As they get older, women usually maintain their ability to hear higher

Question

As they get older, women usually maintain their ability to hear higher frequencies longer than men do. This is only because men are usually exposed to more dangerously loud noises at work and during recreation. In societies that do not have hazardous noises, there is no difference in hearing loss between men and women. Nor is there a difference in hearing loss between males and female animals whose hearing has been studied.

Which of the following choices MUST be true based on the information above?

A) When women and men are exposed to the same level of hazardous noises while working, men experience greater loss of hearing.
B) The difference between men and women in their ability to hear higher frequencies is entirely unrelated to any difference in the structure of the inner ear.
C) If male animals were exposed to the same loud noises to which many men are exposed, the animals would experience greater loss of hearing than would female 
 animals.
D) In general, women and men do not differ in their ability to hear lower frequencies.
E) Women who live in societies that do not have hazardous noises experience less loss of hearing than do women who live in societies that do have hazardous noises.

sobby · Accepted Answer

B is the answer .
Now why B :
Lets check the only important word in argument that played the trick here - "ONLY".

"As they get older, women usually maintain their ability to hear higher frequencies longer than men do. This is  only  because men are usually exposed to more dangerously loud noises at work and during recreation."

Now why men loss ability to hear higher frequency and women not---The "ONLY" reason is men are exposed to more dangerously loud noises at work and during recreation

So according to argument rest all the reason that can contribute to cause is not true.

Why not E :

E makes a general statement that is applicable for all the women .That can't be necessarily true.there will be one or two exceptions...

kedarsharma · Answer

But in the argument there is no mention of internal structure of the ear

Tan2017 · Answer

I thought the same and eliminated that option in the first instance. However if you read the prompt carefully it does say "This is  only  because men are usually exposed to more dangerously loud noises at work and during recreation."

amanvermagmat · Answer

option A is actually against the conclusion. Eliminated.

option C talks about male and female animals, no study has been done to expose male animals to higher frequencies, so this is out of scope. Eliminated

option D also seems out of scope because no study has been done on lower frequencies. Eliminated.
 
option E seems tricky, it says women exposed to less hazardous noises experience less loss of hearing. But the passage says that in such cases, there is no difference in hearing between men and women. It doesn't talk about hearing of women exposed to less hazardous noises vis-a-vis those exposed to hazardous noises. Eliminated.

Hence  option B answer

jedit · Answer

Can experts please provide explanation as to why E is wrong. The only explanation provided seems inadequate.

helloksin · Answer

This is a good example for Cause and Effect kind of CR problems. The question states one cause, so the answer usually talks about another cause. Depending on Weaken/Strengthen/Must be true, the cause mentioned in answer validates or invalidates the cause mentioned in the question stem. Based on this, we can answer the above question-

Let's analyze the answer choices:

A) When women and men are exposed to the "same level of hazardous noises" while working, men experience greater loss of hearing.
OUT. Question clearly states that hearing difference happens due to exposure to different levels of noise- "men are usually exposed to more dangerously loud noises." Which means that men are not more prone than women to experience hearing loss given the same conditions.

B) The difference between men and women in their ability to hear higher frequencies is entirely unrelated to any difference in the structure of the inner ear.
KEEP. This answer is talking about another potential cause for hearing loss. It eliminates/invalidates another cause (difference in ear structure) that could lead to hearing difference between men and women. Only if this is true, will the premise in question (men experience greater hearing loss only due to their greater exposure to hazardous noises) hold true. And as we know, premises always have to be true.

C) If male animals were exposed to the same loud noises to which many men are exposed, the animals would experience greater loss of hearing than would female animals.
OUT. This is out of scope. The contention is between male and female humans, and nothing to do with what animals experience.

D) In general, women and men do not differ in their ability to hear lower frequencies.
OUT. Again out of scope. The contention is about higher frequencies. We shouldn't bother about what happens at lower frequencies.

