Some 70 percent of consumers polled at an upscale supermarket said tha

Question

Some 70 percent of consumers polled at an upscale supermarket said that they did not care for the taste of Apex toothpaste. Nonetheless, sales of Apex accounted for a full 75 percent of toothpaste sold at that supermarket. The conclusion that at least 75 percent of shoppers buying toothpaste did in fact enjoy the taste of Apex toothpaste relies on the assumption that ___________________.
Question
Which of the following best completes the passage?

Which of the following best completes the passage?

(A) most of the shoppers polled did not make any toothpaste purchases that day.
(B) most shoppers who bought Apex did so because of its proven efficacy in fighting tooth decay.
(C) nearly every shopper who bought Apex did so because he or she did not like its taste.
(D) a large number of shoppers polled were dental professionals.
(E) shoppers will not buy a certain brand of toothpaste if they do not care for its taste.

Carcass · Answer

A)most of the shoppers polled did not make any toothpaste purchases that day.
most of shoppers----------we don't talk about

B)most shoppers who bought Apex did so because of its proven efficacy in fighting tooth decay.
idem

C)nearly every shopper who bought Apex did so because he or she did not like its taste.
who care nearly

D)a large number of shoppers polled were dental professionals.
we don't know

E)shoppers will not buy a certain brand of toothpaste if they do not care for its taste. 
correct

PadawanOfTheGMAT · Answer

Woot woot! Nearly 6 weeks after I took my gmat I am still able to get the correct answer: E

ABD are out of context, they could be true or false it won't change the outcome.

C is the opposite answer.

E is a double negation, that addresses the issue of the taste.

mariyea · Answer

E is right b/c E is saying that if someone doesn't care for the taste of toothpaste then he wouldn't buy it (or if someone cares for the taste of the toothpaste he would buy it) - sort rearranged statement in the passage that says that 75% of the customers bought Apex for the taste (ie b/c they cared about the taste)

akshathbs · Answer

this is one the weirdest question i have ever come across !!
and going by the methods people have used they have taken this question for an assumption question which is not the case . This is a complete the passage question !!

ans is E coz tht's the only thing that logically follows

fieldsrd · Answer

E is the only choice that at least related to the last part of the passage.

sarangadhar · Answer

I agree with E, when looking at the question independent of the first premise given regarding poll... but i don't understand how this premise is connected to answer E. can we say this premise is no way realted and can be ignored?

if 70% of the shoppers did not care for Apex taste (means 70% don't enjoy the Apex taste), how would 75% of the total toothpaste buyers enjoyed the Apex taste. Only possible situation is that Poll wasn't conducted with all kinds of people, selected evenly for pool, who buy the toothpaste. So, A seems to be a good contender. If most of the folks who don't enjoy the taste did not buy any toothpaste that day, only then it is possible to sell Apex based on its taste.

jaizen · Answer

How is it possible that 75% bought Apex when 70% of those polled didn't like the taste?

That means those who were polled was not an accurate representation of the cross section of ppl who bought APEX.
And those who bought Apex bought it because they liked the taste.

I guess A explains the discrepancy whereas E is an assumption that supports the conclusion. Anyway, this is a confusing question, and thus annoying!

SyedSan · Answer

Some 70 percent of consumers polled at an upscale supermarket said that they did not care for the taste of Apex toothpaste. Nonetheless, sales of Apex accounted for a full 75 percent of toothpaste sold at that supermarket.  The conclusion that at least 75 percent of shoppers buying toothpaste did in fact enjoy the taste of Apex toothpaste  relies on the assumption that ___________________.
Question
Which of the following best completes the passage?

A)most of the shoppers polled did not make any toothpaste purchases that day.
B)most shoppers who bought Apex did so because of its proven efficacy in fighting tooth decay.
C)nearly every shopper who bought Apex did so because he or she did not like its taste.
D)a large number of shoppers polled were dental professionals.
E)shoppers will not buy a certain brand of toothpaste if they do not care for its taste.

Answer has to be E, it directly fixes the assumption required for bold sentence to be correct - note that question doesn't utilizes the first two sentences.

Also,
_________________
"Argument : If you love long trips, you love the GMAT.
Conclusion : GMAT is long journey.

What does the author assume ?
Assumption : A long journey is a long trip. "
_________________
^^^ this reasoning is clearly wrong.

