Critical Reasoning

Due to extreme poverty in italy between 1870 and 1930, almost 41/2 million italians - most of whom were farmers - immigrated to united states. The wave from italy reached its height in the 10 year span between 1920 and 1930, when italians comprised 12 percent of the total number of immigrants admitted to the united states. The majority of these italian immigrants were from southern italy and sicily, and upon their arrival, they settled along east coast, with the heaviest concentrations in cities such as New York, Boston and Philadelphia, though some made the arduos trip across the country to settle in northern california.

The statements above, if true, support which of the following?

A. The american descendants of those early italian immigrants outnumber the current population of italy.
B. Many American farmers today are descendants of italians.
C. The strong euro has contributed to the sharp decline in italian immigrants.
D. An Italian immigrant to america today is still likely to be from southern italy or sicily.
E. At the turn of the 19th century, the southern portion of italy was a prominent agricultural region.


Source -- Kaplan[/list]

Is it E. In the passage it is mentioned that most of the immigrants were from southern part and most of them were farmers. So it seems that southern part was an agricultural part of Italy at that time.

The Jock wrote:Is it E. In the passage it is mentioned that most of the immigrants were from southern part and most of them were farmers. So it seems that southern part was an agricultural part of Italy at that time.

Yes, the OA is E

I have a few questions:

The passage mentions that most of the immigrants were farmers and majority were from southern italy. I find it difficult to come to conclusion based on this information that the southern italy was agrarian.

It could very well be possible that the southern italy had other prominent areas and because the farmers were in trouble they migrated to us for better prospects. The information in passage is not enough to come to conclusion.

sharmasumitn1 wrote:

The Jock wrote:Is it E. In the passage it is mentioned that most of the immigrants were from southern part and most of them were farmers. So it seems that southern part was an agricultural part of Italy at that time.

Yes, the OA is E

I have a few questions:

The passage mentions that most of the immigrants were farmers and majority were from southern italy. I find it difficult to come to conclusion based on this information that the southern italy was agrarian.

It could very well be possible that the southern italy had other prominent areas and because the farmers were in trouble they migrated to us for better prospects. The information in passage is not enough to come to conclusion.

Agree with you on this one... I had the same line of thought.... but then we are not searching for the absolutely correct answer, we are searching for the best answer among the 5 options... hance, E....

sharmasumitn1,

This is a first family question and we have find our answer based on the information given in the passage itself. If we go and make some assumptions in these type of questions we can get the wrong answer. Just check the question stem. it says that "The statements above, if true, support which of the following? " have a look at the "if true" part. so we have to find the question from the passage only and we can not get any outside information here.
Hope it helps....

The Jock wrote:sharmasumitn1,

This is a first family question and we have find our answer based on the information given in the passage itself. If we go and make some assumptions in these type of questions we can get the wrong answer. Just check the question stem. it says that "The statements above, if true, support which of the following? " have a look at the "if true" part. so we have to find the question from the passage only and we can not get any outside information here.
Hope it helps....

The Jock,

I am not bringing outside information to the passage. Nowhere in the passage there is enough data to support that the agriculture was prominent in southern italy. The passage does not discuss anything about the prominence of any business activity or percentage of agriculture in total business activity in southern italy.

How did you conclude that the agriculture was prominent ?

E is rightly the answer....

The Jock is right, he just connected the dots....

agriculture--> done by a farmer

sharmasumitn1 wrote:

The Jock wrote:sharmasumitn1,

This is a first family question and we have find our answer based on the information given in the passage itself. If we go and make some assumptions in these type of questions we can get the wrong answer. Just check the question stem. it says that "The statements above, if true, support which of the following? " have a look at the "if true" part. so we have to find the question from the passage only and we can not get any outside information here.
Hope it helps....

The Jock,

I am not bringing outside information to the passage. Nowhere in the passage there is enough data to support that the agriculture was prominent in southern italy. The passage does not discuss anything about the prominence of any business activity or percentage of agriculture in total business activity in southern italy.

How did you conclude that the agriculture was prominent ?

You can't!

Thanks for catching this for us. This problem was already on our list of problems to revise in the next printing. As you've said, the preponderance of farmers in southern italy doesn't mean that it was a 'prominent' agricultural region. At Kaplan stand behind everything we publish, but we're only human, and errors like this slip through the cracks.

We do regularly publish errata sheets for our published materials. Hopefully, there won't be a 'next time', but if there IS, then next time you think you've spotted a mistake in one of our books, shoot an email to [email protected] to report it. In the mean time, I don't have the link on me, but I'll see what I can do about tracking down the current errata sheet for you.

Let me know if there is anything else I can do to help, and thanks for choosing Kaplan!

Wow...That was a nice speedy reply.

KapTeacherEli wrote:

sharmasumitn1 wrote:

The Jock wrote:sharmasumitn1,

This is a first family question and we have find our answer based on the information given in the passage itself. If we go and make some assumptions in these type of questions we can get the wrong answer. Just check the question stem. it says that "The statements above, if true, support which of the following? " have a look at the "if true" part. so we have to find the question from the passage only and we can not get any outside information here.
Hope it helps....

The Jock,

I am not bringing outside information to the passage. Nowhere in the passage there is enough data to support that the agriculture was prominent in southern italy. The passage does not discuss anything about the prominence of any business activity or percentage of agriculture in total business activity in southern italy.

How did you conclude that the agriculture was prominent ?

You can't!

Thanks for catching this for us. This problem was already on our list of problems to revise in the next printing. As you've said, the preponderance of farmers in southern italy doesn't mean that it was a 'prominent' agricultural region. At Kaplan stand behind everything we publish, but we're only human, and errors like this slip through the cracks.

We do regularly publish errata sheets for our published materials. Hopefully, there won't be a 'next time', but if there IS, then next time you think you've spotted a mistake in one of our books, shoot an email to [email protected] to report it. In the mean time, I don't have the link on me, but I'll see what I can do about tracking down the current errata sheet for you.

Let me know if there is anything else I can do to help, and thanks for choosing Kaplan!

Thanks for the clarification