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At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on Updated on: 13 Jun 2021, 04:45
Originally posted by mymba99 on 21 May 2008, 06:19.
Last edited by Bunuel on 13 Jun 2021, 04:45, edited 2 times in total.
Renamed the topic and edited the question.
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64% (01:27) correct 36% (01:41) wrong based on 6367 sessions

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At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on the numerous challenges facing the company, including among them the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and the declining sales for the company’s powerful microprocessor chip.


(A) including among them the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and the declining sales for

(B) which includes the threat of a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and declining sales of

(C) included among these the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit as well as a decline in sales for

(D) among them the threat of a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and the decline in sales of

(E) among these the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit as well as the decline in sales for
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D
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At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on 11 Aug 2014, 12:23
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kinjiGC
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At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on the numerous challenges facing the company, including among them the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent infringement suit and the declining sales for the company’s powerful microprocessor chip.
A. including among them the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and the declining sales for
B. which includes the threat of a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and declining sales of
C. included among these the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit as well as a decline in sales for
D. among them the threat of a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and the decline in sales of
E. among these the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit as well as the decline in sales for

Can some one explain what type of modifier is used in the correct option and some other usages of this type modifier.

Meaning : At the annual SHM investors heard numerous challenges. Among those challenges were two challenges : threat from a rival's MDPI and decline in sales of company's powerful microprocessor chip.

verbing modifier should modify the preceding clause and should make sense with the subject of the preceding clause. Here including modifies the challenges and doesn't fit well with "investors" subject of the preceding clause.
A. including among them the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and the declining sales for
Rejecting the option A for the above reason and also sales of instead of "for".

B. which includes the threat of a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and declining sales of
which should replace challenges and includes has SV issue

C. included among these the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit as well as a decline in sales for
included should modify the closest noun "challenges" that is correct. "included among these" construction doesn't seem correct. sales of should be used instead of "for".

D. among them the threat of a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and the decline in sales of
This looks the least of the devil.

E. among these the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit as well as the decline in sales for
"sales for" is the issue.

Doubts:
1) Any issue in "among them" and "among these"?
2) them should refer to the animate pronouns. Isn't it?
3) Any other errors?
Show more


Hi kinjiGC,

Thanks for posting your doubt here. :-)

It is true that "comma + verb-ing modifier" modifies the preceding action and must make sense with the doer of the modified action. However, "including" is an exception to this rule. Preceded or not preceded by a comma, "including" ALWAYS modifies a noun entity. In this sentence, "including" modifies "the numerous challenges" because what follows "including" are some of the challenges that the company faced.

Hence, Choice A is not incorrect from "comma + including". It is incorrect, as you have already mentioned, for the use of preposition "for" after "the declining sales" and use of preposition "from" after "threat". The correct preposition in the context of this sentence will be "threat of".

Choice B - Again, there is no problem with the modification of "which" here because "facing the company" is a noun modifier that modifies "the numerous challenges" and cannot be placed anywhere. So "which" can jump over this modifier and correctly modify "challenges". But yes, singular Verb "includes" does not agrre in number with plural Subject "challenges".

Choice C: Again, "included" in this choice is not incorrect for the same reason already explained in Choice B. "these" is demonstrative pronoun and must be followed by a noun. Per the context of the sentence, "these" should be followed by "challenges". But it is not. Hence, use of "these" is incorrect. This choice also repeats both teh incorrect prepositions of Choice A.

Choice D: This choice is correct. Here, "among them...." is a Noun Modifier that correctly modifies "the numerous challenges". Note that "them" can be used to refer to animate as well as inanimate objects.

Choice E: This Choice repeats the "these" error of Choice C and the preposition errors of Choice A.

All your doubts have been addressed in the analysis here. Please study them well, compare it to your analysis, and understand what all you possibly missed in your analysis.

Hope this helps. :-)
Thanks.
SJ
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At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on 03 Nov 2012, 13:29
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AbhiJ
At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on the numerous challenges facing the company, including among them the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent infringement suit and the declining sales for the company’s powerful microprocessor chip.
A. including among them the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and the declining sales for WE CANT USE PARTICIPLE MODIFIERS WITH COMMA
B. which includes the threat of a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and declining sales of WHICH ILLOGICALY MODIFIES COMPANY.
C. included among these the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit as well as a decline in sales for A SUIT CANT THREATEN YOU BUT YOU CAN FACE THE THREAT OF A SUIT.
D. among them the threat of a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and the decline in sales of ABSLOUTELY CORRECT. THIS IS AN ABSOLUTE PHRASE.
E. among these the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit as well as the decline in sales for A SUIT CANT THREATEN YOU BUT YOU CAN FACE THE THREAT OF A SUIT.