E) Women who live in societies that do not have hazardous noises experience less loss of hearing than do women who live in societies that do have hazardous noises.
OUT. Out of scope. This is comparing one group of women to another group of women. But our contention is about hearing difference between men and women. So even if this statement were true, it doesn't lend anything to the premises in question stem about why men cannot maintain their ability to hear high frequencies when compared to women.

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pkm9995 · Answer

Everything boils down to B&E......The reason why E is wrong is living in the society with hazardous sound and getting exposed to the hazardous sound are two different things. Exposed is the word of the trade

s8kadian · Answer

As they get older, women usually maintain their ability to hear higher frequencies longer than men do. This is only because men are usually exposed to more dangerously loud noises at work and during recreation. In societies that do not have hazardous noises, there is no difference in hearing loss between men and women. Nor is there a difference in hearing loss between males and female animals whose hearing has been studied.

Which of the following choices MUST be true based on the information above?

A) When women and men are exposed to the  same level  of hazardous noises while working, men experience  greater loss of hearing .

B) The difference between men and women in their ability to hear higher frequencies is entirely  unrelated to any difference  in the structure of the inner ear.
 --  unrelated to any difference but exposure to more dangerously loud noises  
 
C) If male animals were exposed to the same loud noises to which many men are exposed, the animals would experience greater loss of hearing than would female animals.
 --  irrelevant - no comparison between humans n animals  
 
D) In general, women and men do not differ in their ability to hear  lower frequencies .

E) Women who live in  societies  that do not have hazardous noises experience less loss of hearing than do women who live in societies that do have hazardous noises.

alokgupta1009 · Answer

As they get older, women usually maintain their ability to hear higher frequencies longer than men do. This is only because men are usually exposed to more dangerously loud noises at work and during recreation. In societies that do not have hazardous noises, there is no difference in hearing loss between men and women. Nor is there a difference in hearing loss between males and female animals whose hearing has been studied.

Which of the following choices MUST be true based on the information above?

A) When women and men are exposed to the same level of hazardous noises while working, men experience greater loss of hearing.

-- Why greater... Passage mentions that exposure to noise is the key to loss of hearing.. same level noises... no difference.. so, INCORRECT

B) The difference between men and women in their ability to hear higher frequencies is entirely unrelated to any difference in the structure of the inner ear.

-- what if more exposure to noises for men changes their inner ear structure. INCORRECT

C) If male animals were exposed to the same loud noises to which many men are exposed, the animals would experience greater loss of hearing than would female animals.

-- not sure if we can conclude from the passage that the same findings for human would turn out to be true for animals too. INCORRECT

D) In general, women and men do not differ in their ability to hear lower frequencies.

-- Passage is not talking about lower frequencies. God knows if they differ or not. INCORRECT

E) Women who live in societies that do not have hazardous noises experience less loss of hearing than do women who live in societies that do have hazardous noises.

-- it should be true I think because it's ultimately the noise that hits on loss of hearing. CORRECT.

What's OA ?

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s8kadian · Answer

alokgupta1009   Masterscorp

Which of the following choices  MUST  be true based on the information above?

E  is incorrect because there is no mention of "  societies that do have hazardous noises  " -- it only mentions "  dangerously loud noises at      work place   "

how would you know that the societie's hazardous noises have high enough danger level to impact ability to hear higher frequencies ?

B ) The difference between men and women in their ability to hear  higher frequencies  is  entirely unrelated to any difference in the structure of the inner ear .
-- unrelated to any difference -- except only to "  exposure to more dangerously loud noises  " as mentioned in statement

hope it helps

arvind910619 · Answer

Hi  VeritasPrepKarishma

I am in split between B and E .
I chose E based on the information in the prompt but B is the OA .
Choice B on the other hand gives information regarding structure of the internal ear but nothing has been said in the prompt about the structure.

Can you please guide me thorough this question and questions of this type .

Thanks ,
Arvind

s8kadian · Answer

arvind910619  -- do you not see the word " unrelated " on option B

- it means  not  related to --any difference in the structure of the inner ear.

