Recent surveys indicate that, contrary to popular belief,

Question

Recent surveys indicate that, contrary to popular belief, total abstinence from alcohol does not correlate  as strongly with good health as with moderate drinking.

A. as strongly with good health as with moderate drinking
B. strongly with good health, like moderate drinking does
C. as strongly with good health as does moderately drinking
D. as strongly with good health as does moderate drinking
E. as strongly with good health as moderate drinking

agdimple333 · Answer

i will go with D.

important to understand the meaning of the sentence.. here comparison is between total abstinence from alcohol correlates with good health vs. how moderate drinking relates with good health.

crick20002002 · Answer

D for me.

This is a good question.

B and C are clearly out.

A looks to be putting total abstinence parallel with moderate drinking, which is wrong.

D corrects this by correlating strong health with total abstinence and strong health with moderate drinking.

Crick

HaasEWMBA2015 · Answer

Definitely "D".

"A" and "E" are out as the word "does" is required in this sentence. Moderately and strongly do not need to be parrallel as you only need to make words parrallel that are parrallel in meaning, "C" is out because of this.

This leaves "B" and "D". In "B" like is used to compare something similar, "as" is used to give an example. "as" is the correct word leaving "B" as the correct answer choice.

ctkrishnan · Answer

D.. for correct comparison... 
What is the OA???

gmatopoeia · Answer

**

My choice is D.
Is OA really A? Seems a little strange in terms of logic, no?

A seems to be saying: total abstinence from alcohol does not correlate strongly with good health; total abstinence from alcohol correlates strongly with moderate drinking. (Correlation of abstinence of alcohol with good health vs correlation of total abstinence from alcohol with moderate drinking)

D says moderate drinking correlates strongly with good health. Comparatively, total abstinence from alcohol correlates less strongly with good health. (Correlation of abstinence of alcohol with good health vs correlation of moderate drinking with good health).

schandok · Answer

I had a tie b/w A and D- picked D. It's a tough one. Can OE be posted.

malar · Answer

Strange OA. Correlation of total abstinence/moderate drinking with good health compares here. So we need does, no?

gautammalik · Answer

I'll go with A.
"correlate strongly with good health" || "correlate with moderate drinking"

Marcab · Answer

the logic says, total abstinence from alcohol does not correlates as good health as strongly as moderate drinking does.
now going against the logic, total abstinence from alcohol does not correlate with good health as with moderate drinking...means abstinence relates well with moderate drinking...IRRELEVANT

IMO D

vix · Answer

It might be a fluke or great luck that I thought that A is best (I looked at it with perspective of ||ism) and it is the OA, against everyone else's response! Rare A!

parker · Answer

For the OP, could you share the source of this question? It's tagged as a MGMAT question, but we can't find it in our strategy guides, CATs, or question banks.

nishtil · Answer

OA looks strange....
option A is parallel but changes the meaning of the sentence comparing good health with modrate drinking... correct option should compare abstinence with modarate drinking... IMO with D

amit2k9 · Answer

between A and D.

the correlation is between total abstinence| moderate drinking and good health.
D correctly puts the meaning,whereas A changes the relation making it between total abstinence and moderate drinking.The later is wrong,hence.

D it is.

nrgmat · Answer

A would have been first guess too..Because you are correlating one thing 'with' another..

mirfan2 · Answer

I am in the D club.

D  does  seem like the right answer, Don't fall for A

GMATPASSION · Answer

Meaning of the sentence is of Extreme Importance on this sentence.

Correlation : Abstinence with Gud health

Moderate drinking with gud health

Correlation is not between : Abstinence & moderate drinking.

So A,C & E are out beacuse of the above logic.

B is out : "like" is used incorrectly here.

D correctly shows the correlation.
:-D

bschool83 · Answer

OA is D

MichaelS · Answer

I doubt that it's ours, and it's a little awkward, but it's not a bad question. No way the answer is A, though.

Notice the comparison signal,  as strongly...as . Eliminate answers in which the two clauses joined by this signal are not logically comparable and structurally similar.

In A, the two elements joined are the prepositional phrases  with good health  and  with moderate drinking . This suggests that abstinence correlates with good health less strongly than abstinence correlates with moderate drinking. But that meaning is nonsensical. Abstinence and moderate drinking are mutually exclusive: they don't correlate at all. ELIMINATE.

Though the comparison made in B is more sensible, B uses  like  to compare two clauses and is wrong for that reason ( like  can join only nouns). ELIMINATE

In C, the two elements joined are  correlate with good health  and  does , with  does  standing in for the earlier verb. That is, C says that moderately drinking and good health correlate more strongly than do abstinence and good health. This is sensible. Leave for now.

In D, the two elements joined are  correlate with good health  and  does , with  does  standing in for the earlier verb. That is, D says that moderate drinking and good health correlate more strongly than do abstinence and good health. This is sensible. Leave for now.

E is ambiguous between the sensible comparison made in C and D, and the nonsensical comparison made in A. ELIMINATE.

That leaves C and D. The only difference between C and D is  moderately  versus  moderate . I expect that most people who pick D here do so because it "sounds" better. Fair enough, but there is another reason to prefer D over C, though that reason doesn't get much play on the GMAT. If you want to modify a gerund (such as  drinking ) with an adverb (such as the  moderately  in C), the adverb should go after the gerund. If you want to modify a gerund with an adjective (such as the  moderate  in D) the adjective should go before the gerund. So D.

This approach assumes that you recognize  AS adverb AS  as a comparison signal. I haven't counted instances, but I suspect that you're even more likely to see  As adjective AS . You should recognize that each of these is a comparison signal/parallel marker.

Here are some examples of  AS adverb AS :

No other sprinter holds his top speed as well as Usain Bolt does. 
This could also be written,
 No other sprinter holds his top speed as well as does Usain Bolt. 
But will usually be elided,
 No other sprinter holds his top speed as well as Usain Bolt.

No other sprinter runs as quickly as Usain Bolt does. 
This could also be written,
 No other sprinter runs as quickly as does Usain Bolt. 
But will usually be elided
 No other sprinter runs as quickly as Usain Bolt.

Here are some example of  AS adjective AS :

No other sprinter is as successful as Usian Bolt. 
 No other sprinter is as tall as Usain Bolt.

jeprince112 · Answer

D over C for the simple fact that:

total abstinence (adj + noun) is parellel to moderate drinking (adj + noun)... while moderately drinking (adv + verb) would not be parallel.

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