desired, at least from the perspective of the editor, supporting the idea that the reporters should not write their own headlines.

Argument Evaluation

Situation
The headlines newspaper reporters write for their own stories are often clever only because they allude to little-known information that never appears explicitly in the stories themselves.

Reasoning
What would most help the argument support the conclusion that newspaper editors should not allow reporters to write headlines for their own stories? The argument's only explicit premise is that the headlines newspaper reporters write for their own stories are often clever only because they allude to little-known information that never appears explicitly in the stories themselves. In order for this premise to support the conclusion that newspaper editors should not allow reporters to write their own headlines, it would be helpful to be given a reason why editors should avoid headlines alluding to such little-known information.

(A) This suggests that reporters are likely to write better headlines for their stories than editors are, so it weakens the argument that editors should not allow reporters to write their own headlines.

(B) Since a reporter who wrote a story is likely to understand that story well, this does not provide a reason why editors should not allow reporters to write their own headlines.

(C) If most reporters did what is suggested, they could perhaps hone their headline-writing skills—unless almost all reporters are weak in such skills, as suggested in the given information. The fact that they do not bother to do so may help explain why reporters' headline-writing skills are weak. An explanation of why this is so does not provide additional support for the argument's conclusion.

(D) The people who know more about a story's subject matter than the reporter writing the story might be just as likely to see the cleverness of allusions to little-known information as the reporters are. So, to the extent that this is relevant at all, it slightly weakens the argument by suggesting that obscurely clever headlines sometimes function as intended.

(E) Correct. The argument's explicit premise suggests that typically a reporter's headline for his or her own story cannot be recognized as clever by a reader who has read the whole story. So, if editors want headlines that anyone who has read the accompanying stories would recognize as clever, they have a reason not to let reporters write the headlines.