Meaning of B is -- the difference in hearing ability has nothing to do with the structure of the inner ear

Also,

Statement: In societies that do not have hazardous noises, there is  no difference in hearing loss  between men and women.

Option E : Women who live in societies that do not have hazardous noises experience  less loss of hearing  than do women who live in societies that do have hazardous noises.

what is less loss ??? -- do they start hearing more ?

nikithaiyer5 · Answer

Option E says that the loss of hearing ability in women in quite places is less in comparison to the women in noisy places, this is not validated by the stimulus. The stimulus talks about the hearing loss in men in noisy and not-so-noisy conditions, but we don't know what is the effect on women when they are exposed to noise. The hearing loss of women when exposed to noisy conditions is not given in the stimulus. Hence E is wrong.

Hope its clear. If so, show it with KUDOS.

Hope its clear. If so, show it with KUDOS.

nikithaiyer5 · Answer

Loss is less implies that there is loss, but the loss is lesser than the loss in other case..

societies that do not have hazardous noises - Loss of hearing is 20dB
societies that do have hazardous noises - Loss of hearing is 50dB

Clear ??

Bunuel · Answer

VERITAS PREP OFFICIAL SOLUTION:

Answer: B

Explanation: This is an inference question. Choice B MUST be true because we are told that the difference in ability to hear higher frequencies is only because of loud noises at work and recreation. Nothing else, including structural differences in the inner ear, can therefore be related to this difference.

(A) Actually, the stimulus leads us to think that there would be no difference in hearing loss between men and women who have experienced the same level of noise, since noise is claimed to be the cause of hearing loss.

(C) This is tempting perhaps, but we cannot say for sure that this would be true. We have no way of knowing how the animals would be affected by noise levels that are only known to be dangerous to people.

(D) The topic of lower frequencies is not addressed, so we cannot say for sure what must be true about these frequencies and hearing loss.

(E) This does not have to be true, since the women who live in societies that have hazardous noises may not be exposed to these noises. This might seem unlikely, but, as with all inferences, since this choice might not be true, it’s the wrong choice.

sandesh87 · Answer

this is a very bad quality question. Because the first sentence mentions that . Nothing is mentioned about the ability to hear higher frequency sounds. Only whether they maintain their ability to hear higher frequency is mentioned.

Stanislav · Answer

I ended up between B and E.

Very simple, again the same problem, carefully reading for the PRECISE wording mentioned in the argument.

E is wrong because we cannot assume the information that women who live in societies with no hazardous noises experience less loss of hearing than do women who live in societies that do have hazardous noises. This information cannot be inferred from the argument. This is a perfect example of a trap from the test takers.

B is correct because indeed men's and women's ability to hear higher frequencies is entirely unrelated to any difference in the structure of the inner ear. This information can be inferred from the argument because there is no mention of the inner ear related to men's and women's ability to hear higher frequencies.

Hope this helps.

Debo1988 · Answer

VeritasKarishma Hope you're well

Although A seems the best among the lot, I am not entirely convinced with this option. Here's why : A says "The difference between men and women in their ability to hear higher frequencies is entirely unrelated to any difference in the structure of the inner ear. The prompt only tells us about the tendency to maintain the ability, as they get older . For A to be correct. we are assuming that the ability to hear is the same as maintaining the ability at old age. In a must be true question, are we allowed to make assumptions? Thanks Debo

GMAT0010 · Answer

Hi,
So B vs E:
Let's try to understand the argument first.
So since men are exposed to more dangerous noises than women are, women are less likely to suffer from hearing loss.
Now: Notice the word more. If a man and woman are locked in a room next to a construction site, and if you toss away the key, after a few days, men will not have a higher loss of hearing than women.
Coming back to the argument,
B says that men and women have equal capacities for hearing. Which must be true.
E says that women have less hearing losses overall and that location plays a role, which is false. Say that A lives in an isolated area and B lives in a bustling city, and if B too was isolated from noise, would this hold?
So B
Hope this helps!

As they get older, women usually maintain their ability to hear higher

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As they get older, women usually maintain their ability to hear higher

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