People's supply of willpower is not infinite; psychologists have

Question

﻿People's supply of willpower is not infinite; psychologists have found that successfully accomplishing one task requiring self-control leads to less persistence on a second, seemingly unrelated task. But that finite supply can become larger, because, like a muscle, willpower grows with use: a recent study showed that people who followed a physical exercise program for two months reported studying more, watching less television, and doing more housework after those two months.

The reasoning above makes which of the following assumptions?

A. Studying, watching television, and doing housework should be considered tasks unrelated to one another.

B. The people in the study did not watch less television than the average person before the study took place.

C. People's supply of willpower cannot be increased by means other than repeatedly exercising that willpower.

D. The exercise program followed by the people in the study required more willpower than did whatever exercise they engaged in before the study.

E. Prior to the study, the people in the study had unsuccessfully attempted to demonstrate more self-control over their studying, television watching, or housework.

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MartyMurray · Accepted Answer

The conclusion of the argument is not clearly indicated by a keyword or by the structure of the argument. However, by considering which statement in the passage is supported by another statement, we can determine that the conclusion is the following:

that finite supply (of willpower) can become larger, because, like a muscle, willpower grows with use

The support for that conclusion is the following:

a recent study showed that people who followed a physical exercise program for two months reported studying more, watching less television, and doing more housework after those two months

The correct answer to the question must state an assumption that the argument makes in using that evidence to support the conclusion.

A. Studying, watching television, and doing housework should be considered tasks unrelated to one another.

Notice that, regardless of whether studying, watching television, and doing housework should be considered unrelated tasks, it is still the case that, after following a physical exercise program for two months, the study participants reported doing more studying and housework and less television watching. In other words, after following an exercise program, the participants demonstrated increased willpower.

So, the evidence provided appears to support the conclusion regardless of whether this choice is assumed.

B. The people in the study did not watch less television than the average person before the study took place.

Notice that, regardless of whether the people in the study watched less television than the average person before the study took place., it is still the case that, after following a physical exercise program for two months, the study participants reported watching less television than they watched before. In other words, the participants demonstrated increased willpower.

So, the evidence provided appears to support the conclusion regardless of whether this choice is assumed.

C. People's supply of willpower cannot be increased by means other than repeatedly exercising that willpower.

The argument is simply that "willpower grows with use."

That conclusion could be true and could follow from the evidence even if people's supply of willpower CAN be increased by means other than repeatedly exercising that willpower, in other words, in a different way. After all, it's possible for a goal to be accomplishable in two different ways.

So, the argument doesn't assume what this choice says.

D. The exercise program followed by the people in the study required more willpower than did whatever exercise they engaged in before the study.

The evidence used to support the conclusion that people's finite supply of willpower can become larger, because, like a muscle, willpower grows with use is the fact that "people who followed a physical exercise program for two months reported studying more, watching less television, and doing more housework after those two months."

Honestly, the argument is not that tightly constructed. It's not 100 percent clear what the relationship between exercise and using willpower is.

Also, how this choice figures into the argument is not 100 percent clear. Does a person really have to use  more  willpower to exercise use of willpower?

At the same time, it seems clear that the fact that people followed a physical exercise program for two months does not mean that they exercised use of willpower. After all, it could be the case that those people didn't need to use willpower to exercise. Maybe they just liked exercising, or maybe they were accustomed to exercising and thus didn't need much willpower to exercise.

So, this choice seems to be a good candidate because it provides some confirmation that, in exercising, people did exercise use of will power and thus could have developed more willpower that supported their studying more, watching less television, and doing more housework.

E. Prior to the study, the people in the study had unsuccessfully attempted to demonstrate more self-control over their studying, television watching, or housework.

This choice is hard to eliminate. After all, it seems to confirm that people did indeed develop more willpower by exercising for two months and that it is for that reason that they "reported studying more, watching less television, and doing more housework."

However, I think we can eliminate this choice because the evidence that they reported studying more, watching less television, and doing more housework is sufficient on its own to indicate that they developed more willpower. We don't need the additional evidence that, prior to the study, they had  unsuccessfully attempted  to demonstrate more self-control over their studying, television watching, or housework. After all, they did study more, watch less television, and do more housework. So, it's clear that something did change.

So, while this question was a close call for me, I think we can safely chose  D

gmatophobia · Answer

Hello  MartyMurray

Thanks for sharing your thoughts on this question.

I was stuck between D and E and both options seem good at the first read. After reading your explanation, I now understand that E does provide a bit of redundant information in there. I do however want to understand whether the use of the words "more" and "whatever exercise" is necessary in the context of this argument. In other words, whether the use of "more" and "whatever exercise" makes this option an assumption.

