Visitors to the park have often looked up into the leafy canopy and

Often, you can get insights regarding SC issues by using simpler examples, doing something similar to plugging in numbers in quant. Let's try that here.

The people playing the music, who were from Ireland, smiled the entire time.

Looks good to me.

So, we have part of our answer.

However, in case of this "monkeys sleeping on the branches" example, we have a slightly different situation.

Let's try this one.

We have seen people playing music, whose country of origin was Ireland.

Notice that this is a different situation. I don't know the exact linguistic term here, but "playing music" is not just a restrictive modifier in this case. It's a component of what "we have seen."

We didn't see a thing "people playing music." We saw a scenario in which people were playing music. So, the idea that "people playing music" is one noun phrase that is logically modified by "whose country of origin was Ireland" doesn't really hold here. In fact, what would make more sense is the following.

We have seen people whose country of origin was Ireland playing music.

So, getting back to the monkeys question, even if "whose" didn't seem to refer to "branches," the structure doesn't seem logical, not because "whose" can't jump a verb-ing modifier but because, in this case, the noun + verb-ing modifier is not a simple noun phrase focused on the monkeys. It represents a scenario. So, "whose" would not really be referring to the monkeys. It would be illogically referring to a scenario.

It's all pretty subtle. You know?

If the emphasis is on the people themselves, the sentence is fine. If the emphasis is on the scenario, the sentence does not make sense.,

I guess, in this case, the presence of the relative clause "who smiled ..." forces us to intepret the sentence as focusing on the people.

Yeah, we definitely can't jump there. Typically, we only jump over a noun modifier when the whole phrase is referring to one thing: "I brought a bag of food and toys, which I opened for all to see." Since "sleeping on branches" describes what the monkeys are doing, it's not really all one thing in the same way, so we read "whose" as applying to the nearest noun.

As for "have hung," it's fake-out parallelism. Just because we use present perfect in the main core of the sentence, that doesn't mean we need it in our modifier. It implies that the monkeys' arms and legs HAVE HUNG at some time, but not necessarily at the time that people saw the monkeys. Remember that present participles (-ing) are not verbs, but rather time-neutral modifiers. I can say "I saw people leaving the store," "I see people leaving the store," or even "I will see people leaving the store." The -ing form is not an indicator of time; it just makes a modifier, and thus works very well for our purpose here.

Dear Friends,

Here is a detailed explanation to this question-

Meaning is crucial to solving this problem:
Understanding the intended meaning is key to solving this question; the intended meaning of this sentence is that visitors to the park have often looked up into the leafy canopy and seen monkeys that were sleeping on the branches, and the monkeys' arms and legs hung like socks on a clothesline.

Concepts tested here: Meaning + Modifiers + Verb Forms + Parallelism

• The simple past tense is used to refer to events that concluded in the past.
• The simple past continuous tense is used to refer to actions that took place in the past over a period of time.
• The simple present tense is used to indicate actions taking place in the current time frame, indicate habitual actions, state universal truths, and convey information that is permanent in nature.
• The present perfect tense (marked by the use of the helping verb “has/have”) is used to describe events that concluded in the past but continue to affect the present.
• In the “noun + comma + phrase” construction, the phrase must correctly modify the noun; this is one of the most frequently tested concepts on GMAT sentence correction.
• “who/whose/whom/which/where”, when preceded by a comma, refer to the noun just before the comma.

A: This answer choice incorrectly uses “whose arms and legs…” to refer to “branches”, illogically implying that the arms and legs that hung like socks belonged to the branches; the intended meaning is that the arms and legs that hung like socks belonged to the monkeys; please remember, “who/whose/whom/which/where”, when preceded by a comma, refer to the noun just before the comma. Moreover, Option A incorrectly uses the simple past tense verb “saw” (rather than the past participle “seen”) with the helping verb “have”, which is used as part of the present perfect and present perfect continuous verb constructions; in simple words, “have…saw” is incorrect whereas “have…seen” is the correct usage. Further, Option A incorrectly uses the simple past tense verb “saw” to refer to an action that began and concluded in the past but continues to affect the present; present perfect tense is correct for such usage. Additionally, Option A incorrectly uses the simple present tense verb “hang” to refer to an action that took place in the past over a period of time; remember, the simple past continuous tense is used to refer to actions that took place in the past over a period of time, and the simple present tense is used to indicate actions taking place in the current time frame, indicate habitual actions, state universal truths, and convey information that is permanent in nature.

