According to a recent study of sexual behavior in the U.S., over half

Question

According to a recent study of sexual behavior in the U.S., over half of the  couples that were married and engaged at the time of the study's survey were living  together before making a final commitment to each other.

A) couples that were married and engaged at the time of the study's survey were living

B) couples that were engaged or married at the time of the study's survey had lived

C) couples who were engaged or married at the time when the study's survey occured were living

D) married and engaged couples at the time of the study's survey had lived

E) married or engaged couples at the time of the study's survey were living

Hi This is a old question which i found in this site. However i did not find a good reasoning for the answers. Can some one give examples for solving this.

Thanks

Capricorn369 · Accepted Answer

Nice question and my answer is B.
2 pointers to note - 
1. "engaged or married" is required you cant be "engaged and married" at the same time. A & D off.
2. "had" is required becasue couple "Lived" before they got "engaged or married". C & E off.

Press Kudos if it helps! Cheers!

badribaba1984 · Answer

@capricorn369. : Why having "Had" mandatory ? Why cant we have past progressive of "were living" ?

Capricorn369 · Answer

@badribaba1984 -If a sentence involves two actions taking place in the past with one action taking place before the other, then we use the past perfect tense. Here, we're talking about 2 events. Couples "Lived" and than "engaged/ married". First "lived" and second "engaged or married". Hence, Past perfect is required here. 
Few more examples - 
You  had  studied French before you moved to London.
She only understood the movie because she  had  read the book.

Press Kudos if it helps! Cheers!

thebigr002 · Answer

@badribaba : well, thats an interesting name. admiration apart, in the sentence above, the action of getting engaged or married = making the final commitment. Therefore, the people studied by the survey have to live together before they make the commitment... just as @capricorn369 has explained above. hope we're clear now. if yes, consider giving kudos... cos they don't come in easy..

lastshot · Answer

Will you please through some light on the use of Before in the sentence ??

In non-underlined part Before is mentioned, hence it this case use Past perfect tense must be optional ,

In E, use of past progressive tense seems OK, As it suggest that they were living together ...then they took a final commitment.

Regards
ST

iamdp · Answer

A) couples that were married and engaged at the time of the study's survey were living

>The intended meaning is that the couples who were either married or engaged at the time of the study > Either type (married or engaged) had lived together in the past
before getting engaged or married.

> Cannot be married and engaged at the same time

B) couples that were engaged or married at the time of the study's survey had lived

>CORRECT 
  
C) couples who were engaged or married at the time when the study's survey occurred were living

> Wrong > it says that the couples were still living together at the time of study   but intended meaning is that the study found they had lived together before getting married or engaged.

D) married and engaged couples at the time of the study's survey had lived

> Cannot be married and engaged at the same time

E) married or engaged couples at the time of the study's survey  were living

> were living is wrong as explained

Nightmare007 · Answer

I will prefer E over A.
Had is optional* not required as we already have Before blah blah in the sentence. 
You cannot use - That : That is used for inanimate things not for humans or couples.
Hence because of the above two reasons I prefer E.

sandaki · Answer

+1 E

In B, don't think it is appropriate to use "That" for couples.Also since there is "before" in the non-underlined part, it is optional/redundant to use "had".

abhimahna · Answer

Experts, Please provide you views on this. How can we use "that" to refer to people?

GMATNinja · Answer

According to generally accepted rules of English grammar, "that" can refer to people or objects. The GMAT doesn't often use "that" to refer to people, but it's perfectly correct -- even though I can't find very many examples of it on official GMAT questions. Of course, usual caveats apply about this question: the GMAT spends $1500-$3000 developing each question, and it's impossible for even the very best test-prep question writers -- even the awesome people at GMAT Club -- to compete with that. So don't lose too much sleep over this one.

nakulanand · Answer

can that refer to people? please help, i have my GMAT in 2 days!

shubham1985 · Answer

On the GMAT, 'that' cannot refer to people. GMAT prefers who or whom to refer to people.

Thanks !
Please consider pressing kudos if my response helped you in any way !

nakulanand · Answer

Than in this how can that refer to couple?

shubham1985 · Answer

This question is not from the official source. So, sometimes you might find such debatable questions from other sources.

nakulanand · Answer

Shubham1985 this is from an official gmatprep practice test, I came across it myself!

shubham1985 · Answer

ok, then in this question, B seems to be the best between B and C. Others can be striked out immediately for the meaning. Meaning takes the higher precedence over the 'that' error. However, majority of the times, you will not find gmat using 'that' to refer to people. Another point to note here is that it is about selecting the least worst choice among the bad choices.

Pari28 · Answer

Why is Option C incorrect ??

It is very possible that the couple were living together before getting married or engaged.

felixduan320 · Answer

Hi,

But the couple is still living together to this day. For a similar question, how do we know "were living" isn't correct? Yes they started living together before being engaged/married, but they are still living together to this day, so it is an action that started in the past but has not ended. Past perfect is for a verb that has started and ended in the past, but they are still living together, so what is wrong with the continuous tense C?

EducationAisle · Answer

Hi  felixduan320 , the sentence is not concerned about whether the couple is still living together  to this day ; the frame of reference is when the couple made a final commitment to each other.

The presence of the word  before  tilts the decision in favor of  past perfect . So, the two events are:
i) Making a final commitment to each other
ii) Living together

Since living together happened before/till the time that final commitment was made to each other, past perfect is appropriately used to depict the  earlier  of these two events:  living together .

Please refer to our video on  Past Perfect Tense  for more information.

According to a recent study of sexual behavior in the U.S., over half

Prep Toolkit

Top 5 GMAT Debrief Videos

615 to 715 in 15 Days (Ria's Strategies)

More than Quant/Verbal Abilities: Speed vs. Accuracy

745 with Only Self-Prep and GMAT Club

From 555 to 765: 210-point Improvement

Perfect 805 Score Debrief by Julia

My Rewards

GMAT Sentence Correction (SC - EA only) Questions

According to a recent study of sexual behavior in the U.S., over half

Prep Toolkit

615 to 715 in 15 Days (Ria's Strategies)

More than Quant/Verbal Abilities: Speed vs. Accuracy

745 with Only Self-Prep and GMAT Club

From 555 to 765: 210-point Improvement

Perfect 805 Score Debrief by Julia

My Rewards