A recent study found that people who drink coffee regularly have a low

Question

A recent study found that people who drink coffee regularly have a lower risk of developing Alzheimer's disease. The study concluded that coffee has a protective effect against Alzheimer's disease.

Which of the following, if true, most seriously weakens the study's conclusion?

A. The study did not account for other lifestyle factors, such as diet and exercise, which may influence the risk of developing Alzheimer's disease.

B. Coffee drinkers are more likely to be health-conscious and seek medical advice more frequently, leading to earlier detection and management of Alzheimer's disease.

C. The study found that people who drink tea regularly have a similar lower risk of developing Alzheimer's disease.

D. The study was conducted over a short period, which might not reflect the long-term effects of coffee consumption on Alzheimer's disease risk.

E. The study did not distinguish between different types of coffee, such as caffeinated and decaffeinated.

Ulki201 · Answer

Found this question somewhere but to me it should be B instead of A.

A does not work imo because it merely says that coffee has a protective effect. Not that there are no other factors apart from coffee consumption.

B works imo because if those coffee drinkers also live a healthier lifestyle, then is could be that there is merely a correlation and that the cause for lower risk of cancer does not lie in the coffee consumption but the healthier lifestyle.

cyrwr1 · Answer

i don't agree with A.

Just because other factors that may affect the likelihood exist does not weaken the conclusion that Coffee may have a protective effect.

B, on the other hand, offers a valid reason in that those coffee drinkers are healthier.

ShenotShih1017 · Answer

Can anyone explain why the answer is A and not B? That seems incorrect to me.

Not accounting for diet an exercise means there’s a potential third variable impacting the results, but B explicitly says that there IS a 3rd variable impacting the results.

Posted from my mobile device

enduser1993 · Answer

IMO- It seems B strengthens the conclusion. I may be wrong.

Ulki201 · Answer

Answer given differs from opinion of forum members

Oppenheimer1945 · Answer

B talks about earlier detection and management of Alzheimer's disease (AD). The disease is developed and getting managed. Hence this does not logically connect with the conclusion.

A on the other hand talks about other factors which are not taken into consideration, which could be the reasons for lower risk of AD. A better weakener.

pratiksha1998 · Answer

But in option A how can we be sure that the influence on the risk is positive influence or negative influence? What if the other diets have negative influence and they might be increasing the risk.=?

DmitryFarberMPrep · Answer

Any time we're calling one weakener "better," we have a problem. There should never be two answers that weaken (unless it's a "weaken except" question).

In this case, as others have said, the answer must be B. This is a classic correlation vs. causation argument, and B addresses the point that drinking coffee may be correlated with other behaviors that lower the risk of Alzheimer's.

Answer choice A might seem relevant, since it brings up other causes, but without further information it does nothing at all to weaken the argument. We'd need to know that some of these other causes are correlated with drinking coffee. If they merely exist independently, then there is still a correlation between coffee drinking and lowered risk that we need to explain. It would be like if every time you ate sushi you got a headache, so you concluded that sushi causes headaches. Knowing that other things (illness, blunt trauma, loud music) can also cause headaches wouldn't matter. Sushi could still cause headaches, too, and we have evidence linking the two. However, if every time you had sushi, you were exposed to other potential causes of headaches (e.g. alcohol, smoke, smooth jazz, whatever), then we'd have reason to question whether sushi was the real cause.

khushi8377886606 · Answer

I think it's A only because even though B says that coffee drinkers go for checkups causing early detection it still means that coffee might be inducing them to do so, which is not C causing B or C causing A or B but conforms A causing B.

glagad · Answer

There is confusion between A & B. 
I chose B as i feel it directly weakens the argument. 
A merely raises a doubt for Alternate Causation, but does nothing to substantiate the doubt.

DmitryFarberMPrep · Answer

khushi8377886606

That's an interesting line of reasoning, but don't let that lead you to choose an invalid answer that has already been debunked here. As I've detailed above, A doesn't weaken at all.

As for B, sure, it's possible in theory that coffee drinking causes people to be health-conscious seekers of medical advice, but that's a pretty remote possibility. Since it's also quite likely (almost certain, I'd say!) that this a separate characteristic that is not simply caused by coffee consumption, B is still a weakener. Again, a weakener does not need to disprove the conclusion, just introduce a reasonable doubt.

A recent study found that people who drink coffee regularly have a low

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A recent study found that people who drink coffee regularly have a low

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