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Animal-induced allergies - Strengthen Problem

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Animal-induced allergies - Strengthen Problem

by sg7007 » Fri Apr 03, 2009 5:07 am
People who have spent a lot of time in contact with animals often develop animal-induced allergies, some of them quite serious. In a survey of current employees in major zoos, about 30 percent had animal-induced allergies. Based on this sample, experts conclude that among members of the general population who have spent a similarly large amount of time in close contact with animals, the percentage with animal-induced allergies is not 30 percent but substantially more.

Q. Which of the following, if true, provides the strongest grounds for the experts' conclusion?

A. A zoo employee who develops a serious animal-induced allergy is very likely to switch to some other occupation.

This is the correct answer choice. I put it because it was the closest answer, but I still don't get how exactly it strengthens the author's conclusion. First of all, in the author's conclusion, I think it is very absurd that the percentage of the general population with animal-induced alergies is higher than that of the zoo employees. Should I have just taken the author's conclusion as is? Or could my thinking be justified?

Please explain how to approach this problem properly.
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by scoobydooby » Fri Apr 03, 2009 6:19 am
refer to Stuarts explaination in the link below

https://www.beatthegmat.com/zoo-employee-t16279.html
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by ssgmatter » Thu May 13, 2010 8:21 am
People who have spent a lot of time in contact with animals often develop animalinduced
allergies, some of them quite serious. In a survey of current employees in
major zoos, about 30 percent had animal-induced allergies. Based on this sample,
experts conclude that among members of the general population who have spent a
similarly large amount of time in close contact with animals, the percentage with
animal-induced allergies is not 30 percent but substantially more.
Which of the following, if true, provides the strongest grounds for the experts'
conclusion?
A. A zoo employee who develops a serious animal-induced allergy is very likely to
switch to some other occupation.
B. A zoo employee is more likely than a person in the general population to keep
one or more animal pets at home
C. The percentage of the general population whose level of exposure to animals
matches that of a zoo employee is quite small.
D. Exposure to domestic pets is, on the whole, less likely to cause animal-induced
allergies than exposure to many of the animals kept in zoos.
E. Zoo employees seldom wear protective gear when they handle animals in their
care.

This is the complete question.......Can somebody please explain this one in details.......

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Thankyou!
Last edited by ssgmatter on Thu May 13, 2010 8:23 am, edited 1 time in total.
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by ssgmatter » Thu May 13, 2010 8:22 am
scoobydooby wrote:refer to Stuarts explaination in the link below

https://www.beatthegmat.com/zoo-employee-t16279.html
I think this link is not working :-(
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by Stacey Koprince » Fri May 14, 2010 8:51 am
Received a PM asking me to reply. Yep - looks like the link is a bad link.

Q: strengthen / explain the situation

Arg:
P1: people who spend time with animals often develop animal allergies
P2: zoo employees: 30% had animal allergies (assumption: those employees all had lots of animal contact... what about the people who work at the front gate selling tickets or in some office somewhere doing the marketing or accounting?)
P3: conclusion: in general population (not just zoo employees), ppl with lots of animal contact have animal allergies at a rate "substantially more" than 30%. [Note to self: substantially MORE? How can we assume it's HIGHER? Wouldn't the natural assumption be to assume it's about the same? That's kind of a leap there.]

Okay, so there's something missing that allows the conclusion to make this big leap to assuming the rate is "substantially more." If we knew what that piece of info was, it would make the conclusion somewhat more likely to be true. And that's what I'm trying to do with this question, so let's go find that piece of info.

A) Zoo employees who get animal allergies will stop being zoo employees. Okay, so they'd remove themselves from the "zoo employee" category... which means they wouldn't be part of that survey anymore. They're leaving this job BECAUSE the job requires animal contact. People who work in non-animal-related fields wouldn't need to quit their jobs. So, basically, this one's saying that zoo employees would underrepresent the % of people who have animal allergies, because that allergy would cause some people to leave that specific job.

B) pets at home doesn't address issue in arg. Eliminate.

C) This is probably true. But the argument already limits the "general population" group under discussion to the ones who have a similar level of exposure as zoo employees. The argument didn't try to conclude anything about ALL members of the general population. (And, if it did, then this choice would WEAKEN the argument, not strengthen it!) Eliminate.

D) domestic pets vs. zoo animals is not at issue in the arg. Eliminate.

E) protective gear not at issue. Eliminate.
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by sanketh84 » Tue Aug 10, 2010 11:10 pm
The question is actually quite ambigious and in IMO no answer option sits perfectly well. I have a different take on this. If u look at option C, what it says is that the % of general population with the same level of exposure of a zoo employee is very small. So if you have a 1000 zoo employees, then you might have say a 100 people in the general population with the same kind of exposure. Even 50 people wth animal induced allergies bumps up the %. I know not the best of reasoning as "small" is not perfectly defined.

But I think you have to assume several things even if u need to pick A. Actually after C if A is assumed it makes sense but C is trying to imply is no where present in the argument.

