Ten years ago, the country of Vorland adopted new automobile safety re

Introduction of new safety regulations requiring airbags and better seat in automobiles Annual number of drivers and passengers hospitalized overnight for automobile accidents decreased Regulations ===> Made Vorland's automobiles safer for drivers and passengers ( Involved in accidents )

Except option (E) all other options are out of scope and irrelevant...

Why (E) ? Lets negate option (E)

Over the past ten years, there has been a steady decline in the annual number of drivers and passengers involved in automobile accidents in Vorland.

Decline in no of accidents = Decline in no of hospitalization

So, the new regulations are not responsible for the improvements in safety standards of Drivers.... <----- The argument falls apart.

Hence correct answer will be (E)

(A) The citizens of Vorland generally obey all national and local speed limits. -- out of context

(B) Of the patients treated at hospitals in Vorland, the percentage treated being treated for injuries sustained in automobile accidents has decreased in the past ten years. -- precentage cannot be related to number here.

(C) The safety improvements required by the regulations have not significantly affect the price of new automobiles. -- out of scope

(D) There has been no increase in speed limits on Vorland's major highways over the past ten years. -- out of context

(E) Over the past ten years, there has not been a steady decline in the annual number of drivers and passengers involved in automobile accidents in Vorland.

correct . if we negate this option, as the no. of accidents reduced so no. of people hospitalised reduced but not the effect of regulations.

Ten years ago , the country of Vorland adopted new automobile safety regulations requiring airbags and better seat belts in all new automobiles.

Since then, the annual number of drivers and passengers hospitalized overnight or longer for injuries sustained in automobile accidents has steadily declined.

Clearly, the regulations have made Vorland's automobiles safer for drivers and passengers who are involved in accidents.

Which of the following is an assumption on which the argument depends?

we can filter out options A, D and C for going out of scope regarding speed limits.

(A) The citizens of Vorland generally obey all national and local speed limits. ......OFS

(C) The safety improvements required by the regulations have not significantly affect the price of new automobiles. .......OFS

(D) There has been no increase in speed limits on Vorland's major highways over the past ten years. .........OFS

Tight competition is between B and E. Both talk about accidents.

(B) Of the patients treated at hospitals in Vorland, the percentage treated being treated for injuries sustained in automobile accidents has decreased in the past ten years. ............key word is percentage here. %reduction can never ensure the reduction of the annual number of drivers and passengers hospitalized overnight or longer for injuries sustained in automobile accidents. Both the the percentage treated being treated for injuries and annual number of drivers and passengers hospitalized can reduce and still the regulations may not have made Vorland's automobiles safer for drivers and passengers who are involved in accidents.


(E) Over the past ten years, there has not been a steady decline in the annual number of drivers and passengers involved in automobile accidents in Vorland................Here we have no ambiguity and is the correct choice.

There are two important GMAT patterns in the stem. Noticing these patterns can help make a prediction before looking at the answer choices.

First, this is a classic correlation/causation argument. The stem argues that because two things happened together (the new regulations and the decline in injuries requiring hospitalization) one of those things caused the other (the new regulations led to the decline in the number of people going to the hospital after auto accidents). Built into this argument is the assumption that something else wasn't the real cause. In this case we have to assume that something other than seat-belts and airbags wasn't the real reason the number of people who went to the hospital after an accident declined. That's already a pretty good prediction.

The second useful pattern to notice in the stem is the word 'number'. The GMAT loves to reward test takers who are always on the look out for the difference between percentages/rates/proportions and absolute numbers. Here, our evidence is just that the absolute number of hospitalization-requiring injuries sustained in auto accidents declined. It doesn't tell us, for example, that the percentage of accidents that resulted in injuries requiring hospitalization declined. And that gives us a pretty good idea of something other than regulations about seatbelts and airbags that might have caused the decline: maybe there were just fewer accidents. This way the percentage of accidents that caused severe injuries could have remained the same (i.e. seatbelts and airbags didn't help at all) even though a smaller number of accident victims showed up at the hospital.