Can some one explain what type of modifier is used in the correct option and some other usages of this type modifier.
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This type of modifier is called Absolute phrase. This type of phrase consists of noun and noun modifier and modifies a whole clause or sentence. An absolute phrase can't stand alone as a sentence, but often expresses an additional thought.
An absolute phrase is separated from the main clause by a comma; it may come before or after that main clause.
It is usually asked at 720+ level.

i)Sound can travel through water for enormous distances,
its acoustic energy prevented from dissipating by boundaries in the ocean created by water layers of different temperatures and densities.
ii) More than 300 rivers drain into Siberia's Lake Baikal, which holds 20% of the worlds fresh water, more than all of the North American Great Lakes combined.


Hope that helps
-s
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At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on 01 Feb 2011, 02:13
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There is a short cut to cross this long passage. ‘Sales for’ is bad idiom, and so skip 1, 3 and 5. ‘Sales of’ is good idiom. Between 2 and 4, choice 2 no doubt sticks to the relative pronoun touch rule – ‘which’ touches and means ‘company’ - but sadly flouts logical predication by not referring to ‘challenges’ and hence dump it. Merrily tread along 4.
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At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on 22 May 2008, 12:04
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saravalli
At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on the numerous
challenges facing the company, including among them the threat from a rival’s
multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and the declining sales for the company’s
powerful microprocessor chip.
A. including among them the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patentinfringement
suit and the declining sales for
B. which includes the threat of a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit
and declining sales of
C. included among these the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patentinfringement
suit as well as a decline in sales for
D. among them the threat of a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and
the decline in sales of
E. among these the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit
as well as the decline in sales for
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the key is to look for decline IN sale OF.. sales for is wrong idiom..

so we are left with B and D..which in B is wrong..there are numerous challenges so we need something plural..D is best
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At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on 23 May 2008, 16:51
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In that case, 'numerous challenges' is plural. So we need 'include' and not 'includes'.

I even thought what if the 'which' is pointing to 'presentation' and then 'includes' will be right...but later thought I was thinking too much.
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At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on 26 Jun 2010, 04:02
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lordw
At the annual stockholder meeting, investors heard a presentation on the numerous challenges facing the company, including among them the threat from a rival´s multibillion dollar patent infringement suit and the declining sales for the company's powerfull microprocessor chip.

B. which includes the threat of a rival´s multibillion dollar patent infringement suit and declining sales of
C. included among these the threat from a rival´s multibillion dollar patent infringement suit as well as a decline in sales for
D. among them the threat of a rival's multibillion dollar patent infringement suit and the decline in sales of
E. among these the threat from a rival's multibillion dollar patent infringement suit as well as the decline in sales for

Guys my doubt is between options D and E, can someone explain with details? Tks. Lw
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By process of elimination -

decline of X is the correct idiom. decline for X is wrong. This eliminates A, C and E.

In choice B, the comma is followed by which. The 'which' in this modifier (part of the sentence after the comma) modifies the noun preceding the comma - in this case which modifies company. This does not make sense as company does not include the thread and the declining sales. The challenges include the threat and the declining sales. Hence eliminate B.

Answer should be D.
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At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on 22 Feb 2011, 08:25
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It may also be helpful to note that, in general, the test-writers don't like indicative pronouns (these, those, this, that, etc) that float free without attached nouns.

For example...

I'm not sure how I feel about that rule. (Correct)
I'm not sure how I feel about that. (Incorrect)


That knocks off C and E.

Two of the choices that are left-- A and D, include object pronouns ("them") while B contains no pronoun at all. It might be temping to nix all pronouns, but as daagh mentioned above, ", which" must touch the noun it is modifying, and in choice C it is touching "company"--eliminate B.

But, you may ask, what about the fact that there are *several* plural nouns earlier in the sentence ("stockholders, "investors," and "challenges")? Doesn't that mean the pronoun is ambiguous?

