List of 9 distinct integers

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sidceg: Senior | Next Rank: 100 Posts; Posts: 89; Joined: Fri Jun 01, 2012 12:22 amFollowed by: 2 members; Location: Bangalore, India; Thanked: 6 times

by sidceg » Sat Oct 12, 2013 10:53 pm

If list S contains nine distinct integers, at least one of which is negative, is the median of the integers in list S positive?

(1) The product of the nine integers in list S is equal to the median of list S.

(2) The sum of all nine integers in list S is equal to the median of list S.

OA is A

This one is from MGMAT CAT. Can one expect these type of questions in the 'average' difficulty level or is this one of the tough questions?

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Source: Beat The GMAT — Data Sufficiency | Sat Oct 12, 2013 10:53 pm

theCodeToGMAT: Legendary Member; Posts: 1556; Joined: Tue Aug 14, 2012 11:18 pmFollowed by: 34 members; Thanked: 448 times; GMAT Score:650

by theCodeToGMAT » Sat Oct 12, 2013 11:24 pm

To find: sign of Median in 9 distinct numbers

Statement 1:
Product of nine integers = Median
since all the numbers are integers, this condition is only possible when Median is "0"
SUFFICIENT

Statement 2:
Sum = Median
This can have multiple situations

-5 -4 -3 -2 1 2 3 4 5
Or, -5 -4 -3 -2 -1 2 3 4 5
INSUFFICIENT

Answer [spoiler]{A}[/spoiler]

R A H U L

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sidceg: Senior | Next Rank: 100 Posts; Posts: 89; Joined: Fri Jun 01, 2012 12:22 amFollowed by: 2 members; Location: Bangalore, India; Thanked: 6 times

by sidceg » Sat Oct 12, 2013 11:32 pm

Thanks Rahul! Now I find it easy. I just didn't think about the the main guy - 0

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sidceg: Senior | Next Rank: 100 Posts; Posts: 89; Joined: Fri Jun 01, 2012 12:22 amFollowed by: 2 members; Location: Bangalore, India; Thanked: 6 times

by sidceg » Sun Oct 13, 2013 9:46 am

Hey something just struck my mind. The question asks whether the median is positive. But we have found out that the median must be 0. So now down to the properties of zero. Zero is considered neither even nor odd and neither positive nor negative right? So how does one say that statement 1 is sufficient?

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GMAT/MBA Expert

Brent@GMATPrepNow: GMAT Instructor; Posts: 16207; Joined: Mon Dec 08, 2008 6:26 pmFollowed by: 1268 members; Location: Vancouver, BC; Thanked: 5254 times; GMAT Score:770

by Brent@GMATPrepNow » Sun Oct 13, 2013 10:04 am

sidceg wrote:Hey something just struck my mind. The question asks whether the median is positive. But we have found out that the median must be 0. So now down to the properties of zero. Zero is considered neither even nor odd and neither positive nor negative right? So how does one say that statement 1 is sufficient?

Target question: Is the median positive?

From statement 1, we can conclude that the median is zero.
In other words, the median is definitely not positive?
Since we can answer the target question with certainty, statement 1 is SUFFICIENT

Cheers,
Brent

Brent Hanneson - Creator of GMATPrepNow.com

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