prescription medications_How to apporach this question.

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It is illegal to advertise prescription medications in Hedland except directly to physicians, either by mail or in medical journals. A proposed law would allow general advertising of prescription medications. Opponents object that the general population lacks the specialized knowledge to evaluate such advertisements and might ask their physicians for inappropriate medications. But since physicians have the final say as to whether to prescribe a medication for a patient, inappropriate prescriptions would not become more common.

Which of the following would it be most useful to establish in order to evaluate the argument?

(A) Whether advertising for prescription medications might alert patients to the existence of effective treatments for minor ailments that they had previously thought to be untreatable
(B) Whether some people might go to a physician for no reason other than to ask for a particular medication they have seen advertised
(C) Whether the proposed law requires prescription-medication advertisements directed to the general public to provide the same information as do advertisements directed to physicians
(D) Whether advertisements for prescription medications are currently an important source of information about newly available medications for physicians
(E) Whether physicians would give in to a patient's demand for a prescription medication chosen by the patient when the one originally prescribed by the physician fails to perform as desired

Answer: E

Experts, please instruct how to attack the evaluation cr's.
Source: — Critical Reasoning |

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by reply2spg » Tue Mar 09, 2010 9:00 pm
Is this a LSAT question? However, these kind of questions are expected in GMAT. If you see in OG11 and 12 you will see such tough questions. Strategy, which I have used while solving this question, is answer yes and no to each Option (Mostly those questions, which you think relevant and not OOS). For both Yes and No if you have solid backing then that option is your answer.
gmat_perfect wrote:It is illegal to advertise prescription medications in Hedland except directly to physicians, either by mail or in medical journals. A proposed law would allow general advertising of prescription medications. Opponents object that the general population lacks the specialized knowledge to evaluate such advertisements and might ask their physicians for inappropriate medications. But since physicians have the final say as to whether to prescribe a medication for a patient, inappropriate prescriptions would not become more common.

Which of the following would it be most useful to establish in order to evaluate the argument?

(A) Whether advertising for prescription medications might alert patients to the existence of effective treatments for minor ailments that they had previously thought to be untreatable - Incorrect - Passage is not talking about the minor or major ailments, so eliminated
(B) Whether some people might go to a physician for no reason other than to ask for a particular medication they have seen advertised - Incorrect - This is absurd and can be eliminated easily
(C) Whether the proposed law requires prescription-medication advertisements directed to the general public to provide the same information as do advertisements directed to physicians - Incorrect - what is the use of directing advertisements to general public, since doctor is going to prescribe the medicine.
(D) Whether advertisements for prescription medications are currently an important source of information about newly available medications for physicians - Incorrect - Use the strategy. Answer Yes - In case of Yes, physician will be biased and there will be cases when 'inappropriate prescriptions would become more common'. There is no explaination for answer 'NO'. So this is not correct answer
(E) Whether physicians would give in to a patient's demand for a prescription medication chosen by the patient when the one originally prescribed by the physician fails to perform as desired -- Correct - Use Yes and No answer Test for this question. You will get an explanation for both answers. Therefore, E is correct.

Answer: E

Experts, please instruct how to attack the evaluation cr's.

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by Tibin » Wed Sep 04, 2013 6:50 am
Evaluation means to determine the influence. Easiest way to evaluate the influence of a claim is to consider the extreme cases.

Steps:

1.Spot the conclusion.
2.Take the options to extremes.
3.One extreme should weaken the conclusion and the other extreme should strengthen the conclusion.

If this happens then it is logical to conclude that the answer choice influences ( helps to evaluate) the argument.As simple as that !!!! :)

Coming to the question in hand,

From options A to D,

Whether options are answered with YES or NO does not matter. This is not the case with option E.

E : Whether physicians are likely to succumb to pressure from patients to prescribe inappropriate medications.

YES : yes says that there is a need of concern since patients can pressurize physicians to prescribe the medications which are advertised.
NO : no says that there is no need of concern.

Hope this helps.