In other words, we have to assume that there was NOT a steady decline in the number of accidents. D.

please explain why the answer is E

hii
shweta,
happy to respond you
see what we need focus on this part of the stimulus 'the annual number of drivers and passengers hospitalized overnight or longer for injuries sustained in automobile accidents has steadily declined' . so it deos not mean that the # of accidents has decreased, and in option E it states that although the no of accidents has not declined but the safety plan helped in reducing injuries and getting hospitalized of drivers and passengers involved in accidents .
so many of the driver and passengers would have involved in accidents but it does not necessary that they all have injured and hospitalized just because the safety plan such air bags and seat belts .

hope that makes sense
if you liked my post press kudos

P1: New safety rules, air bags and better seat belts in all cars.
P2: Annual # of overnight or longer hospitalized injuries decreased
C: New regulations made cars safer for ppl involved in accidents
Assumption
Number of accidents is not less than before -> If less then the number of hospitalized injures decreased could be due to other factor
There can be other assumptions. We need to pay attention to those answers that either Support the conclusion by introducing some other facts that help strengthen the conclusion or Defend the conclusion from possible attack by other contradicting/weakening facts that can undermine the conclusion.
1) Ppl generally obey all speed limits -> this affects only the number of accidents and we don’t know whether most of the accidents happened because of people not obeying speed limits -> IRRELEVANT
2) Overall percentage of patients involved in automobile accidents has decreased in the last 10 years -> This includes all cases, including those overnight or longer cases. We care about a specific case. -> Hence INCORRECT
3) Price of cars is IRRELEVANT
4) We DON’T know how speed limit affects the severity of the accidents. IRRELEVANT
5) If number of accidents declined -> number of hospitalized injures could also decrease proportionally and this could hurt the argument. This assumption negates such possibility. CORRECT

Ten years ago, the country of Vorland adopted new automobile safety regulations requiring airbags and better seat belts in all new automobiles. Since then, the annual number of drivers and passengers hospitalized overnight or longer for injuries sustained in automobile accidents has steadily declined. Clearly, the regulations have made Vorland's automobiles safer for drivers and passengers who are involved in accidents.

Which of the following is an assumption on which the argument depends?


(A) The citizens of Vorland generally obey all national and local speed limits.

(B) Of the patients treated at hospitals in Vorland, the percentage treated being treated for injuries sustained in automobile accidents has decreased in the past ten years.

(C) The safety improvements required by the regulations have not significantly affect the price of new automobiles.

(D) There has been no increase in speed limits on Vorland's major highways over the past ten years.

(E) Over the past ten years, there has not been a steady decline in the annual number of drivers and passengers involved in automobile accidents in Vorland.

VeritasKarishma GMATNinja Can you help me eliminate B and choose E ? Negation test is not working here...

The secret to cracking this question, like with all other difficult CR questions is in reading CLOSELY. Reading closely is paying strong attention to the phrasing and real words used. The reason for this the traps on these type of questions lay in getting you to assume what the statements are saying. For example on this questions its easy to miss that the question is talking about a reduction in the seriousness of the injuries not the reduction in accident rates. The keywords here are more than overnight. Once we have figured out this then we can crack on any type of question thrown at us from the stem: strengthen, weaken, or even assumption.

In option E, it can also be that even if the total number of accidents are decreasing, the number of serious accidents are constant. Say suppose the total number of accidents went down from 100 to 75, but the serious accidents remained at 50.
Please explain the above.

I marked D because if the speed limit has been increased, then the cars would have to abide by the traffic rules and hence lower accidents.

Understanding the argument -
Ten years ago, the country of Vorland adopted new automobile safety regulations requiring airbags and better seat belts in all new automobiles. Fact
Since then, the annual number of drivers and passengers hospitalized overnight or longer for injuries sustained in automobile accidents has steadily declined. Fact
Clearly, the regulations have made Vorland's automobiles safer for drivers and passengers who are involved in accidents. - Conclusion. Two independent events, and we convert them to a causal connection. So earlier, there were 1000 automobile accidents, out of which 100 passengers were HOSPITALISED for automobile accidents (the rest 900 were, say, minor or didn't require hospitalization). And now, after the introduction of regulation, the "number of drivers and passengers HOSPITALISED overnight or longer for injuries sustained in automobile accidents has steadily declined," say to 20.

