Young female ballet dancers and gymnasts sometimes fail to maintain good eating habits caused by the desire to be as thin as possible.

(A) Young female ballet dancers and gymnasts sometimes fail to maintain good eating habits caused by the desire to be as thin as possible.
(B) Good eating habits sometimes fail to be maintained by young female ballet dancers and gymnasts caused by desiring to be as thin as possible.
(C) Because they desire to be as thin as possible, good eating habits are sometimes not maintained by young female ballet dancers and gymnasts.
(D) Because they desire to be as thin as possible, young female ballet dancers and gymnasts sometimes fail to maintain good eating habits.
(E) Young female dancers and gymnasts sometimes fail to maintain good eating habits because they desire to be as thin as possible.

E looks fine but when it is compared to D (which is 100% clear), 'they' in 'E' can refer to habits, although logically, no one would think so.

I could not understand your logic. You are saying position of "that" in E is ambiguous. Whatever logic you applied to reach this conclusion is also applicable to option "D". More ever, a sentence starting with "because" is somewhat awkward and there was a way to more precise sentence as in option "E".
Please elaborate..[/quote]

I know it can get confusing. Look closely. As I mentioned, in D, "that" is a part of the modifying clause. Infact, the sentence can also be written as "Young female ballet dancers and gymnasts, because they desire to be as thin as possible, sometimes fail to maintain good eating habits." Option E is indeed highly precise but with a very subtle error.
Hope this helps.

Again whatever I say is only my opinion.
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my 2 cents

"Desire to be as thin as possible" is the modifier here
In general it makes sense to put modifier as close to the subject it modifies as possible,
so D is doing a good ob by putting this closer to dancers and gymnasts than E, which is putting modifier closer to eating habits.

I agree with the original explanation

IMO D.

A ) Original sentence- maintain good eating habits caused by the desire to be as thin as possible - conveys wrong meaning
B ) Awkward sentence
C ) "Because they desire to be as thin as possible" can not modify "good eating habits "
D ) "Because they desire to be as thin as possible" correctly modifies young female ballet dancers - no pronoun reference error - correct answer choice
E ) they - can refer to Young female ballet dancers or good eating habits - pronoun reference error.

'D' - 1.29 mins:-D
This is a tricky question I was confused between A and D but finally chose D.

(A) Young female ballet dancers and gymnasts sometimes fail to maintain good eating habits caused by the desire to be as thin as possible. 'habits caused by the desire to be as thin as possible' seems odd
(B) Good eating habits sometimes fail to be maintained by young female ballet dancers and gymnasts caused by desiring to be as thin as possible. Seems Good eating habits fail to maintain young female
(C) Because they desire to be as thin as possible, good eating habits are sometimes not maintained by young female ballet dancers and gymnasts. Modifier issue - Because they desire .. good eating habits
(D) Because they desire to be as thin as possible, young female ballet dancers and gymnasts sometimes fail to maintain good eating habits. Choose based on PoE and meaning
(E) Young female dancers and gymnasts sometimes fail to maintain good eating habits because they desire to be as thin as possible. 'They' could have multiple antecedents Habits or Dancers and Gymnasts'
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How to choose between D and E ????
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Young female ballet dancers and gymnasts sometimes fail to maintain good eating habits caused by the desire to be as thin as possible.

A) Young female ballet dancers and gymnasts sometimes fail to maintain good eating habits caused by the desire to be as thin as possible. good eating habits are caused by the desire to be thin?? Reverses the meaning of the sentence. Wrong
B) Good eating habits sometimes fail to be maintained by young female ballet dancers and gymnasts caused by desiring to be as thin as possible. same meaning error as A
C) Because they desire to be as thin as possible, good eating habits are sometimes not maintained by young female ballet dancers and gymnasts. they=good eating habits. wrong
D) Because they desire to be as thin as possible, young female ballet dancers and gymnasts sometimes fail to maintain good eating habits.
E) Young female dancers and gymnasts sometimes fail to maintain good eating habits because they desire to be as thin as possible.they=good eating habits. wrong

It all about the meaning and modifier placement . so D
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mahakmalik

The problem with E is that the pronoun they is ambiguous. It could refer either to habits or to dancers and gymnasts.

The omission of the word ballet seems to be inadvertent; in a GMAT test, you would probably not find such omissions.

I agree with your point to an extent, but the writer of this problem eliminates answer E stating the same reason I mentioned earlier, that the pronoun is ambiguous. Moreover we have seen some examples from the official guide, in which although the antecedent for a pronoun is very clear from the context of meaning, the usage has not been allowed because of existence of another possible antecedent, even though that other antecedent would give rise to an absurd meaning to the sentence.

However there are examples that support your view as well... that an answer has been accepted although there are two antecedents of which only one is meaningful !!

Considering your point, I would say that we should eliminate an answer on the basis of pronoun ambiguity - when one of the antecedents give rise to an absurd meaning - only as a last resort. When we are stuck between two answers and none of them can be eliminated on the basis of grammar or more obvious meaning problem, we would use this ambiguity to eliminate one of them.