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Driving under the influence is a more severe problem among c

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Driving under the influence is a more severe problem among c

by BTGmoderatorAT » Sat Mar 03, 2018 6:59 am
Driving under the influence is a more severe problem among college students at rural and suburban universities than at urban universities. Social scientists wanted to determine how much of the problem is due to the distance students must drive to obtain alcohol. They looked at police records for incidents involving students at a number of universities, and compared those with the mean distances between student housing and bars and liquor stores. The longer the distances, the more likely students were to be arrested or involved in accidents.

Which of the following, if true, would it be most important to take into account in evaluating the result?

(A) Many college students do not purchase alcohol at bars or liquor stores.
(B) Students at rural, suburban, and urban universities are arrested for driving under the influence more frequently than are non-student members of their communities.
(C) The average enrollment at urban universities is greater than that at rural and suburban universities.
(D) Local sheriff's departments near rural and suburban universities devote more resources to identifying and arresting those driving under the influence than do urban police forces.
(E) The number of bars and liquor stores per square mile is nearly five times as high in urban areas as it is in rural and suburban areas.

What's the best approach to determine the answer? Can any experts explain?
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by elias.latour.apex » Sun Mar 04, 2018 7:42 am
This is a dubious critical reasoning question whose supposed best answer is (D).

The first problem with this question is that there is no conclusion in the stimulus. Rather, what we find is a list of facts. The question stem asks us to evaluate "the result." However, it is unclear what this result is.

If we analyze it more deeply, we might notice that the question the researchers were hoping to resolve is whether the distance from the dorm to a liquor store was a contributing factor to the severity of the driving under the influence ("DUI") problem there. However, the data gathered by the social scientists indicate only that arrests and accidents are higher without indicating whether those arrests or accidents were alcohol related. Assume that the social scientists concluded that the distance did contribute to the DUI problem, our goal would presumably be to determine whether the accidents and arrests were alcohol related in order to determine the validity of the assumed conclusion.

However, the supposed best answer says that local sheriff's departments near rural and suburban universities devote more resources to identifying and arresting those driving under the influence than do urban police forces. This certainly might explain a greater number of arrests, but it would do nothing to explain the greater number of accidents nor would it indicate whether a disproportionate number of the accidents in rural areas were alcohol related.

In conclusion, wherever possible, only use real GMAT critical reasoning questions from past tests.
Elias Latour
Verbal Specialist @ ApexGMAT
blog.apexgmat.com
+1 (646) 736-7622
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