Let's assume LJ = LT so, the argument would be: If you love LJ, you love the GMAT. however this argument in no way implies that GMAT is long journey.

what you need to assume is "you love ONLY long journey"; this assumption if added to argument correctly concludes that GMAT is long journey.

goalset · Answer

E is the correct answer as shoppers will buy the toothpaste only if the taste is good.

siddharthmuzumdar · Answer

E is the correct answer here.

However, if the question were "Resolve the Paradox", would the answer change to A?

kuttingchai · Answer

C = least 75% of buyer enjoy taste of A-TP

A = might be that buyers actually care about the taste

P = A-TP sale acc for 75% of total sale

Vote for E

debapriyo · Answer

I will go with E ,
reason: The assumption is 75% buyers who brought the toothpaste either like the taste or buy toothpaste because of its taste..E gives strength to that saying they would have not gone for the toothpaste if they didn't like the taste.

iwillcrackgmat · Answer

Some 70 percent of consumers polled at an upscale supermarket said that they did not care for the taste of Apex toothpaste. Nonetheless, sales of Apex accounted for a full 75 percent of toothpaste sold at that supermarket. The conclusion that at least 75 percent of shoppers buying toothpaste did in fact enjoy the taste of Apex toothpaste relies on the assumption that ___________________.
Question
Which of the following best completes the passage?

A)most of the shoppers polled did not make any toothpaste purchases that day.
B)most shoppers who bought Apex did so because of its proven efficacy in fighting tooth decay.
C)nearly every shopper who bought Apex did so because he or she did not like its taste.
D)a large number of shoppers polled were dental professionals.
E)shoppers will not buy a certain brand of toothpaste if they do not care for its taste.

75% of the toothpastes sold were from Apex and customer do not care about the taste are the facts
and customer are not enjoying the taste of Apex 
if we read C now it clearly suggests that it is the assumption needed to end up with the above conclusion.
even though B is a luring and plausible option it doenst support the above conclusion..

+1 kudos if U like this post

TGC · Answer

Confused on this one:

total sales = 400

75% from supermarket = 300

70 % doesn't care = 210

30% care = 90

Where from above logic can we lead to answer this question !!

How would 75% of shoppers as per the conclusion will care about the taste even if we consider that in 25% sales from other markets people cared about the taste the it would be

90 + 25%of 400(100) = 190

190/400 cannot be by any chance 75 %

Plz Advice !!

law258 · Answer

E is correct.

A)most of the shoppers polled did not make any toothpaste purchases that day. --> irrelevant

B)most shoppers who bought Apex did so because of its proven efficacy in fighting tooth decay. --> irrelevant

C)nearly every shopper who bought Apex did so because he or she did not like its taste. --> if this was true, then the argument falls apart

D)a large number of shoppers polled were dental professionals. --> irrelevant

E)shoppers will not buy a certain brand of toothpaste if they do not care for its taste. --> CORRECT; if this is not true, the argument fails

chesstitans · Answer

Personally, I have a strong faith that in critical reasoning question, if ones can perform a good job in pre-thinking, or have no difficulty in finding the answer, people should not study the question in details.
=> pre-thinking is a way to avoid studying any wrong options.
This is mostly same to reading comprehensive.

AkshdeepS · Answer

A)most of the shoppers polled  did not make any toothpaste purchases that day.

Irrelevant

B)most shoppers who bought Apex did so because of its proven efficacy in  fighting tooth decay.

We are talking about taste .

C)nearly every shopper who bought Apex did so because  he or she did not like its taste.

Opposite. Conclusion says TASTE = PURCHASE

D)a large number of shoppers polled were  dental professionals.

Irrelevant

E)shoppers will not buy a certain brand of toothpaste if they do not care for its taste.

Correct - It shows that if shoppers buy a brand of toothpaste , they like its taste.

mallya12 · Answer

please explain the argument? If 70% don't care and 75% like the taste the only possible way is that poll was not conducted with all kind of people.

Kushchokhani · Answer

IanStewart   sayantanc2k   KarishmaB   ChiranjeevSingh   GMATRockstar   HaileyCusimano   MyGuruStefan   GyanOne   AnthonyRitz   generis

I agree with  mallya12

In fact, option E seems to be disputing the premises in the first two sentences, whereas Option A links the premises to conclusion.

Some 70 percent of consumers polled at an upscale supermarket said tha

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GMAT Critical Reasoning (CR) Questions

Some 70 percent of consumers polled at an upscale supermarket said tha

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