If it helps, let's look at it this way: the regulations have made Vorland's automobiles safer for drivers and passengers involved in accidents BECAUSE
1. The annual number of drivers and passengers hospitalized overnight or longer for injuries sustained in automobile accidents has steadily declined
2. Ten years ago, the country of Vorland adopted new automobile safety regulations requiring airbags and better seat belts in all new automobiles

What can weaken the conclusion - what if the "1000" number has come down to 80? So, the number of drivers and passengers HOSPITALIZED will also reduce. If that happens, it means there is some alternate cause Z (which we do not know what) that caused the number of drivers and passengers HOSPITALIZED to reduce.

So, we need to guard the conclusion against this weakness. How? By assuming that this didn't happen.

Option Elimination -

(A) The citizens of Vorland generally obey all national and local speed limits. - Applicable when the number of accidents was higher as well. Distortion.

(B) Of the patients treated at hospitals in Vorland, the percentage of being treated for injuries sustained in automobile accidents has decreased in the past ten years. - This is a classic trap. The conclusion talks about numbers, and the answer choice talks about percentages. Percentages can be misleading. Say earlier, out of 1000, 100 were HOSPITALISED, showing the percentage to be 10%. Suppose the total number of automobile accidents is 10,000, and now the number of drivers and passengers HOSPITALISED is 500, showing the percentage as 5%. But has the number of HOSPITALIZAIONS reduced as well? No. The number has increased five times. Distortion.

(C) The safety improvements required by the regulations have not significantly affect the price of new automobiles. - Had we been given the argument that buyers are price-conscious, we would have considered this a contender. But since we don't know about that, this is out of scope. What if Volland is one of the wealthiest countries in the world, and people don't care about price? Or it can be the poorest. We don't know, so let's not make any unnecessary assumptions to make it work. . More importantly, the argument does not talk about the price consciousness of automobile buyers.

(D) There has been no increase in speed limits on Vorland's major highways over the past ten years. - Distortion.

(E) Over the past ten years, there has not been a steady decline in the annual number of drivers and passengers involved in automobile accidents in Vorland. - Please read the question stem clearly. It is that the number of drivers and passengers HOSPITALISED has reduced out of the total number of drivers and passengers involved in automobile accidents. But if somehow we didn't read well and subconsciously assumed that the number of drivers and passengers HOSPITALISED has reduced out of the total number of accidents (Auto or non-auto), then this option may sound as if we already know it from the passage and doesn't add value and we may strike it off. But "read question stem" carefully. Correlate each line with the past one to make sense.

The author specifically argues that "the regulations have made Vorland's automobiles safer for drivers and passengers who are involved in accidents."

"The regulations" are "new automobile safety regulations requiring airbags and better seat belts in all new automobiles."

We're looking for an assumption on which this argument depends. In other words, which answer choice MUST be true in order for the argument to hold up?

Here's the exact language of (D):


(D) tells us that there "has been no increase" in speed limits. This means that the speed limit has either stayed the same or gone down. On the whole, then, the speed limits either wouldn't impact crashes or would make the number of crashes go down.

Do we need to assume this? Not at all. The author says that the safety regulations requiring airbags and better seat belts are the reason why a smaller number of people are hospitalized overnought. (D) opens the door to another explanation: maybe speed limits went down and made accidents less dangerous, and THAT is the reason for the lower hospitalizations. This actually hurts the author's argument a bit, so we definitely don't need to assume this.

Eliminate (D).

Here's (E):


Remember that the author thinks that the new regulations are the reason why serious hospitalizations are down. But wait -- what if there are just fewer accidents, and THAT is why fewer people stay overnight in the hospital? (E) eliminates this possibility. We need to assume that there are NOT fewer accidents in order for the author's argument to hold up.

Your example would actually support the author's argument: if serious accidents stayed the same (at 50), but overnight hospitalizations went way down, that strengthens the argument that the regulations have worked.

I hope that helps!