This question is grounded in deductive logic.

Premises:
'No trust' means 'No emotional conn'
'No emotional conn' means 'Feeling isolated'

Conclusion:
'Trust' is necessary for 'happiness'

The point here is that we are concluding about trust and happiness but in the premises the link between 'feeling isolated' and 'happiness' is missing. It is a necessary missing premise i.e. an assumption. So we need an option which say 'Feeling isolated' means 'Not happy'. That's when the logic is complete.
Look at the premises now:

Premises:
'No trust' means 'No emotional conn'
'No emotional conn' means 'Feeling isolated'
'Feeling isolated' means 'Not happy'

Conclusion:
'Trust' is necessary for 'happiness'

Now it all makes sense, doesn't it? Hence (A) will be your answer.
_________________

Therapist: The ability to trust other people is essential to
happiness, for without trust there can be no
meaningful emotional connection to another
human being, and without meaningful emotional
connections to others we feel isolated.

Trust -> Happiness
no Trust->no emotional connection with another human being->isolated

Which one of the following, if assumed, allows the conclusion of the therapist’s argument to be properly inferred?
(A) No one who is feeling isolated can feel happy.
Happiness and Isolation are in different relationship chains. The author has not established the link in the premise.
(B) Anyone who has a meaningful emotional connection to another human being can be happy.
Happiness and emotional connection are in different relationship chains. The author has not established the link in the premise.
(C) To avoid feeling isolated, it is essential to trust other people.
True. In the second relationship chain, if we want to avoid isolation, we have to start from trust.
(D) At least some people who do not feel isolated are happy.
May be or may not be. we cannot be sure. The link is not between isolation and happiness
(E) Anyone who is able to trust other people has a meaningful emotional connection to at least one other human being.
we have been provided no trust = no emotional connection, it does not mean trust = emotional connection.
no sugar = no good cake
sugar = good cake ?? (what if you added salt instead of baking powder,

Answer should be C.

C is a classic trap answer for formal logic (conditional relationship type questions). The statement in C is indeed true and nothing wrong in it. however (C) doesn't bridge the gap and doesn't help to resolve the question - Find the assumption.

Give it another try!
_________________

Therapist: The ability to trust other people is essential to happiness,

something (trust) is essential for something else (happiness)

for without trust there can be no meaningful emotional connection to another human being,

No trust ---> no connection with something else

and without meaningful emotional connections to others we feel isolated.

No connection -----> isolation is the result.

This is the logic chain -----> so the key point that bridge al the elemnts is the TRUST

(E) Anyone who is able to trust other people has a meaningful emotional connection to at least one other human being.

E must be the answer
_________________

Both C & E are not the right answers.
_________________

Unfortunately, even B is not the answer
_________________

When a question has a strong Formal Logic component, expect a wrong answer to reverse or inverse the logic.


Analyze: The therapist starts off with a claim: Trust is essential to happiness. Using formal logic, this translates to: If you have happiness, then you must have trust. Or, by the contrapositive: If you don’t have trust, then you can’t be happy. The evidence to back this up is a string of formal logic: If you don’t have trust, then you have no meaningful emotional connection; and if you have no meaningful emotional connection, then you feel isolated. This is all good, but the formal logic in the evidence starts with a lack of trust and ends at feeling isolated. The conclusion, on the other hand, says that a lack of trust leads to no happiness. The therapist never makes the connection from isolation to unhappiness. That’s the assumption, as stated in (A).

(A) As stated above

(B) Extreme. The therapist claims that a lack of trust leads to no emotional connection. It can be validly claimed that the therapist also assumes that anyone who has no emotional connections will be unhappy. However, that does not mean that anyone who does have emotional connections will be happy. That inverts the formal logic and doesn’t help connect the evidence to the conclusion.

(C) Irrelevant Comparison. This is per fectly accurate based on the evidence. In fact, it’s the contrapositive of the evidence. However, it fails to connect that evidence to the concept of happiness in the conclusion, so it doesn’t work as an assumption. Remember that an assumption is an unstated piece of information that connects the evidence to the conclusion. This answer restates the evidence in other words—a classic LSAT trap.

(D) Outside the Scope. The assumption is about people who do feel isolated. Adding information about people do don’t feel isolated is irrelevant to the argument.

(E) Irrelevant Comparison. This answer reverses the formal logic in the evidence, but it still doesn’t connect the evidence to the concept of happiness in the conclusion.
_________________

Well I have some thoughts to share, if I can:

- according to my info the best question numbers to study are generally from 1 to 16 in any given LSAT test. I have an huge data-base of LSAT question (both Cr and RC) and I didn't find it. This necessarily doesn't mean that the question doesn't come from this range.

- I'm quite sure of my shape in verbal part of the test, after all pick almost the questions right under time condition both the OG and the question pack 1.

- I have revisited ALL the assumption questions in OG 11/12/13 and verbal review and I do not see a question similar to this (maybe I'm wrong, is a possibility).

- the fact that I picked it wrong does not mean that this is not a good question from where to learn something useful. Moreover,: is not a good question because I got it wrong. NOPE.