The exercise program followed by the people in the study required  more willpower  than did  whatever exercise  they engaged in before the study.

While I do understand and agree with you that the passage concludes that "willpower grows with use", I am a bit confused if we absolutely need those determiners in the assumption.

Sonia2023 · Answer

The conclusion is: 
But that finite supply can become larger, because, like a muscle, willpower grows with use

Premise:
a recent study showed that people who followed a physical exercise program  for two months  reported studying more, watching less television, and doing more housework after those two months.

The argument assumes that willpower of the individuals grew (as is evident from the reported increase in studying, decrease in television watching etc) because of exercising (as willpower grows with use).

Choice E, if negated appropriately breaks the premise of the argument.

Negated version of the argument:
Prior to the study, the people in the study had  successfully   attempted to demonstrate more self-control over their studying, television watching, or housework

If they had successfully attempted to demonstrate more self control over their studying and television watching then premise is false which can't be the case". Therefore E is not the correct answer.

Choice D, on the other hand, says that the exercise program followed by the people in the study required more willpower than did whatever exercise they engaged in  before the study . If negated this choice says that the exercise program followed by the people in the study did not require more willpower than did whatever exercise they engaged in before the study, then the conclusion is broken.

Let's understand this with an example:

With the two month program, say there was a reduction of 50 hours: 
 
Television watching prior to study - 100 hours; post study - 50 hours

If the individual was following whatever exercise plans they had before, they could have achieved the same result as above if the willpower required was the same in the previous exercise plan vs that required in the 2 month plan. The results of the study are proved wrong/interpreted in a different way. We don't know what exercise plans an individual was following - it can be as rigorous/disciplined as the 2 month plan or not. So the option choice D takes this uncertainty into account by saying whatever exercise plan they engaged in required less willpower than the 2 month program. Therefore, the willpower increased because of the two month plan.

MartyMurray   gmatophobia  - Does this reasoning make sense?

MartyMurray · Answer

I don't think we need those determiners. As long as it took willpower to exercise, the people would be exercising willpower.

I find this question a little weak. Its logic is somewhat vague.

MartyMurray · Answer

Hi Sonia.

Actually, your reasoning above doesn't work.

Notice that, even if, prior to the study, the people in the study had successfully attempted to demonstrate more self-control over their studying, television watching, or housework, they still could have demonstrated EVEN MORE self-control over their studying, television watching, and housework during the study.

We have to be careful to notice this type of possibility in GMAT CR since it often figures into the logic of a question.

For instance, in a Weaken the argument question, a choice that states that something has already increased will not weaken an argument whose conclusion is that that thing will increase. After all, even though it has already increased, it can increase more.

mkarmakar · Answer

May be an alternate explanation for option D:

D. The exercise program followed by the people in the study required more willpower than did whatever exercise they engaged in before the study.

The idea is that will power can increase with use.  Negation:  Now if the the exercise they did before the study required more will power than the exercise they were during the study, it might be the case that due the previous exercise which required high will power, they were not able to study, watch less television etc. Also after they begun the study, the new exercise required less will power & thus they were able to allocate remaining will power for studying more, watching less television.

In that case will power is not increasing & the argument falls apart. Thus we have to assume what option D says.

shonik · Answer

I just got this question in the Official GMAT Practise exam 2 and the answer according to them is C.

The idea is the blurred lines between the word exercise and use.
Exercise means repetition of the same set of movements, whereas use means practical applications.

Negating option C effectively says that there can be another way of increasing willpower which is through exercise/practice rather than direct application of it at all times.

I guess this requires a little bit of reading between the lines and treating it word for word.

I selected option D as well, as many of you have suggested but now that I think about it, D kinda doesnt make sense to me.

Bunuel · Answer

Could you please provide a screenshot of the question? Thank you!

SergejK · Answer

Got it now. This was really tough, however, it follows the process of other arguments where  no conclusion of the author is presented  but instead  researchers' conclusion is restated .

