Contrary to financial analysts, who predicted last year that the

Question

Contrary to financial analysts, who predicted last year that the market for home computers would dwindle, the personal computer industry continued to show strong growth in the first quarter of this year.

(A) analysts, who predicted
(B) analysts, whose predictions

(A) analysts, who predicted
(B) analysts, whose predictions
(C) analysts and their predictions
(D) analysts' predicting
(E) analysts' predictions

https://www.nytimes.com/1997/04/28/business/strong-growth-in-pc-industry-reports-say.html

Despite Wall Street anxieties about the market for home computers, the personal computer industry over all continues to show strong growth, according to two reports to be issued on Monday.

GMATNinja · Accepted Answer

This question is all about the comparison:

In the main part of the sentence, we have, "the personal computer industry continued to show strong growth in the first quarter of this year." 
 In the opening part, we need something that is  contrary  to that statement -- in other words, something that  goes against  the stated action of the personal computer industry (continuing to show growth). 
 Simply put, what follows "contrary to" should be something  different from  what actually happened (the personal computer industry continued to show strong growth...).

If we ignore the noun modifiers ("who..." and "whose...") in (A) and (B), we have, "Contrary to  financial analysts , the personal computer industry continued to show strong growth in the first quarter of this year."

What is it that's  different from  (contrary to) what actually happened? 
 In (A) and (B), it's the  financial analysts  themselves. But that doesn't make any sense! 
 The financial analysts are just the people who made the predictions, and the people themselves are not logically comparable to what actually happened.

Now take a look at the correct choice, (E):

What is it that's  different from  (contrary to) what actually happened? 
 Here, it's what the financial analysts PREDICTED would happen -- and that makes perfect sense! What actually happened (the PC industry continued to show strong growth) differs from what the analysts predicted would happen (the market for home computers would dwindle). 
 In (E), we have two things that are logically comparable, so it makes sense to contrast those two things using the construction, "Contrary to  ,  ."

Choice (C) can be eliminated for the same reason as (A) and (B): "contrary to  their predictions " could be okay, but, again, it doesn't make sense to compare what actually happened to the  financial analysts  themselves.

Choice (D) is a bit better than (A), (B), and (C), but the comparison is still a little off. Instead of, "Contrary to financial analysts'  predictions ," we have, "Contrary to financial analysts'  predicting ." So instead of comparing what actually happened to the predictions, (D) compares what actually happened to the  act  of predicting.

That isn't quite right, so (E) is the best choice.

I hope that helps!

AjiteshArun · Answer

Hi  ballest127 ,

I don't think we should look at this as a comparison. Or if we do, we should read the sentence a little differently. For example:

1.   Contrary to popular belief ,  the head of the committee is not responsible for this situation .

This is not a comparison, in the sense that  contrary to  is not meant to be read as  unlike . That is, we  cannot  read (1) as:

2.   Unlike popular belief, the head of the committee is not responsible for this situation.

Contrary to X  is just a way of saying that whatever we're about to introduce is the opposite of what X would indicate. So (1) actually means:

3.  Most people believe that the head of the committee is responsible for this situation, but he or she is not.

SonalSinha803 · Answer

E is the best option. Call conveys the accurate meaning in the most concise way.

Posted from my mobile device

SWAT09 · Answer

E
Contrary to financial analysts,who predicted last year that the market for home computers would dwindle, the personal computer industry continued to show strong growth in the first quarter of this year.

(a) analysts, who predicted - contrary to prediction not analysts themselves
(b) analysts, whose predictions - contrary to prediction not analysts themselves
(c) analysts and their predictions- and their unnecessary, not contrary to both
(d) analysts' predicting - incorrect
(e) analysts' predictions - correct

Doer01 · Answer

Hi,
 What jumps straight out right after the non-essential modifier is the noun, the personal computer industry, which did something against analysts!! But because its in the non-underlined portion, it is correct. So there is a meaning error that needs correction.
B has the same error. OUT
C makes analysts and their predictions parallel. OUT
D predicting makes it just wrong. there is a proper noun in the dictionary, why use a gerund ??
E uses the noun required "prediction". Now, the meaning error is corrected.: Winner

sayan640 · Answer

"the personal computer industry" is a thing and not a person. " financial  analysts," is a group of persons. Now a person cant be compared with 'a thing'. So option A is wrong.
Option B repeats the same error. Option C takes 'analysts' too and so repeats the same error. Option D also uses 'analysts'".
Option E introduces "predictions' and is the correct answer.
Please give me kudo s if you liked my answer.

ballest127 · Answer

Hi Experts,

I have a question.