Unfortunately, no. A degree of pronoun ambiguity can be tolerated if it is grammatically clear from the sentence which of the possible antecedents is intended (notice, this is different from being clear because "I can tell what they probably meant from the content")--grammatically clear means clear from the *structure*)

(1) "stockholders" modifies "meeting" and is not a standalone noun-- out
(2) "investors" is the subject of the clause ("INVESTORS HEARD"), but we want an object noun (because we have THEM), not a subject noun. If our pronoun was "they" we would be referring to "investors"--out
(3) "challenges" is the object of the preposition ("presentation ON THE NUMEROUS CHALLENGES") -- here's our guy!

One last clue-- parallelism is very powerful on the GMAT, and the structure in D is nicely parallel:

(D) ...among them the THREAT OF....and the DECLINE OF... (yay)

...whereas in A we have

(S)...among them the THREAT FROM...and THE DECLINING SALES OF (less yay)

That's more ammo for (D) being the correct response.
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At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on 08 Mar 2011, 15:58
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Yup--sorry it's taken me so long to reply (out of the country on vacation).

A SUBJECT pronoun is a pronoun that takes the place of a noun in the subject position--in other words, the noun that is PERFORMING the action.

SUBJECT PRONOUNS-- I, you, he, she, it, they

The cat jumped over my dad.
SHE jumped over my dad.

The boy threw the ball.
HE threw the ball.

Those people like Jeanine a lot.
THEY like Jeanine a lot.

OBJECT pronouns take the place of nouns in the object position-- nouns that are RECEIVING the action. If you see a preposition before a noun, that noun must be an object (that doesn't mean there *must* be a preposition, however--see the second and third examples below).

OBJECT pronouns: me, you, him, her, it, them

The cat jumped over my dad.
The cat jumped over him.

The boy threw the ball.
The boy threw it.

Those people like Jeanine a lot.
Those people like her a lot.


"you" and "it" are the same for both families of pronouns, but things can get more confusing for the others. If you're not sure which case (object or subject) you should use, you can try swapping in another one from that family to check.

For example, if you wanted to test the correctness of the following sentence--
"Between you and I, that puppy is awfully mopey." (?)

You could "swap in" another member of the same family..."I" is a subject pronoun, so you should be able to subsitute another subject pronoun...

Which is correct?
"Between you and THEY, that puppy is awfully mopey."
OR
"Between you and THEM, that puppy is awfully mopey."

The second example, which uses the OBJECT case pronoun, is correct, so we actually want to say--
"Between you and ME, that puppy is awfully mopey" (CORRECT)
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At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on 31 Jan 2012, 04:34
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Hi Friends I came close to C and E, but i went wrong by marking E...To my fate the answer is D...But i striked of D as "them" has an ambiguous referent, as it could refer to challenges or stockholders....Please explain if i am wrong.....

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At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on 31 Jan 2012, 12:37
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kotela
Hi Friends I came close to C and E, but i went wrong by marking E...To my fate the answer is D...But i striked of D as "them" has an ambiguous referent, as it could refer to challenges or stockholders....Please explain if i am wrong.....
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Hi,
Pronoun should have a clear antecedent, alright. More importantly, a pronoun must have a logical antecedent. In the sentence in question, "them" is a plural pronoun. The logical antecedent of "them" is "numerous challenges" a plural noun. The other plural noun in this sentence is "investors". Now "they" cannot refer to "investors" because it is not logical to say that "investors" are one of the numerous challenges faced by the company.

Take this example: In an accident, the car hit the tree and so Joe had to take it to the garage. Here, "it" can only refer to "car" because the other singular entity in the sentence, "tree", cannot be taken to the garage. So here we need not explicitly mention that Joe had to take his car to the garage.

In an accident, the car hit the tree and it got damaged pretty badly. Now, here "it" is ambiguous because both the singular entities, car as well as tree, can be damaged pretty badly. Hence, in this sentence "it" must be replaced by a noun stating what got damaged.

In this GMATPrep question, "them" has only one logical referent and hence it is not ambiguous.

This concept has been covered in detail in the "Pronouns" concept file in Level 1 Preview Concepts section that is included in the free trail. Just register and learn.

