Critical Reasoning

Advertising Executive: More than 1D million American households now own digital video recorders which can fast-forward over television commercials; approximately 75% of these households fast-forward over at least one commercial per 3D-minute program. Television commercials are now much less cost-effective as they are not as widely watched as they used to be.
Which of the following, if true, strengthens the claim that television commercials are less cost-effective than they used to be?

(A) Product placement within television programs is a viable alternative to tradition- al television commercials.

(B) The television programs preferred by consumers without digital video recorders are similar to those preferred by consumers with the devices.

(C) Prior to the advent of digital video recorders, very few television viewers switched channels or left the room when commercials began.

(D) The cost-effectiveness of television advertising is based less upon how many peo- ple watch a particular commercial and more upon the appropriateness of the demographic.

(E) Due to an imperfect sampling system used to measure the number of viewers, many companies find it difficult to determine the return on investment for tele- vision commercials.

OA ?

IMO: C

Advertising Executive: More than 1D million American households now own digital video recorders which can fast-forward over television commercials; approximately 75% of these households fast-forward over at least one commercial per 3D-minute program. Television commercials are now much less cost-effective as they are not as widely watched as they used to be.

Which of the following, if true, strengthens the claim that television commercials are less cost-effective than they used to be?

(A) Product placement within television programs is a viable alternative to tradition- al television commercials.

(B) The television programs preferred by consumers without digital video recorders are similar to those preferred by consumers with the devices.

(C) Prior to the advent of digital video recorders, very few television viewers switched channels or left the room when commercials began.

(D) The cost-effectiveness of television advertising is based less upon how many peo- ple watch a particular commercial and more upon the appropriateness of the demographic.

(E) Due to an imperfect sampling system used to measure the number of viewers, many companies find it difficult to determine the return on investment for tele- vision commercials.



According to me the OA is C. But still I will explain each and every option carefully.

Option A: Does not affect to the conclusion of the argument. We are interested whether or not now the commercials are cost effective or not. Hence option A is not applicable.

Option B: This option says that there is absolutely no difference in the time when the digital cameras were not present to the times when the digital cameras are present. This negates or weakens our conclusion given in the stimulus. Focus on the conclusion, 'Television commercials are now much less cost-effective as they are not as widely watched as they used to be'. The 'now' word is very important in the conclusion.

Option C: For the same reason above, this strengthens the argument. It says that before the digital cameras entered the households, the people had to view or they used to see all the advertisements or they never missed the advertisements. And our premise already says that since the digital cameras or recorders have come, the people are least interested in the advertisements.

Option D: This option weakens the premise given in the stimulus and hence weakens the overall argument.

Option E: This option also weakens the argument. It says there is no specific way to determine the number of viewers so the companies are not able to figure out whether the digital cameras are affecting the count of the people who watch television commercials.

Hence the OA has to be C... By the way what is the OA.


Hope this helps...

hey_thr67 wrote:Advertising Executive: More than 1D million American households now own digital video recorders which can fast-forward over television commercials; approximately 75% of these households fast-forward over at least one commercial per 3D-minute program. Television commercials are now much less cost-effective as they are not as widely watched as they used to be.
Which of the following, if true, strengthens the claim that television commercials are less cost-effective than they used to be?

(A) Product placement within television programs is a viable alternative to tradition- al television commercials.

(B) The television programs preferred by consumers without digital video recorders are similar to those preferred by consumers with the devices.

(C) Prior to the advent of digital video recorders, very few television viewers switched channels or left the room when commercials began.

(D) The cost-effectiveness of television advertising is based less upon how many peo- ple watch a particular commercial and more upon the appropriateness of the demographic.

(E) Due to an imperfect sampling system used to measure the number of viewers, many companies find it difficult to determine the return on investment for tele- vision commercials.

Hi!

For strengthening questions, start by deconstructing the argument: find the conclusion, summarize the evidence and identify the author's assumption. Next, make your prediction: the correct answer will support the assumption.

Let's break down this argument:

Conclusion - TV commercials are less cost-effective than they used to be.
Evidence - many TV viewers today fast-forward over commercials.

Remember - an assumption is something that MUST be true in order for the conclusion to make sense. In this argument the conclusion compares the present to the past, but the evidence is only about the present. Accordingly, the author has to be making an assumption about the past.

Assumption - before DVRs, more TV viewers actually watched commercials.

So, let's look for an answer that makes us believe that more people used to watch commercials!

Only (C) fits the bill - none of the other choices even address the past vs. present nature of the argument.

A great tool for double-checking choices is Kaplan's Denial Test - consider the impact of the OPPOSITE of the choice on the argument.

Denying (C), we get "Before DVRs, a substantial number of TV viewers switched channels or left the room when commercials began."

Well, if people were ignoring commercials long before the DVR became popular, then the DVR would have had no impact on cost-effectiveness of ads. Since the denial of (C) weakens the argument, (C) must be a strengthener.

C fits