One one hand is good to enforce your logic muscle, one the other hand I'm not completely sure to spend time with such question IF during the exam the probability to encouter it is something like 0.1 %.

regards
_________________

I agree. Chances of seeing such complex formal logic questions in GMAT can be too slim (unless you are doing way too well during the exam). Just treat them as a good practice. GMAT may have very few questions involving sufficient-necessary conditions, but not as complex and tangled as LSAT formal logic questions.
_________________

on a second thought, I definitely screwed. The question was ASSUMPTION and I was deducing conclusion.
A makes sense.

Actually, I think that this particular thought process might be new to you - that is why you feel its complicated. You can choose to ignore it but it isn't very hard when you get down to it.

Here, check out this OG question and my solution based on the same concept. It is a very useful methodology which is based on something like this:

Premises:
A implies B
B implies C

Conclusion:
A implies D

Now, there is a missing link here: C implies D. That is the assumption (a necessary missing premise). We explicitly discuss deductive logic in our course to give you a clear picture.

a-recent-report-determined-that-although-only-three-percent-97089.html#p823336
_________________

my map for this question:
no isolated -> yes MC -> yes trust -> yes happiness

assumption -> no one who is isolated is happy. read A and selected it right away without reading the other answer choices.

GMATNinja generis VeritasKarishma nightblade354 AshutoshB harishgmat GmatDaddy

This is a pure gem of a question to discuss much advocated negation technique and bridging the gap
Please help me with performing PoE correctly :


Start with a question stem to know what are you looking for?
This is an assumption question.




On a quick glance, I first took all as facts, then I understood I need to have a conclusion in the argument since this is an assumption question.
On a closer read, I substituted for with because and hence the main conclusion becomes:
trust = happiness

Furthermore, premises are
trust = ec
ec = isolation

A: trust
B: EC
C: isolation
D: happiness

Premises mentions A -> B, B ->C , the conclusion is about A -> D and D is nowhere in premises.


Cool, I linked A with D and that's my answer by bridging the gap.

Now, the tough part: to eliminate other answers with similar confidence.
Unfortunately, I could cross out only (C) since the intention is never under the scope
of argument.


I will honestly admit having resorted to negation technique (it is so tempting to perform
negation, when we see quantitative words) but could not get through.
In statements with quantitative terms, we negate numerical terms instead of main verb.
Here is how I negated:


Someone who has a meaningful emotional connection to another human being can be happy


No one who is isolated is happy


No one who is able to trust other people has a meaningful emotional connection to at least one other human being.

I could not decide why B, D or E could not break the conclusion
_________________

Since I answered the question correctly, here is my approach

The main topic revolves around HAPPINESS (trust, emotional connection, isolation are like trigger / cause / effect words)

Figuratively the pattern of text is following:

Without X, y wouldn’t happen and without y it is impossible to be Z, and without Z we are isolated.

So trust / or no trust, is the main trigger that in the end makes people feeling happy or not and hence isolated or / not

(A) No one who is feeling isolated can feel happy. ( I kept it straight away)

(B) Anyone who has a meaningful emotional connection to another human being can be happy. (eliminated straight away – one cant be sure of word “anyone” )

(C) To avoid feeling isolated, it is essential to trust other people. (this one I kept)

(D) At least some people who do not feel isolated are happy. (Eliminated straight away - one can`t be sure of wordinf " at least some people” )

(E) (Anyone who is able to trust other people has a meaningful emotional connection to at least one other human being. (Eliminated straight away - – one cant be sure of word “anyone” )


Now, when I am left with A and C, I asked myself a question what is the main topic of the text. yes, HAPPINNESS 

C makes emphasis on “feeling isolated” i.e. TO FEEL ISOLATED, bla, bla . And we concerned about “happiness”

A makes emphasis on “feeling happy” i.e. No one who is feeling isolated CAN FEEL HAPPY

Hence, A

adkikani,

This is a justify question. This question form will not appear on test. With justify questions, you do not negate the answer choices. But you do negate for assumption. This difference is critical for you to understand.
_________________

Eliminating options:

(B) Anyone who has a meaningful emotional connection to another human being can be happy.
We know what happens when there is no emotional connection (you feel isolated). But what happens when there is an emotional connection? We can't say. This is beyond the scope of our argument. Our argument does not discuss the case of "has emotional conn".

(C) To avoid feeling isolated, it is essential to trust other people.
No connection to happiness - that aspect of the conclusion is missing.

(D) At least some people who do not feel isolated are happy.
This is beyond the scope of the argument. We are assuming that if you feel isolated, you are not happy. What happens if you "do not feel isolated", we cannot say. The argument does not talk about it.

(E) Anyone who is able to trust other people has a meaningful emotional connection to at least one other human being.
Again, the argument talks about what happens when you do not trust (there is no emotional conn). We do not know what happens when you do trust. Is there an emotional conn? We don't know.
_________________

Hello from the GMAT Club VerbalBot!

Thanks to another GMAT Club member, I have just discovered this valuable topic, yet it had no discussion for over a year. I am now bumping it up - doing my job. I think you may find it valuable (esp those replies with Kudos).

Want to see all other topics I dig out? Follow me (click follow button on profile). You will receive a summary of all topics I bump in your profile area as well as via email.