Hope this helps.
Shraddha

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At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on 04 Nov 2012, 06:39
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AbhiJ
At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on the numerous challenges facing the company, including among them the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent infringement suit and the declining sales for the company’s powerful microprocessor chip.
A. including among them the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and the declining sales for
B. which includes the threat of a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and declining sales of
C. included among these the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit as well as a decline in sales for
D. among them the threat of a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and the decline in sales of
E. among these the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit as well as the decline in sales for

Can some one explain what type of modifier is used in the correct option and some other usages of this type modifier.
Show more

I just wanted to add some thoughts on this SC question.

1st of all this questions has 3:2 split...if you look closely...at the end you have sales for and sales of...the correct expression is sales of
that leaves us with 2 options, which is B & D. If you examine carefully...in option B the two entities are not parallel hence it is not correct. A noun (the threat of a rival’s multibillion) and participle (declining sales).Participles can be made parallel with (present, past and adjectives).
Now coming to the "Including" Modifier.. any verb(ing) modifier can be used in two context (refer to e-gmat free videos on SC). ,verb(ing) refers/modifies the subject and not the immediate noun preceding it.
e.g. Joe killed the snake, using the stick.
Here the verb(ing) refers to subject Joe who used the stick. So in the sentence posted by you, meaning wise the including refers to the subject that is Investors, which is not the intended meaning.
Hope this clarifies all your questions on "ing" modifiers.
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At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on 04 Nov 2012, 07:29
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If you have the Manhattan Sentence Correction Strategy guide, the Advanced section (at the end of the book) has the answer to your question. There are 4 exceptions to NOUN Modifiers including the one that is used here

If a phrase is important to a sentence and can not be placed anywhere else in the sentence then the modifier is not required to touch the noun being modified "Challenges" (in this case)

Normally your modifier should touch "challenges" but you cant separate "facing the company" so your modifier is now modifying the noun" challenges facing the company"

Any answer that has "included" and "among" is unnecessarily repetitive

Included already incorporated "among" so you need only one of those 2 words.

Option A and C are out

"Which" refers to the immediately preceding noun
So B is out

You are left with D and E

But i think all you wanted was the clarification on the modifier.
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At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on 06 Nov 2012, 15:22
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A. Including <-> Among them = redundancy

B. Includes does not agree in number with Challenges

C. Included <-> Among these = redundancy, these

E. These, Sales for is unidiomatic

These as a pronoun is usually wrong and should be a red flag.
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At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on 09 Aug 2014, 11:53
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AbhiJ
At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on the numerous challenges facing the company, including among them the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent infringement suit and the declining sales for the company’s powerful microprocessor chip.
A. including among them the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and the declining sales for
B. which includes the threat of a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and declining sales of
C. included among these the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit as well as a decline in sales for
D. among them the threat of a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and the decline in sales of
E. among these the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit as well as the decline in sales for

Can some one explain what type of modifier is used in the correct option and some other usages of this type modifier.
Show more

Meaning : At the annual SHM investors heard numerous challenges. Among those challenges were two challenges : threat from a rival's MDPI and decline in sales of company's powerful microprocessor chip.

verbing modifier should modify the preceding clause and should make sense with the subject of the preceding clause. Here including modifies the challenges and doesn't fit well with "investors" subject of the preceding clause.
A. including among them the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and the declining sales for
Rejecting the option A for the above reason and also sales of instead of "for".

B. which includes the threat of a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and declining sales of
which should replace challenges and includes has SV issue

C. included among these the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit as well as a decline in sales for
included should modify the closest noun "challenges" that is correct. "included among these" construction doesn't seem correct. sales of should be used instead of "for".

D. among them the threat of a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and the decline in sales of
This looks the least of the devil.

E. among these the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit as well as the decline in sales for
"sales for" is the issue.

Doubts:
1) Any issue in "among them" and "among these"?
2) them should refer to the animate pronouns. Isn't it?
3) Any other errors?
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At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on 13 Apr 2015, 00:56
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souvik101990
At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on the numerous challenges facing the company, including among them the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and the declining sales for the company’s powerful microprocessor chip.

A. including among them the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and the declining sales for

B. which includes the threat of a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and declining sales of

C. included among these the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit as well as a decline in sales for

D. among them the threat of a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and the decline in sales of

E. among these the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit as well as the decline in sales for
Show more

A, C, E - declining sales for.. is wrong. Should be declining sales of .
B - 'which' refers to company which is wrong. Challenges include 'the threat...' and 'the declining sales..'
Hence 'D'.

