aspirant2011 wrote:Everyone participating in the early sociological study committed a crucial methodological error by failing to fully consider alternative ways of classifying their data.

(A) by failing to fully consider alternative ways of classifying their ... A is the best option here...
(B) by failing fully to consider alternative ways of classifying their ...... B is out ... failing fully .. implies totally failed.
(C) they failed to consider alternative ways to classify their ... there is no conjuction to join the two clauses
(D) by not fully considering alternative ways to classify the .... "not" is a working verb
(E) by not considering fully alternative ways of classifying his or her same as above


A is my choice ..... let me know if I missed anything.
[spoiler]OA: After some discussion. Please explain your answer choices.[/spoiler]
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singh181 wrote:I prefer D to E.
(D) by not fully considering alternative ways to classify the
(E) by not considering fully alternative ways of classifying his or her

"fully" is an adverb. "fully" is modifying "considering" in the original sentence and (d) and "alternative" in (e). So, according me E is a meaning change.

Also, intent of the sentence talks about objective or goal, so "to classify" is better than "of classifying".