Critical Reasoning

Can someone help me with what should be the step by step strategy for this CR question ?

It would really be amazing if one can explain what to do first, then what next and so on. I want to know the mechanism to solve this Q.

nchaswal wrote:Can someone help me with what should be the step by step strategy for this CR question ?

It would really be amazing if one can explain what to do first, then what next and so on. I want to know the mechanism to solve this Q.

Conclusion: Late evening curfew unlikely to decrease frequency of serious crimes committed by teenagers

Premise: Most teenage crimes take place between 3 and 6 pm.

We're trying to weaken this argument, so let's try to find a gap between the conclusion and the premise. The citizens of Parktown want to decrease the frequency of serious crimes. The author is worried that a curfew won't work, because most teenage crimes overall occur between 3 and 6 pm, when teenagers might still be out. Notice the gap: the citizens are worried about serious crimes, but the premise includes evidence about overall crimes. So even if most crimes overall are happening between 3 and 6, if those crimes are relatively trivial, the curfew could still work, because that would mean that the serious crimes are happening later, and those are the ones the citizens of Parktown care about.

Answer choice B reveals that the afternoon crimes are mostly trivial. If that's case, then a curfew could still work, as it's the serious crimes that we're trying to prevent.

nchaswal wrote:Can someone help me with what should be the step by step strategy for this CR question ?

It would really be amazing if one can explain what to do first, then what next and so on. I want to know the mechanism to solve this Q.

We need to focus on the problem that we are trying to solve here. - SERIOUS CRIMES.
Premise: Teenagers are to be kept in the the homes in late evenings, still the author feels that the crimes will not be reduced.

If we can shoe that the serious crimes happen later in the evening, then we can weaken the judgement of the author.

Option B says that the crimes that happen between 3 and 6 are petty crimes. This directly points that the serious crimes happen late at night.
hence we can weaken the judgement of the author.

Correct Option: B

I posted an explanation here:
https://www.beatthegmat.com/increasing-c ... 74211.html