Thanks!
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At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on 29 Jul 2015, 05:00
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The shortest route to solving this problem is via idiom and pronoun reference; ‘Sales for’ is wrong idiom and sales of is proper. We can kick out A, C and E. Now it becomes easy to choose between B and D; B is out because, the reference for the pronoun, ‘which; is wrong by referring to the companies; If we were to argue that it might refer to the ‘challenges” then the verb includes is wrong; Or can it refer to the presentation,: even then the use of present tense is not appropriate, because the presentation was done in the past. It should logically refer to the challenges and therefore choice B goofs it up.

Coming to the use of the demonstrative pronoun ‘these’, one has the need to indicate about what he is referring to by pointing his fingers or use some kind of a gesture toward it, while there is a listener who is also a part o the whole episode. That is the reason that demonstrative pronouns are used mostly in spoken English. This usage is the general norm, notwithstanding a deviation here and there.

The object pronoun’ them’ has no such problems and hence D
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At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on 20 Sep 2016, 02:49
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In option D, don't we require a helping work (are) with the option.?? One more thing can verb-ing modifiers be used with past tense?..
eg: In 1850, Shershah built the Grand Trunk Road, extending from A to B.
In 1850, Shershah built the Grand Trunk Road, which extended from A to B.

Which between the above 2 sentences is correct?
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At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on 21 Sep 2016, 08:46
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meetmba91
In option D, don't we require a helping work (are) with the option.?? One more thing can verb-ing modifiers be used with past tense?..
eg: In 1850, Shershah built the Grand Trunk Road, extending from A to B.
In 1850, Shershah built the Grand Trunk Road, which extended from A to B.

Which between the above 2 sentences is correct?
Show more

Your query 1:
No, "are" is not required - "among them..." falls in a special category of modifier called subgroup modifier. Another example ( from Manhattan SC guide):

This model explains all known subatomic particles, SOME OF THEM only recently discovered.

Your query 2:
The present participle modifier takes up the tense of the main verb of the sentence.
I saw a bird flying. ... since the action seeing happened in the past, the action flying also happened in the past.

Your query 3:
You need to understand the difference between:
a. I saw a bird flying... means I saw a bird - it was flying
b. I saw a bird, flying.. means I saw a bird while I was flying.
A comma + a present participle modifier refers to the subject of the previous clause or the the whole clause.

In 1850, Shershah built the Grand Trunk Road, extending from A to B.... wrong: "extending" refers to the subject of the previous clause Shershah. Shershah built the Grand Trunk road - when he built it he could not have extended it at the same time.

In 1850, Shershah built the Grand Trunk Road, which extended from A to B. Here "which..." correctly refers to "Road".
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At the annual stockholders meeting, investors heard a presentation on 15 Jan 2017, 01:26
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Please change the OA to D.

Let us look at each of the answer options -

A - Incorrect.
"including among them the threat from a rival’s multi-billion-dollar patent infringement suit and the declining sales for the company’s powerful microprocessor chip."

"including + among" is redundnant.
"threat from" is generally used with people. Hence, unidiomatic.
"the threat" and "the declining" are not perfectly parallel.
"sales for" here is incorrect. It seems to imply "sales for the sake of the company's microprocessor chip".

B - Incorrect.
"the numerous challenges facing the company, which includes the threat of a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and declining sales of"

"which" seems to refer to "the company"
"the threat" and "declining" are not perfectly parallel.

C - Incorrect.
"included among these the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent infringement suit as well as a decline in sales for"

"included + among" is redundant as removing "included" does not change the meaning of the sentence.
"these" is incorrect as demonstrative pronouns must have a noun to modify. They cannot be used independently.
"threat from" is generally used with people. Hence, unidiomatic.
"sales for" here is incorrect.

D - correct answer.
"among them the threat of a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit and the decline in sales of"

"threat of X" - here X is the threat. Hence, correct.
"sales of" - is the correct idiom.

E - incorrect.
"among these the threat from a rival’s multibillion-dollar patent-infringement suit as well as the decline in sales for"
Usage of "these" is incorrect.
"sales for" is unidiomatic.
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