Nighttime News

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Nighttime News

by logitech » Thu Nov 20, 2008 2:38 pm
For several years, Nighttime News attracted fewer viewers than World News, which broadcasts its show at the same time as Nighttime News. Recently The producers of Nighttime News added personal interests stories and increased coverage of sports and weather. The two programs now have a roughly equal numbers of viewers. Clearly, the recent programing changes persuaded viewers to switch from World News to Nighttime News.


Which one is the assumption in this argument ?



a) Viewers are more interested in sports and weather than in personal interest stories.

b) The programming content of Nighttime News is more closely aligned with the interests of the overall audience that is the content of World News

c) Some World News viewers like the new Nighttime News programming better than they liked the World News programing

d) There are other possible causes for an increase in the number of viewers of Nighttime News, including a recent ad campaign that aired on many local affiliates.

e) The quality of World News will remain constant even if Nightime News improves.


Let's have some quality discussion.
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Re: Nighttime News

by iamcste » Thu Nov 20, 2008 2:46 pm
logitech wrote:For several years, Nighttime News attracted fewer viewers than World News, which broadcasts its show at the same time as Nighttime News. Recently The producers of Nighttime News added personal interests stories and increased coverage of sports and weather. The two programs now have a roughly equal numbers of viewers. Clearly, the recent programing changes persuaded viewers to switch from World News to Nighttime News.


Which one is the assumption in this argument ?



a) Viewers are more interested in sports and weather than in personal interest stories.

Cant say from info provided

b) The programming content of Nighttime News is more closely aligned with the interests of the overall audience that is the content of World News

we cant comment on this as we dont have info on overall audience



c) Some World News viewers like the new Nighttime News programming better than they liked the World News programing

No data on this Out of scope

d) There are other possible causes for an increase in the number of viewers of Nighttime News, including a recent ad campaign that aired on many local affiliates.

other causes out of scope

e) The quality of World News will remain constant even if Nightime News improves.

This is assumption


Let's have some quality discussion.

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Re: Nighttime News

by logitech » Thu Nov 20, 2008 2:56 pm
iamcste wrote: Clearly, the recent programing changes persuaded viewers to switch from World News to Nighttime News.

e) The quality of World News will remain constant even if Nightime News improves.

This is assumption

[/quote]

Conclusion is the in past tense. So we are actually trying to find what happened not what will happen.



And also in an assumption question, when you negate the correct choice, the argument fails right ?

What do you think ?
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by rohangupta83 » Thu Nov 20, 2008 2:57 pm
agree with iamcste - imo E

if the quality of news at WN remained constant but the quality of news at NTN improved, it is logical to think that some viewers switched from WN to NTN.

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by logitech » Thu Nov 20, 2008 3:02 pm
rohangupta83 wrote:agree with iamcste - imo E

if the quality of news at WN remained constant but the quality of news at NTN improved, it is logical to think that some viewers switched from WN to NTN.
E does not say REMAINED.
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by mals24 » Thu Nov 20, 2008 3:18 pm
Whats wrong with C?

C: Some World News viewers like the new Nighttime News programming better than they liked the World News programing

Conclusion says that the recent programing changes persuaded viewers to switch from World News to Nighttime News.

Negation of C will be 'None of the WN viewers like the NN programming better than WN programming.'
Hence if WN viewers don't like the programming they will not switch right. So then doesn't the conclusion fall apart.
:?

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by logitech » Thu Nov 20, 2008 3:21 pm
mals24 wrote:Whats wrong with C?

C: Some World News viewers like the new Nighttime News programming better than they liked the World News programing

Conclusion says that the recent programing changes persuaded viewers to switch from World News to Nighttime News.

Negation of C will be 'None of the WN viewers like the NN programming better than WN programming.'
Hence if WN viewers don't like the programming they will not switch right. So then doesn't the conclusion fall apart.
:?
:roll: I don't know.

What is wrong with B ?
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by mals24 » Thu Nov 20, 2008 3:29 pm
Ok logitech I'll make your life simple

Can someone explicitly explain all the options, why the correct option is correct and the other options incorrect.

Btw A & D are clearly out.

A: we really don't care whether people are more interested in sports or personal stories. Out of Scope.

D: again we really don't care what the other possible causes are. I mean 2 changes are enough to make this question confusing we don't need more changes. Out of Scope.

B, C, E???

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by rohangupta83 » Thu Nov 20, 2008 3:33 pm
if B were true and the quality of programming was closely aligned, why would the viewers from WN switch to NTN when both are presenting similar programming.

That's my take on B

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by logitech » Thu Nov 20, 2008 3:34 pm
mals24 wrote:Ok logitech I'll make your life simple

Can someone explicitly explain all the options, why the correct option is correct and the other options incorrect.
Thank you.
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Re: Nighttime News

by raajan_p » Thu Nov 20, 2008 4:14 pm
logitech wrote:
iamcste wrote: Clearly, the recent programing changes persuaded viewers to switch from World News to Nighttime News.

e) The quality of World News will remain constant even if Nightime News improves.

This is assumption

Conclusion is the in past tense. So we are actually trying to find what happened not what will happen.



And also in an assumption question, when you negate the correct choice, the argument fails right ?

What do you think ?[/quote]


Logitech - > E says that "e) The quality of World News will remain constant even if Nightime News improves. "

I understand from your question that conclusion have been represented in past tense while option E is in future tense.

However, think about this...as per the stimulus, the Nightime news has already improved. Which means the second piece of E has already occurred. So, I can assume the first piece "The quality of World News will remain constant" of E - fair statement?

Not sure if this helped you or confused even more :wink:

Now, lets also look at B

b) The programming content of Nighttime News is more closely aligned with the interests of the overall audience that is the content of World News

Dont you think that the highlighted piece of option B is too extreme to assume?

Just my too cents.

I would have chosen E as well for this Question.

Guys, please pour in your views as well

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by cramya » Thu Nov 20, 2008 5:41 pm
I will go with E) as the assumption behind the authors statement is that the quality of World news is good and the Nightimes has caught up wiht it by doing the changes it did. Even after nightimes added more perosnal stories,sports etc the author say both have on an average the same number of viewers. I think this is indirectly referring to the quality of Wordltimes.

I could be way off, but I will go with E) right or wrong :-)

Logitech, whats the OA? Please post the OA with our questions.Lets practice what we preach in the Quant forum my friend :-)

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by logitech » Thu Nov 20, 2008 5:45 pm
Cramya,

Unlike in quant questions, in verbal questions, a discussion is more productive without an OA. I can PM anybody who wants the OA but for the sake of good discussion I will rather publish it a little bit later.
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by cramya » Thu Nov 20, 2008 5:49 pm
I see where u r coming from. Posting OA should make no difference as the user has to explain more in critical resoning than Quant on why they choose what they choose.

All I can do is politely enourage posting OA's using spoiler and its totally up to the indiivduals there on.

Good luck!

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by logitech » Thu Nov 20, 2008 6:02 pm
cramya wrote:I see where u r coming from. Posting OA should make no difference as the user has to explain more in critical resoning than Quant on why they choose what they choose.

All I can do is politely enourage posting OA's using spoiler and its totally up to the indiivduals there on.

Good luck!
And most of the time, our brain is trying to find an explanation to the OA and this process is affecting to receive take-aways from the wrong answer choices.
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