Why can we use "contrary to" for comparison between "analysts' predictions" and "the personal computer industry"?

I think these two are not comparable.

Please explain.
Thank you.

Will2020 · Answer

GMATNinja VeritasKarishma DmitryFarber Can you please comment on this question? Why A and B is wrong? And E says that the analyst's predictions are contrary to the personal computer industry, does that makes sense? Isn't it supposed to be contrary to the "performance" of the personal computer industry? Also, should it be prediction (singular)? Since we are just talking about one prediction. it doesn't matter that this prediction was made by multiple analysts; it's still one prediction, right? Tks!

99ramanmehta · Answer

Hi  Will2020 ,

Although I'm not one of the experts you'd called out to, I'd still like to help you my friend.

Options A and B are incorrect as in both of these options 'financial analysts' (people) and 'current situation of the personal computer industry' (an event) are being compared.

Option E simply implies that contrary to the predictions (of the financial analysts) something else (the personal computer industry continued to show strong growth) happened.

DmitryFarberMPrep · Answer

Exactly! If we started a sentence with "Contrary to analysts," we'd need to follow with another group of people: "Contrary to analysts, auditors feel that XYZ." Even then, it's a bit odd--can two groups of people really be contrary to one another the way that two views can?

KarishmaB · Answer

Remove the non essential modifier and see if the sentence structure makes sense:

(A) Contrary to financial analysts, ..., the personal computer industry continued to show strong growth in the first quarter of this year.

On the other hand, look at the structure of (E):

Contrary to predictions that A will happen, B continued to show growth.

The predictions must have been that B will not show growth and this is contrary to reality. Correct.

Multiple analysts would have made their own predictions (of no growth). 
If they got together and gave out a single prediction as a group, that would be correct too. It is irrelevant in this question.

Kinshook · Answer

Contrary to financial  analysts, 
who predicted  last year 
that the market for home computers would dwindle, 
the personal computer industry continued to show strong growth in the first quarter of this year.

(a)  analysts , who predicted
(b)  analysts, whose predictions 
(c)  analysts and their  predictions
(d) analysts'  predicting 
(e)  analysts' predictions

IMO E

AmarpreetK · Answer

The correct option is E. The issue tested in this question is comparison
A: Incorrect, because the comparison is being made here between the analysts and the personal computer industry; while as per the meaning of the sentence the prediction of analysts made last year is compared with the reality in the computer industry in the present time.
B: Incorrect, because of the reason stated in A
C: Incorrect, Because of reason stated in A; also no need for adding a conjunction here 
D: Incorrect, because of the wrong verb tense.
E: Correct, because of correct comparision and the verb form

hassan233 · Answer

GMATNinja  your approach to this question would be greatly appreciated!!

Nefertiti9 · Answer

Contrary to financial analysts, who predicted last year that the market for home computers would dwindle, the personal computer industry continued to show strong growth in the first quarter of this year.

(A) analysts, who predicted
(B) analysts, whose predictions

(a) analysts, who predicted--> comparing analyst to computer industry
(b) analysts, whose predictions---> same as A
(c) analysts and their predictions---> comparing analyst and their predictions to computer industry 
(d) analysts' predicting--> Comparing Action to noun
(e) analysts' predictions---> BEST

contrary to -->needs a noun and E supplies the noun in correct from.

VerbalBot · Answer

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Contrary to financial analysts, who predicted last year that the

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Contrary to financial analysts, who predicted last year that the

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