Veritas Prep CR Forum Expert - Karishma - Ask Me Anything about CR

Hi [quote="VeritasKarishma"] ,

Since I'm not authorized to open the link that you shared, requesting you to please clarify option D.

Thanks!

Hi

Can we still post our doubts in this thread?

Thanks

Certainly, but I request you to tag me.

Hey KarishmaB, many thanks for doing this. Am unable to open this link that you've shared in this forum:

https://gmatclub.com/forum/physician-go ... l#p2641097

Could you please share your take on this question again? ---

Hi VeritasKarishma / experts - how would you eliminate C and D specifically in this

The OA is E

Thank you for everything !
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Physician: Goliath Pharmaceutical Company has claimed that the recent increase in the number of diagnosed cases of Disease X shows that the disease is increasing in virulence. This is a questionable argument, just as it would be incorrect to claim that our increased success rate in treating patients with Disease X is due to the disease becoming less virulent. The real cause of both increases is a newly introduced screening process that reduces misdiagnoses of patients infected with the Disease X pathogen.

The Physician’s statements, if accurate, provide the most support for which of the following as a conclusion?


(A) The new screening procedure is the reason that more people are requesting to be tested for Disease X.
(B) It is not possible to determine that a patient has Disease X without using the new screening process.
(C) The increase in diagnosed cases of Disease X is proportional to the increase in the number of clinics utilizing the new screening procedure.
(D) The new screening process occasionally diagnoses patients with Disease X when they are actually suffering from another illness.
(E) The increase in the number of diagnosed cases of Disease X is not due to an increase in the disease’s virulence.

^^KarishmaB - for the above Goliath Pharmaceutical question:

In (C), what does "proportionally" mean ? i thought "proportionally" meant --

The more hospitals use the "newly introduced screening process" -- faster the rate of the INCREASE in the number of diagnosed cases.

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On the other hand, i didnt think (OA: E) was an inference (a fact)

All the passage says is that the claim (claim marked in yellow specifically) is Questionable.

Questionable implies, perhaps true / perhaps false - no one is sure.

(E) on the other hand is claiming with 100 % surety that INCREASED VIRULENCE is NOT the cause for recent increase in the number of diagnosed cases of Disease X

GPC claims that increase in cases shows increased virulence. This is not true.
If we were to claim that increased success in treating is due to decrease in virulence, that would also not be true.
The real reason for both is a new technique that reduces misdiagnosis.

So the author is claiming that prior to the new tech, there used to be misdiagnosis. So people with disease X did not get diagnosed. Now they do. So we see more diagnoses of disease X. Some who did not have disease X probably got diagnosed with it. Now they don't. So we are seeing an increased success in treating. The point is that if all who have disease X get diagnosed, more diagnoses will result. If those who do not have disease X do not get diagnosed with it, better accuracy in treatment will be the result (Medicine of disease X will work only if a person does have disease X).

If this is true, which option must be true?

(C) The increase in diagnosed cases of Disease X is proportional to the increase in the number of clinics utilizing the new screening procedure.

Not necessary. Can we say if 20% more clinics use the new process, 20% more cases will be diagnosed? No. We don't know how disease X is geographically distributed. 1 clinic in the right location could make a huge difference in the number of people testing positive for disease X etc.

(D) The new screening process occasionally diagnoses patients with Disease X when they are actually suffering from another illness.

This cannot be the conclusion. It is given that it reduces misdiagnoses. We don't know what kind of misdiagnoses it is still capable of, if at all.
Does it give even one false positive result? We don't know. Perhaps it only gives false negatives.

(E) The increase in the number of diagnosed cases of Disease X is not due to an increase in the disease’s virulence.

Yes, this is what the author is claiming. This is the conclusion. He says that increase in number of cases is not due to increase in virulence.

Answer (E)

We have to take it to be true that real cause of both increases is something else. Then virulence is not the reason.
Besides, 'questionable' in this sense means 'incorrect.'
Your logic is questionable means it is not correct.
Besides, the author further says '... just as it would be incorrect to claim ...' to show that both things are incorrect.

Hi KarishmaB -

Lets say (C) was saying this instead :



Just curious, what your thought are on this (C-variant) ?

I think this (C-variant) is inferable.

Proportional means if one doubles the other doubles too. It shows direct variation.
When one increases, other increase too is direct relation, not proportional.

Thanks so much KarishmaB.

Do you think (C-variant) is inferabble ? I think it is.



If number of new screening procedures have increased by 20 % -- the number of diagnosed cases of Disease X will also increase by 20 % surely.

I think that is an inference, one could make.

Not correct. Neither is there proportionality between number of procedures done and number of diagnosed cases nor is it there between no of clinics and number of diagnosed cases (this is what option (C) says).
Say there are 5 clinics and 100 cases diagnosed last year. If this year one more clinic starts using the new technique, does it mean we will see 120 diagnosed cases? No. We may see 200 diagnosed cases if the clinic opened in an area where the disease is widespread. We may see 100 cases only if the new clinic was opened in an area with no cases. We may see 200 cases if the new clinic conducted many tests in the year. We may see 100 cases only if the new clinic conducted very few tests etc. There are infinite scenarios possible.

Hi KarishmaB – thank you for your response.

I agree that (C-original) is not inferable. I thought however – we could infer (C-Variant)

There should be proportionality between number of new screening procedures done and number of diagnosed cases

Reason

• If country wide – the number of new screening procedures goes up by 20 %
• The number of diagnosed cases will go up by 20 % as well

Do you think this is a plausible scenario AGAINST (C-variant) ?

• The number of new screening procedures went up by 20 %.
• The location of the testing was done in a remote village
• In the village, no one had disease X
• Thus the new screening procedures went up by 20 % but the number of diagnoses cases was still 0 % as no one in the remote village had Disease X to begin with

Yes. In any case, nothing says that the increase must be 20%. What if 20% more tests led to only 5% more cases? etc. There is no direct variation between them.

KarishmaB

Hi karishma,
i just want to ask some generic question
1.What's the trend of CR question as of now means what type of more questions are asked.
2.What's your take about conditional reasoning questions are they tested much or rarely tested.

any tips or suggestion to score high in CR.

Essentially we have 4 main types of CR questions - Strengthen, Weaken, Inference and Method (Based on structure of the argument)
The other types are, in a way, applications or different flavours of these. Assumption is a special type of strengthen, mimic a special type of method, 'best completes' a strengthen or a weaken etc.
The kind of questions you will get in the test depends on how well you are performing though the intent of the software is to give you variety. At lower score levels, people are more likely to see simple, direct strengthen/weaken/inference questions more often. At higher scores, the software is likely to throw in more applications and curve balls.
As for conditional reasoning, we don't usually get "questions based on conditional reasoning" but what you do need to understand conditional reasoning very very well. You could have a conditional conclusion or a condition provided in one of the premises. The test maker is very likely to give you options that will confuse you if you do not understand the conditions very well. A flaw in logic or a mimic question could be based on an incorrect inference of a conditional statement etc. All in all, you MUST understand the conditionals well.

KarishmaB

when we apply variance test or yes/no test to evaluate questions so correct option always strengthen and weaken both or do either of will also be correct

The yes/no answers of the correct option impact the conclusion "differently."
One could strengthen/weaken while the other may have no impact. They could have opposite impact too i.e. one could strengthen and the other could weaken.