For A, if C is not assumed, it could be possible that the number of former zoo employees joining the general population is insignificant to cause any changes if the % of exposure is already high in comparison. i think such questions basically contribute to the "enigma" factor that GMAT wants to maintain.
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by FightWithGMAT » Wed Aug 11, 2010 12:04 pm
sg7007 wrote:People who have spent a lot of time in contact with animals often develop animal-induced allergies, some of them quite serious. In a survey of current employees in major zoos, about 30 percent had animal-induced allergies. Based on this sample, experts conclude that among members of the general population who have spent a similarly large amount of time in close contact with animals, the percentage with animal-induced allergies is not 30 percent but substantially more.

Q. Which of the following, if true, provides the strongest grounds for the experts' conclusion?

A. A zoo employee who develops a serious animal-induced allergy is very likely to switch to some other occupation.

This is the correct answer choice. I put it because it was the closest answer, but I still don't get how exactly it strengthens the author's conclusion. First of all, in the author's conclusion, I think it is very absurd that the percentage of the general population with animal-induced alergies is higher than that of the zoo employees. Should I have just taken the author's conclusion as is? Or could my thinking be justified?

Please explain how to approach this problem properly.
Let me try to make it little simple:
First half of the arguments that with a certain level of contact with animals, 30 % of the zoo employees develop allergy.
Same is the case with general public, but such % among general public is substantially more that 30 %.

How it is possible??

Is there a possibility that the zoo employee who have had allergy become a part of general public.

A confirms this. After having affected with the allergy zoo employee leave the job and become a part of general public.
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by prepgmat09 » Thu Aug 12, 2010 9:23 am
Stacey Koprince wrote:Received a PM asking me to reply. Yep - looks like the link is a bad link.

Q: strengthen / explain the situation

Arg:
P1: people who spend time with animals often develop animal allergies
P2: zoo employees: 30% had animal allergies (assumption: those employees all had lots of animal contact... what about the people who work at the front gate selling tickets or in some office somewhere doing the marketing or accounting?)
P3: conclusion: in general population (not just zoo employees), ppl with lots of animal contact have animal allergies at a rate "substantially more" than 30%. [Note to self: substantially MORE? How can we assume it's HIGHER? Wouldn't the natural assumption be to assume it's about the same? That's kind of a leap there.]

Okay, so there's something missing that allows the conclusion to make this big leap to assuming the rate is "substantially more." If we knew what that piece of info was, it would make the conclusion somewhat more likely to be true. And that's what I'm trying to do with this question, so let's go find that piece of info.

A) Zoo employees who get animal allergies will stop being zoo employees. Okay, so they'd remove themselves from the "zoo employee" category... which means they wouldn't be part of that survey anymore. They're leaving this job BECAUSE the job requires animal contact. People who work in non-animal-related fields wouldn't need to quit their jobs. So, basically, this one's saying that zoo employees would underrepresent the % of people who have animal allergies, because that allergy would cause some people to leave that specific job.

B) pets at home doesn't address issue in arg. Eliminate.

C) This is probably true. But the argument already limits the "general population" group under discussion to the ones who have a similar level of exposure as zoo employees. The argument didn't try to conclude anything about ALL members of the general population. (And, if it did, then this choice would WEAKEN the argument, not strengthen it!) Eliminate.

D) domestic pets vs. zoo animals is not at issue in the arg. Eliminate.

E) protective gear not at issue. Eliminate.
Hi Stacey,

I have a question regarding choice E. As I understand from the narrative of your thought process, you would eliminate E by seeing "protective gear", which is not at issue. However, because this is a strengthen question, should we not try to analyze this "outside information" to check if this really affects the argument? e.g. If the choice read "Zoo employees often wear protective gear when they handle animals in their care." , would this not become a valid strengthener?

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by ankurmit » Thu Aug 12, 2010 10:02 am
It was quite tough and I selected E :) as could not found any asnwer..

But Stancy cant we assume that Zoo employees seldom wear protective gear when they handle animals in their care so their number will be less as they will be protected from allergies ??

General population population who don't protect themselves using protective gears will be more than 30 % .
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by debmalya_dutta » Thu Aug 12, 2010 2:16 pm
@Ankur..
E still doesnt help in the concluding that 30% or more of the general population have animal-induced allergies
you dont know that 30% of the general population are in touch with animals
ankurmit wrote:It was quite tough and I selected E :) as could not found any asnwer..

But Stancy cant we assume that Zoo employees seldom wear protective gear when they handle animals in their care so their number will be less as they will be protected from allergies ??

General population population who don't protect themselves using protective gears will be more than 30 % .
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by ankurmit » Thu Aug 12, 2010 8:50 pm
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by Stacey Koprince » Fri Aug 13, 2010 7:35 pm
Hi Stacey,

I have a question regarding choice E. As I understand from the narrative of your thought process, you would eliminate E by seeing "protective gear", which is not at issue. However, because this is a strengthen question, should we not try to analyze this "outside information" to check if this really affects the argument?
Ah, interesting. You have a point. I was interpreting "protective gear" as gear that would, say, prevent the tiger from biting you. :) So I interpreted that as out of scope because we're concerned with allergies, not injuries. But I suppose you could say that there is protective gear that prevents people from... being exposed to allergens? Maybe face masks? Oxygen tanks? Something like that. It's possible. So, yes, take this one to the next level - and it definitely breaks down then. If the zoo people are NOT wearing allergen-protective gear, then you'd expect them to have more incidence of allergies, but they don't.
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