This argument is a  build up argument: it states a fact build upon a finding of researchers , supported by evidence, similar to arguments where a clear personal statement by the author supporting or disagreeing with a specific view is missing. Instead the question asks us   what kind of assumption does the reasoning make.   Clearly, we are focussing on the build up in the argument and there must be an assumption that the researchers must have used to arrive at their reasoning.   So what is their reasoning?   The build up ends with the statement that  even if the willpower is finite, it can grow like a muscle with use.  To arrive there, they  reference a study  where a 2 month  work out routine , led those people to  show more self-control in other areas .   So what is missing?   Actually, the  study   never mentions that the work out routine requires willpower!  So this must be the assumption, which D restates, as it provides information that the work out required more willpower than any other activity prior to the study, which would explain why their willpower for other chores grew. E, the only other choice that would make somehow sense is clearly wrong, as it states what happened prior to the study, without creating a connection to the study itself, which is clearly irrelevant here as we only want to know the connection between the exercise and willpower, which historic information not connected to the study itself cannot provide.

siddharth_ · Answer

Got this in my mock test. Didn’t realise this was an 805 level plus. Got this correct in 2.5 minutes.
This is how I approached this. Hope it helps someone -

We have to find the gap between the reasoning and conclusion.

Reasoning— people did exercise for two months; they were able to do other ‘good’ tasks after two months.
Conclusion — willpower can grow like a muscle
Gap — (going backward in logic) 
1. It was because of the increased willpower that they were able to do the other good tasks.
2. Exercising for two months led to an increase in willpower.
3. Exercising for two months, required some willpower. (Since use is a must for growth).

(For comprehension purposes, one can replace willpower with muscle power in the above)

Now D matches with 3rd above. 
At first glance, E seems to be similar to 1st above, but is not. 
It says that earlier the people were unsuccessful, but doesn’t explicitly say that now they are successful  because  of the increased Willpower. 
It leaves this latter part to our assumption, which is a strict no in CR.
People being unsuccessful earlier is not a necessary assumption for the conclusion to follow from the reasoning.
Moreover, the negation says - earlier they were NOT unsuccessful. This doesn’t matter to us since post, exercising, they improved from wherever they were earlier. (Imagine they had a score improvement from 10 to 15 earlier, but now they improved further from 15 to say 18). Their previous improvement doesn’t affect our conclusion. Hence, this cannot be a necessary assumption.

KarishmaB · Answer

Context: People's supply of willpower is not infinite; Psychologists have found that successfully accomplishing one task requiring self-control leads to less persistence on a second, seemingly unrelated task. Premise: A recent study showed that people who followed a physical exercise program for two months reported studying more, watching less television, and doing more housework after those two months Conclusion: But that finite supply can become larger, willpower grows with use The conclusion of the author is that willpower grows with use. The data used to support it is that people who followed a physical exercise program for two months reported showing more willpower afterwards. What is the assumption? That the "physical exercise program" required more than normal willpower and hence their willpower after the program expanded. What if the "physical exercise program" was similar to what people did before the program too? Then people would not have used more willpower. Then we cannot attribute more study time etc to greater willpower. Hence (D) makes perfect sense. D. The exercise program followed by the people in the study required more willpower than did whatever exercise they engaged in before the study. A. Studying, watching television, and doing housework should be considered tasks unrelated to one another. Irrelevant. 'Tasks unrelated to one another' is not even a part of our actual argument. That was mentioned in context just as an introduction. B. The people in the study did not watch less television than the average person before the study took place. Even if they did, they started watching even less. The comparison of the people is with themselves 2 months ago. C. People's supply of willpower cannot be increased by means other than repeatedly exercising that willpower. The argument does not require that there are no other means of increasing willpower. E. Prior to the study, the people in the study had unsuccessfully attempted to demonstrate more self-control over their studying, television watching, or housework. Again, the comparison of people is with themselves. Prior to the study, the people in the study had demonstrated whatever level of willpower that they had (say X). Were they trying to show higher willpower but being unsuccessful, we don't know and we don't need it to true. They had whatever level of willpower they had. After the study, they demonstrated higher willpower Y. That is all that matters to our argument. Answer (D) Here is a discussion on another Assumption question: https://youtu.be/0j4tovGifIg

arvdrs · Answer

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Bunuel · Answer

Thank you for the screenshot. That confirms the OA given is indeed D, not C. Appreciate you sharing it to clear up the confusion.

lisahoang1301 · Answer

Can I understand this way?
- Option D is to define the assumption
- Option E is to strengthen the argument/conclusion

Is my explanation for both options correct as below?
- Option D: If the exercise program does not require more willpower, people in the study do not actually have to put much effort into exercising and growing their willpower. They can do it easily; thus, the conclusion falls apart.
- Option E: After doing exercise, they improved in self-control. Therefore, willpower grew. That said, even if they never tried before and the exercise sparked a new habit of self-control, the argument still works.

GMATNinja · Answer

Yes, that looks good!

Unlike (D), (E) is not a logical assumption made in the argument. But if (E) is true, it could certainly be a strengthener.

People's supply of willpower is not infinite; psychologists have

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