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Systems Magazine

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by GmatKiss » Fri Mar 09, 2012 1:27 am
Finding of a suvey of Systems magazine subscribers: Thirty percent of all merchandise orders placed by subscribers in reponse to advertisements in the magazine last year were placed by subscribers under age thirty-five.

Finding of a survey of advertisers in Systems magazine: Most of the merchandise orders placed in response to advertisements in Systems last year were placed by people under age thirty-five.

For both of the findings to be accurate, which of the following must be true?

a) More subscribers to Systems who have never ordered merchanise in response to advertisements in the magazine are age thirty-five or over than are under age thirty-five,

b) Among subscribers to Systems, the proportion who are under age thirty-five was considerably lower last year than it is now.

c) Most merchandise orders placed in response to advertisements in Systems last year were placed by Systems subscribers over age thirty-five.

d) Last year, the average dollar a mount of merchandise orders placed was less for subscribers under age thirty-five than for those age thirty-five or over.

e) Last year many people who placed orders for merchandise in reponse to advertisements in Systems were not subscribers to the magazine.
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Source: — Critical Reasoning |

by killer1387 » Fri Mar 09, 2012 1:42 am
Finding of a suvey of Systems magazine subscribers: Thirty percent of all merchandise orders placed by subscribers in reponse to advertisements in the magazine last year were placed by subscribers under age thirty-five.

Finding of a survey of advertisers in Systems magazine: Most of the merchandise orders placed in response to advertisements in Systems last year were placed by people under age thirty-five.

For both of the findings to be accurate, which of the following must be true?

a) More subscribers to Systems who have never ordered merchanise in response to advertisements in the magazine are age thirty-five or over than are under age thirty-five,
--> extreme

b) Among subscribers to Systems, the proportion who are under age thirty-five was considerably lower last year than it is now.
--> no info for "now"

c) Most merchandise orders placed in response to advertisements in Systems last year were placed by Systems subscribers over age thirty-five.
--> cant say (no info for age grp > 35 yrs)

d) Last year, the average dollar a mount of merchandise orders placed was less for subscribers under age thirty-five than for those age thirty-five or over.
--> no info for >35 yrs age grp

e) Last year many people who placed orders for merchandise in reponse to advertisements in Systems were not subscribers to the magazine.
--> Correct

IMO E
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by gmatdriller » Tue Oct 23, 2012 1:00 am
This sort of question could be very intimidating under 2mins, coupled
with the anxiety.

What is the most efficient way to approach, or has anyone tried the use of diagrams,
matrix, etc??
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by David@VeritasPrep » Tue Oct 23, 2012 4:21 pm
Gmatdriller -

I would not want to use quantitative methods here and further confuse the stimulus. Instead I used a sort of sentence correction method. I scanned the two statements in this paradox to see what was different between the two findings. The difference is that the first finding is about orders placed by "subscribers" in response to ads. The second finding does not mention subscribers but talks about all orders placed in response to ads.

So that is how you can resolve the difference between the 30% of orders placed by "subscribers" under age 35 (in response to ads) and in the second statement the majority orders placed by people under age 35 (in response to ads). You are looking for something that says some people under age 35 must have placed orders in response to the ads even though they are not subscribers.

That is what choice E says. It literally must be true that many non-subscribers placed ads. That is the only way to account for this difference.

So that is what I would say, look for changes in language on something like this!

Hope it helps.
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by ihatemaths » Wed Oct 24, 2012 8:44 pm
it looks like a kind of paradox question ain't it ?
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by David@VeritasPrep » Thu Oct 25, 2012 5:31 am
It is a sort of a paradox, yes. It says "for both of the findings to be true" so that would be wording for a paradox. Also, you have the two competing facts of the 30% and the more than 50%.

So yes.
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