Spovil wrote:
People who do not believe that others distrust them are confident in their own abilities, so people who tend to trust others think of a difficult task as a challenge rather than a threat, since this is precisely how people who are confident in their won abilities regard such tasks.
The conclusion above follows logically if which one of the following is assumed?
(A) People who believe that others distrust them tend to trust others.
(B) Confidence in one’s own abilities gives one confidence in the trustworthiness of others.
(C) People who tend to trust others do not believe that others distrust them.
(D) People who are not threatened by difficult tasks tend to find such tasks challenging.
(E) People tend to distrust those who they believe lack self-confidence.
My analysis is below.
Conc: P who trust others:
Dif task = challengeBasis of Conc (BofC): P who
are confident in their own abilities:
Dif task = challengeP1: P who believe that O trust P :
Confident in their own abilitiesAs showed above. the different colors highlights the linkages between the different parts of the argument. So, In order for the conclusion to be true, we need to establish the linkage (assumption) between P1 and the Conclusion.
A valid assumption would be that P who trust others believe that others trust them. (Option C is correct)
If we negate it: "P who trust others don't believe that others trust them" breaks the conclusion.
A)
Incorrect. We are not concern about people who believe that others distrust them (different group of people is mention in the argument: people who do not believe that others distrust them = people who believe that other trust them)
B) Incorrect. This links P1 with the BofC. We need a linkage with the Conclusion.
D) OFS. Argument is not concerned with this group of people threatened by a task. Argument just talks about that the target group of people consider difficult tasks as a challenge rather than a threat.
E) OFS. this option makes a general assumption about all people.