Public health expert: Increasing the urgency of a public health messag

Solution
Understand the passage

Public health expert: Increasing the urgency of a public health message may be counterproductive.

A public health expert offers his opinion on public health messages.
He says that increasing the urgency of a public health message is likely to produce a negative result or an undesired result.
What that means is, instead of increasing the urgency of the message, people might choose to ignore it.

In addition to irritating the majority who already behave responsibly,

He goes on to offer his reasoning behind this opinion.
He believes that apart from annoying most of the people who are already responsible towards health,

it may undermine all government pronouncements on health by convincing people that such messages are overly cautious.

attempts to increase the urgency of public health messages might weaken the impact of all government announcements on health by somehow making people feel that these messages are being overly careful/ (messages are being unnecessarily alarmist)

And there is no reason to believe that those who ignore measured voices will listen to shouting.

The author adds that there is no reason to believe that people who ignore controlled voices will actually listen to anyone shouting.

Pre-thinking
1st Bold Face
Role = claim made by the author
Relationship = It is the main conclusion of the argument

2nd Bold Face
Role = opinion of the author
Relationship = offered in support of the main conclusion

Overall
Go in the same direction.

Answer Choice Analysis

A
The first is a conclusion

Yes. It is the main conclusion of the passage

for which support is provided.

Yes. BF2 provides support for it

but is not the argument's main conclusion;

No.

the second is an unsupported premise

Yes. It does not have any support in the passage as such

 supporting the arguments main conclusion

Yes.

Thus, this choice is incorrect

B
The first is a premise

No. It is the conclusion of the argument

supporting the only explicit conclusion;

No.

so is the second.

Yes. The second boldface supports BF1

Thus, this is not the correct choice.

C
The first is the argument's main conclusion;

Yes

the second supports that conclusion

Yes.

and is itself a conclusion

No. It is not a derived statement and hence cannot be called a conclusion

for which support is provided

No. No support is provided for the send boldface.

Thus, this is not the correct choice.

D
The first is a premise

No.

 supporting the argument's only conclusion;

No. Because it itself is the main conclusion

 the second is that conclusion.

No. It is just the author’s opinion acting as a premise to the main conclusion.

Thus, this is not the correct choice.

E
The first is the argument‘s only explicit conclusion;

Yes. It is the main conclusion

 the second is a premise

Yes. It is just the author’s opinion acting as a premise to the main conclusion

supporting that conclusion

Yes.

Thus, this is the correct choice.

Let’s understand the structure of the Public health expert’s argument-

Author’s conclusion- Increasing the urgency of a public health message may be counterproductive.

Why does he think so?

Reasons/evidence/ premises-

- It can irritate the majority who already behave responsibly
- It may undermine all government pronouncements on health by convincing people that such messages are overly cautious
- There is no reason to believe that those who ignore measured voices will listen to shouting.

Because of all the three reasons above, the author thinks increasing the urgency of public health message may be counterproductive.

When you ask “why” does the author think so (author’s conclusion), the answers you get are your premises. Now, let’s look at the options-

(A) The first is a conclusion for which support is provided but is not the argument's main conclusion; the second is an unsupported premise supporting the argument's main conclusion.
The first is the main conclusion of the argument. Eliminate.

(B) The first is a premise supporting the only explicit conclusion; so is the second.
The first is not a premise but the main conclusion of the argument. Eliminate.

(C) The first is the argument's main conclusion; the second supports that conclusion and is itself a conclusion for which support is provided.
The first part of the option is correct; the second is not a conclusion but a premise that lends support to the conclusion. Eliminate.

(D) The first is a premise supporting the argument's only conclusion; the second is that conclusion.
The first is not a premise and the second is not the conclusion. Eliminate.

(E) The first is the argument‘s only explicit conclusion; the second is a premise supporting that conclusion.
The first is the only explicit conclusion; the second is a premise supporting that conclusion. Correct.


Vishnupriya
GMAT SME

Public health expert:
Conclusion: Increasing the urgency of a public health message may be counterproductive.
1st Supporting Premise: In addition to irritating the majority who already behave responsibly, It may undermine all government pronouncements on health by convincing people that such messages are overly cautious.
2nd Supporting Premise: And there is no reason to believe that those who ignore measured voices will listen to shouting.

(C) The first is the argument's main conclusion; the second supports that conclusion and is itself a conclusion
for which support is provided.
Problem is the 2nd half of the sentence: If you look for why "it may undermine all government..." you will not find any support in the argument.
The last line of this argument is another premise supporting the conclusion presented in 1st line.

(E) The first is the argument‘s only explicit conclusion; the second is a premise supporting that conclusion.
CORRECT

Hi,

As per MGMAT CR process for Describe the role (Bold face) questions, the following is an accurate methodology to crack this question type.
I was able to solve this using the same approach and its quite helpful.

First bold face says "Increasing the urgency of a public health message may be counterproductive."
This is the authors Conclusion and mark it as "B1 = C", indicating Conclusion.
Coming to the 2nd Bold face, authors gives additional information about the above stated conclusion and he is the right guy to be a Premise. ( Since, author is giving more facts about the stated conclusion.)
Now mark it as "B2 = P".

Go on the answer choices to find out for 'C' & 'P' combination.