B: This answer choice incorrectly uses “whose arms and legs…” to refer to “branches”, illogically implying that the arms and legs that hung like socks belonged to the branches; the intended meaning is that the arms and legs that hung like socks belonged to the monkeys; please remember, “who/whose/whom/which/where”, when preceded by a comma, refer to the noun just before the comma. Moreover, Option B incorrectly uses the simple past tense verb “saw” (rather than the past participle “seen”) with the helping verb “have”, which is used as part of the present perfect and present perfect continuous verb constructions; in simple words, “have…saw” is incorrect whereas “have…seen” is the correct usage. Further, Option B incorrectly uses the simple past tense verb “saw” to refer to an action that began and concluded in the past but continues to affect the present; present perfect tense is correct for such usage.

C: Trap. This answer choice incorrectly uses the simple past tense verb “saw” (rather than the past participle “seen”) with the helping verb “have”, which is used as part of the present perfect and present perfect continuous verb constructions; in simple words, “have…saw” is incorrect whereas “have…seen” is the correct usage. Further, Option C incorrectly uses the simple past tense verb “saw” to refer to an action that began and concluded in the past but continues to affect the present; present perfect tense is correct for such usage.

D: Correct. This answer choice avoids the modifier error seen in Options A, B, and E, as it uses the phrase “with arms and legs”, rather than a “who/whose/whom/which" phrase, conveying the intended meaning of the sentence- that the arms and legs that hung like socks belonged to the monkeys. Further, Option D correctly uses the present perfect tense verb “have…seen” to describe an event that began and concluded in the past but continues to affect the present. Additionally, Option D correctly uses the present participle (“verb+ing” – “hanging” in this sentence) to refer to an action that took place over a period of time in the past; remember, the present participle can be used to refer to actions that are continuous in nature, in any time period.

E: This answer choice incorrectly uses “whose arms and legs…” to refer to “branches”, illogically implying that the arms and legs that hung like socks belonged to the branches; the intended meaning is that the arms and legs that hung like socks belonged to the monkeys; please remember, “who/whose/whom/which/where”, when preceded by a comma, refer to the noun just before the comma. Additionally, Option E incorrectly uses the present perfect tense verb “have hung to refer to an action that took place in the past over a period of time; please remember, the simple past continuous tense is used to refer to actions that took place in the past over a period of time, and the present perfect tense (marked by the use of the helping verb “has/have”) is used to describe events that concluded in the past but continue to affect the present.

Hence, D is the best answer choice.

To understand the concept of "Simple Tenses" on GMAT, you may want to watch the following video (~1 minute):



To understand the concept of "Present Perfect Tense" on GMAT, you may want to watch the following video (~2 minutes):



To understand the concept of "Simple Continuous Tenses" on GMAT, you may want to watch the following video (~1 minute):



All the best!
Experts' Global Team

Visitors to the park have often looked up into the leafy canopy and saw monkeys sleeping on the branches, whose arms and legs hang like socks on a clothesline.

(A) saw monkeys sleeping on the branches, whose arms and legs hang
Whose cannot modify animals
(B) saw monkeys sleeping on the branches, whose arms and legs were hanging
Whose cannot modify animals
(C) saw monkeys sleeping on the branches, with arms and legs hanging
saw is not the right tense used because the tense should be parallel to have often looked up
(D) seen monkeys sleeping on the branches, with arms and legs hanging
Correct
(E) seen monkeys sleeping on the branches, whose arms and legs have hung
Whose cannot modify animals

Now regarding your doubts:

1) According to the OE, "whose" modifies "branches". However, in other official questions I have seen that sometimes the clause modifier doesn't modify the closest noun. Actually, it can modify the main noun in a noun phrase as long as it makes sense and it is not ambiguous.
In this case, we have "monkeys sleeping on the branches, whose..."; "monkeys" is the main noun of that noun phrase and makes sense with "arms and legs hang like socks on a clothesline".
So, my question is: Is the split "whose....", a good reason to eliminate some choices?
The answer choice containing whose can simply be eliminated, because on the GMAT, whose can only modify people and here it seems to modify monkeys.

2) What are the rules related to a prepositional phrase after a comma? In this question: "..., with arms and legs hanging". How could we know that the prepositional phrase refers to the monkeys and not the visitors. Because these modifiers modify the entire clause, usually modifies the subject (visitors).
normally a prepositional phrase can be placed anywhere, but generally it is placed closest to the noun being modified, in this case the monkeys.