A study of adults who suffer from migraine headaches revealed that a

Question

A study of adults who suffer from migraine headaches revealed that a significant proportion of the study participants suffer from a complex syndrome characterized by a set of three symptoms. Those who suffer from the syndrome experienced excessive anxiety during early childhood. As adolescents, these people began experiencing migraine headaches. As these people approached the age of 20, they also began to experience recurring bouts of depression. Since this pattern is invariant, always with excessive anxiety at its beginning, it follows that excessive anxiety in childhood is one of the causes of migraine headaches and depression in later life.

The reasoning m the argument is vulnerable to criticism on which one of the following grounds?

(A) It does not specify the proportion of those in the general population who suffer from the syndrome.

(B) It fails to rule out the possibility that all of the characteristic symptoms of the syndrome have a common cause.

(C) It makes a generalization that is inconsistent with the evidence.

(D) It fails to demonstrate that the people who participated in the study are representative of migraine sufferers.

(E) It does not establish why the study of migraine sufferers was restricted to adult participants.

auradediligodo · Accepted Answer

A study of adults who suffer from migraine headaches revealed that a significant proportion of the study participants suffer from a complex syndrome characterized by a set of three symptoms. Those who suffer from the syndrome experienced excessive anxiety during early childhood. As adolescents, these people began experiencing migraine headaches. As these people approached the age of 20, they also began to experience recurring bouts of depression. Since this pattern is invariant, always with excessive anxiety at its beginning, it follows that excessive anxiety in childhood is one of the causes of migraine headaches and depression in later life.

The reasoning m the argument is vulnerable to criticism on which one of the following grounds?

Weaken question

Pre-thinking

In order to understand why option B is the correct option we need to deconstruct the conclusion.

Since this pattern is invariant, always with excessive anxiety at its beginning, it follows that excessive anxiety in childhood is one of the causes of migraine headaches and depression in later life.

Part 1: evidence---> Since this pattern is invariant, always with excessive anxiety at its beginning,

The conclusion is drawn based on this fact. The sequence is always the same so the cause for the last 2 is the first element. But what if   There is another element before?

Part 2: conclusion----->it follows that excessive anxiety in childhood is one of the causes of migraine headaches and depression in later life.

POE:

(A) It does not specify the proportion of those in the general population who suffer from the syndrome.
 Irrelevant

(B)   It fails to rule out the possibility that all of the characteristic symptoms of the syndrome have a common cause.
 In line with pre-thinking

(C) It makes a generalization that is inconsistent with the evidence.
 Irrelevant

(D) It fails to demonstrate that the people who participated in the study are representative of migraine sufferers.
 I feel like this is also a weakener but probably option B is stronger because it is more related to the conclusion

(E) It does not establish why the study of migraine sufferers was restricted to adult participants.
  Irrelevant

fireagablast · Answer

Selected B because the conclusion presumes that migranes are solely due to anxiety, rather than anxiety and migranes being a symptom of something else.

It essentially claims that because I have symptom A, then i must have symptom B, without establishing that the two are not related to a previous condition.

Pranavsawant · Answer

I was unable to eliminate between B and D. How can we say that D is wrong? If they are not representative of migraine sufferers in general how can we justify their hypothesis that what they are saying (based on the study) is valid for people suffering from migraines in general?

B hits the mark but I wanna know how I can eliminate choices like D in the exam cause D is also very convincing. If you have an inaccurate representation, your hypoethesis is limited to those set of people only and cannot be generally claimed.

DmitryFarberMPrep · Answer

D doesn't matter because the argument only claims that anxiety is  one  of the causes of migraines. It doesn't say it's the only cause, or even a major cause. So all we need to know is whether anxiety led to the later symptoms in people with this particular syndrome, not whether other cases of migraines were also caused by anxiety.

Abbas007 · Answer

“The syndrome” refers to the complex syndrome mentioned earlier. The syndrome = a set of three symptoms:
1)Excessive anxiety in early childhood
2)Migraine headaches in adolescence
3)Recurring depression around age 20
So, the “syndrome” is not migraine alone. It is the entire pattern across time. Now rewrite the argument in plain English: 
Researchers studied adults with migraines. Many of them show a consistent pattern:
They were very anxious as children
Later, they developed migraines
Later still, they developed depression
Because anxiety always comes first in this pattern, childhood anxiety must be a cause of migraines and depression later in life.
That’s the argument.
Where is the logical leap?
The author goes from:
“Anxiety always occurs before the other symptoms” to “Therefore, anxiety causes the other symptoms”
⚠️ That is a classic GMAT causal error.
Temporal order ≠ causation. 
Just because A comes before B and C does not mean:
A causes B
A causes C

What alternative explanation destroys the argument?

Here’s the killer alternative:

All three symptoms could be caused by a single underlying factor.
For example:
genetic predisposition
early neurological development
childhood trauma
hormonal or biochemical factors

That underlying cause could:
produce childhood anxiety
later produce migraines
later produce depression
In that case: anxiety is a symptom, not a cause the conclusion collapses

✅ (B) It fails to rule out the possibility that all of the characteristic symptoms of the syndrome have a common cause.

This is correct.

A study of adults who suffer from migraine headaches revealed that a

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A study of adults who suffer from migraine headaches revealed that a

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