There is only one option for this combination and so the answer is "E".


Please hit kudos it you like this post!

Why is C wrong? Isn't the second part a subconclusion for which we can say support is provided in terms of 'by convincing people that such messages are overly cautious"?

Hello expert,

According to me, In option c, second bold letter sentence is author's opinion. But it is not necessary that all author's opinion result into conclusion.
Am i right?

You are right that the second boldfaced portion is the author's opinion. This opinion is used in support of the main conclusion. However, there is nothing in the passage to support that opinion.

Public health expert: Increasing the urgency of a public health message may be counterproductive. In addition to irritating the majority who already behave responsibly, it may undermine all government pronouncements on health by convincing people that such messages are overly cautious. And there is no reason to believe that those who ignore measured voices will listen to shouting.

The two sections in boldface play which of the following roles in the public health expert's argument?

* BOLD FACE Q: First ID the Conclusion and then find out how the BF relates to it.
> BF1 = clearly the conclusion of the passage
> BF2 = clearly supports BF1.
>Other: last sentence is further explaining why BF1 is main conclusion, giving additional info

(A) The first is a conclusion for which support is provided. but is not the argument's main conclusion; the second is an unsupported premise supporting the arguments main conclusion.
- BF1 is the argument's main conclusion & BF2 is a supported premise

(B) The first is a premise supporting the only explicit conclusion; so is the second.
- BF1 is NOT a premise, it is the Conclusion

(C) The first is the argument's main conclusion; the second supports that conclusion and is itself a conclusion for which support is provided.
- BF2 is not itself a conclusion for which support is provided...

(D) The first is a premise supporting the argument's only conclusion; the second is that conclusion.
- BF2 is NOT a conclusion, its a premise.

(E) The first is the argument‘s only explicit conclusion; the second is a premise supporting that conclusion.
- Correct as is.

Kudos please if you find this helpful

mikemcgarry DmitryFarber GMATNinja
the correct choice says that the second bold face is a premise

now as far as i know a premise is something which has to be taken as true and cannot be challenged or its validity cannot be question.
now the second bold face is an opinion of the author and explicitly mentioned by him/her that "it may ....."

please explain egmat

I had the exact same doubt. I have an impression that premise is a fact, while here, the 2nd BF is clearly an opinion and not a fact. So, how is E the right answer?

Yes, a premise is a statement that must be taken as true, and cannot be questioned.

But this doesn't mean that the premise itself must indicate that something is definitely true. Consider this instructional example:


The premise (which is bolded) clearly supports the weatherman's conclusion. However, the premise doesn't read, "It will definitely rain." The premise reads, "It's possible that we'll see heavy rainfall."

We take the entire statement to be true, but the statement itself tells us what is possible. It doesn't matter whether this forecast only tells us what might happen. The overall statement is still a valid premise.

Coming back to our OG question, here's the conclusion again:


And here are the two premises backing up this conclusion:

• Increasing the urgency of a public health message irritates the majority who already behave responsibly.
• Increasing the urgency of a public health message undermine all government pronouncements on health by convincing people that such messages are overly cautious.

Both premises support the public health expert's conclusion. The second premise doesn't offer a 100% confirmation that increasing the urgency will undermine all government pronouncements. But we don't need that in order to accept this as a premise supporting the conclusion.

I hope this helps!

This is a great question. And I agree with you. I think the second boldface has a conclusion and a premise for that conclusion all within the boldface. However, my guess is that the GMAT believes the following:
(conclusion + premise) cannot be treated as a conclusion
(conclusion + premise) can be treated as a premise

I chose answer choice A in this case because it seemed more specific than choice E. they both say the first is a conclusion and the second is a premise, but choice A goes deeper and says the premise is unsupported. I can't pinpoint any support for the premise in the passage, so could someone explain where my thought process is incorrect?

Take another look at the exact wording of answer choice (A):

The key to eliminating this answer choice is that it states that the first boldface section is "not the argument's main conclusion." This is completely incorrect -- the first boldface section IS the argument's main conclusion. Based on this, you can eliminate (A).

I hope that helps!

Hi GMATNinja.. Quick question.. Can the last sentence of the passage “And there is no reason to believe that those who ignore measured voices will listen to shouting” be considered as an intermediate conclusion?
Based on my understanding the second boldface portion supports this last statement which is an Intermediate conclusion supporting the first boldface which is the main conclusion of the argument.
In that sense as well, the answer would be C because the BF2 would indirectly be acting as a premise for BF1.
Let me know your thoughts please?

GMATNinja
Sir,
What's the difference between ''argument's main conclusion'' and ''argument‘s only explicit conclusion''?

• Notice that choice (C) says, "the second supports that conclusion and is itself a conclusion for which support is provided."
• Sure, the second BF portion supports the argument's conclusion, but the passage doesn't include any SUPPORT for the 2nd BF statement!
• The 2nd BF statement is made without any support or evidence, and so we cannot consider it a conclusion for which support is provided.

• The first implies that the argument has more than one conclusion (i.e. a "main" conclusion in addition to one or more intermediate conclusions).
• The second implies that the argument only contains support for one conclusion.

You should be able to eliminate the four wrong answer choices without thinking about that distinction, so I wouldn't worry about it too much.

I hope this helps!