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CR challenge -7

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by abhasjha » Thu Aug 06, 2009 5:20 am
Financial success does not guarantee happiness. This claim is not mere proverbial wisdom but a fact verified by statistics. In a recently concluded survey, only one third of the respondents who claimed to have achieved financial success reported that they were happy.

Which one of the following, if true, most strongly supports the conclusion drawn from the survey results?

(A) The respondents who reported financial success were, for the most part,
financially successful.
(B) Financial success was once thought to be necessary for happiness but is no
longer considered a prerequisite for happiness.
(C) Many of the respondents who claimed not to have achieved financial success
reported that they were happy five years ago.
(D) Many of the respondents who failed to report financial success were in fact
financially successful.
(E) Most of the respondents who reported they were unhappy were in fact happy.
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by ST » Thu Aug 06, 2009 7:00 am
Is it B?
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Re: CR challenge -7

by shahdevine » Thu Aug 06, 2009 7:16 am
abhasjha wrote:Financial success does not guarantee happiness. This claim is not mere proverbial wisdom but a fact verified by statistics. In a recently concluded survey, only one third of the respondents who claimed to have achieved financial success reported that they were happy.

Which one of the following, if true, most strongly supports the conclusion drawn from the survey results?

(A) The respondents who reported financial success were, for the most part,
financially successful.
(B) Financial success was once thought to be necessary for happiness but is no
longer considered a prerequisite for happiness.
(C) Many of the respondents who claimed not to have achieved financial success
reported that they were happy five years ago.
(D) Many of the respondents who failed to report financial success were in fact
financially successful.
(E) Most of the respondents who reported they were unhappy were in fact happy.

Strengthening questions are looking for evidence or premises that back up the point of argument, which here is financial success does not guarantee success. B is the only answer that furthers that conclusion. It says financial success not a prerequisite for happiness which dovetails nicely with statistic finding that 1/3 of people who claimed financial success were happy.

you got this!
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by ManSab » Thu Aug 06, 2009 7:17 am
Confused between A and B.!!
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by sanp_l » Thu Aug 06, 2009 7:29 am
I go with A.
It supports the conclusion by making sure that people having participated in the survey were financially successful.

B is just a consideration. It doesnt add on to the facts.
C is out of context.
D doesnt count considering that the survey included people financially successful.
E prooves the survey wrong.
Sandy
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by gmat_dest » Thu Aug 06, 2009 7:35 am
"not mere proverbial wisdom but a fact verified by statistics."

How does B strengthen the conclusion? Does it uses statistics?

Answer is NO. It just seems an observation from somebody.

My answer choice is A.

Evidence is "only one third of the respondents who claimed to have achieved financial success reported that they were happy. "

Strengthener would be those people who claimed to have financial success actually achieved that.
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by umaa » Thu Aug 06, 2009 8:36 am
Confused between A and B. But I feel B is better than A.
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by deepak115 » Thu Aug 06, 2009 8:36 am
A -

it confirms the fact that those who claimed to be successful, really were. Thus strengthening the statistic.
only one third of the respondents who claimed to have achieved financial success
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Re: CR challenge -7

by life is a test » Thu Aug 06, 2009 8:38 am
shahdevine wrote:
B only rephrases the conclusion which I believe is different from strengthening the conclusion. To strengthen would require reducing the gap between the premise and the conclusion, i.e. confirming an assumption as true.

Here the assumption is that people who say they are financially successful really are successfull. Looking at it from another angle, people who are unhappy may be so because they are unsuccessful and have not been honest about their financial success in the survey.

Hope this helps.
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Re: CR challenge -7

by shahdevine » Thu Aug 06, 2009 10:58 am
life is a test wrote:
shahdevine wrote:
B only rephrases the conclusion which I believe is different from strengthening the conclusion. To strengthen would require reducing the gap between the premise and the conclusion, i.e. confirming an assumption as true.

Here the assumption is that people who say they are financially successful really are successfull. Looking at it from another angle, people who are unhappy may be so because they are unsuccessful and have not been honest about their financial success in the survey.

Hope this helps.
if answer is A. then i stand corrected. this is a tough one. but I will concede a works as well. by the way, be careful. There is nothing wrong with observations if they are used as a fact. Premises do not only have to be statistics based. For instance, I might build an argument about how people prefer sunny days to rainy days based on the observation that i see more people out on sunny days. This is an observation that I can use to back my claim that people prefer sunny days to rainy days. Now this premise might be weak. And doing a survey asking preference questions might strengthen my argument more effectively. But its still a premise that can advance my conclusion/position. GMAT test makers love exploiting test takers that are only looking for statistical premises to strengthen arguments.
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by ogbeni » Thu Aug 06, 2009 11:04 am
A.

Negate A and the argument falls apart, hence A
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by kate.loo » Mon May 16, 2016 12:25 am
Well I feel A is the answer. I guess I'm right. If some expert could throw
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