Critical Reasoning

According to a recent magazine article, of those office employees who typically work 8 hours at the office each day but sometimes say that they will work at home on a particular day, 25 percent actually work less than one hour. At the same time, over 90 percent of those same office employees believe they are more productive working at home than working in their office.

The statements above, if true, best support which of the following conclusions about the office employees discussed in the article?

On average, the office employees working at home for a day work fewer hours than office employees working at the office.

10 percent of the office employees are less productive working from home than working in their office.

At least 15 percent of the office employees do not define productivity exclusively in terms of the number of hours worked.

At least 25 percent of the office employees can complete the same amount of work in one hour at home as in 8 hours at the office.

Some of the office employees make statements regarding their productivity that are not in fact true.

OA is C. can anyone explain the OA?

discussed earlier...

https://www.beatthegmat.com/cr-work-effi ... html#87051

can anyone please simplify the solution!!!! I did not understand the official explanation given in the previous posts

mals24 wrote:can anyone please simplify the solution!!!! I did not understand the official explanation given in the previous posts

Let me give a try to explain the solution.

The question in which we have to "identified the conclusion" can be solved with the help of conditional reasoning (Read Chapter-6 from CR powerscore LSAT for this). Let us make the conditional diagram from the given premises. I am making rough diagram through text only. For more clarity, please refer to the book.

1. According to a recent magazine article, of those office employees who typically work 8 hours at the office each day
100%W = 8 hours (at office)

2. but sometimes say that they will work at home on a particular day, 25 percent actually work less than one hour.
25%W = 1 hour (at home)

3. At the same time, over 90 percent of those same office employees believe they are more productive working at home than working in their office.
90%W = more Productive (at home)

Now let's see each given answer choice one by one:-
The trick is to identified the correct option which retrace the path of the premises.


A) On average, the office employees working at home for a day work fewer hours than office employees working at the office.

We know only that 25% people have spend less than one hour at home on working. But we don't the working hours of other employees at home. So, we can't say this (option A) with surety because may be people the remaining 75% of people have spend more than 8 hours or may be less. Nothing is sure at all. Hence INCORRECT.
REMEMBER: Stick to premise only.



B) 10 percent of the office employees are less productive working from home than working in their office.

10%W = NOT (productive (at home))
The above condition is opposite of the 2nd premises' condition. So, it is wrong. REMEMBER: To choose only choice that retrace the premises' path.

Also, to understand further, we know only about the 90% more productive employee (at home) and we don't know whether rest 10% are whether productive at home same as at office or less productive at home as compare to office. STICK TO THE PREMISE INFORMATION.


C) At least 15 percent of the office employees do not define productivity exclusively in terms of the number of hours worked.

15%W = NOT (define work in terms of hours)
From the premises conditional statements. (3) states that 90% productive at home and (2) states that 25% work for one hour. (It means 100 - 90 + 25)%W are doing same amount of work in less hour (i.e. 1 hour or less). Hence, 15% are not talking productivity in terms of working hours. Hence CORRECT. Choose this choice.

To simplify further, we know that 90% productive at home and we don't know anything about rest 10%. Also, we know that 25% worked for less than 1 hour at home; those supposed as to be less productive. So if we subtract 10% (Unknown production value) from these 25% (known working timing) then we can conclude that 15% from these 25% (working for less than 1 hour) completed their work within that time at home. That means, they are not considering time spend = production value.
Hence, choose this choice.



D) At least 25 percent of the office employees can complete the same amount of work in one hour at home as in 8 hours at the office.

25%W (8 hours @ office) = 25W% (1 hour @home)
Do we have any such statement in any of the conditional statements created from premises? NO. Hence INCORRECT.



E) Some of the office employees make statements regarding their productivity that are not in fact true.

Some (W) = Speaking LIE
This is totally against the premises. As premises conditions are considered to be true only, hence (E) is INCORRECT

Though long post, but hope this helps...

Thank you soooo much codesnooker for the detailed explanation. I like the approach you've used to attack the question very systematic and makes the problem very clear.

Finally this problem made sense.

ok this answer can't be write ...
the statement says "of those office employees who typically work 8 hours..."

And option C talks about the office employees in general..we may have majority of the ppl not working 8 hrs ..maybe less..maybe more...

inputs guys

90 % of 25% say that they are more productive..workin less than an hour..OPTION C CONVEYS THAT CLEARLY... HENCE C.

but 25% of the employees working 8 hrs...what about the rest who don't...

We can't make a general statement for all the people working in an office on the basis of a small sample i.e. ppl working 8 hrs a day!

let us suppose we have 100 employees in office

all work from home one day...
and 25 out of 100 work less than 1 hour...
remaining 75 work more than 1 hour...

90 say that they are productive while working from home..

SO if we consider 75 are productive as they work more than 1 hour..

there are still 90-75 = 15 left who work less than 1 hour but still count them productive.. So atleast 15 don't measure productivity with number of hours worked...

Thus C...

Read the question a bit more carefully... the question refers to the office workers referred to in the passage.

I think C is the right answer here