In addition to her work on the miocene homicide fossil

[manhhiep2509]

In addition to her work on the miocene homicide fossil record, Mary Leakey contributed to archaelogy with her discovery of the earliest direct evidence of hominid activity and painstakingly documenting East African paintings.

(A) Leakey contributed to archaeology with her discovery of the earliest direct evidence of hominid activity and painstakingly documenting

(B) Leakey contributed to archaeology by her discovery of the earliest direct evidence of hominid activity and by painstakingly documenting

(C) Leakey was a contributor to archaelogy with her discovery of the earliest direct evidence of hominid activity and with her painstaking documentation of

(D) Leakey's contributions to archaelogy include her discovery of the earliest direct evidence of hominid activity and her painstaking documentation of

(E) Leakey's contributions to archaelogy include her discovering the earliest direct evidence of hominid activity and painstaking documentation of

[AnjaliOberoi]

A,B, E voilates parallelism...

Discovery of/documentation of
Dicovering/Documenting

Also, in the senetence, its writthen...in addition to her work.......(idiom in addition to X, y where x and Y are parallel)
So, C voilates this rule by introducing Leakey in this context, instaed of leakey's work..

IMO D

[Bill@VeritasPrep]

For modifier/subject agreement, my strategy is to ask what is being described.

In this case, what was "in addition to her work..."? It wasn't Mary Leakey herself, it was her other contributions.

[anilesh.kumar7]

I have a small doubt here. Use of HER requires a NOUN Reference. can someone clarify?

[[email protected]]

Hi anilesh.kumar7,

In SCs, the GMAT will often use a pronoun to refer to a noun that preceded it. However, sometimes the GMAT uses a pronoun early in a sentence to refer to a noun that comes after it (since there is no noun reference before the pronoun). In some rare cases, the GMAT actually uses a pronoun with NO noun reference at all.

The key to this SC is to recognize the information that is provided in the first part of the sentence (if you read too fast, then you might miss it):

"In addition to..." - this implies that there's a "first idea" and the sentence will later present additional "other ideas"
"....her work...." - now we know what the comparison will be: her work on the first thing vs. her work on other things.

This helps us to eliminate A, B and C.

Between D and E, we can spot that Parallelism rules are in play. Eliminate E.

Final Answer: D

GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made,
Rich

[iongmat]

In some rare cases, the GMAT actually uses a pronoun with NO noun reference at all.

Hello Rich, would be really interesting if you can recollect some such question and post here. Are you referring to some question that uses pronouns such as "one" etc.?

[Katy_]

Hi everyone!

I have another question quite the same here:

In addition to her work on the Miocene hominid fossil record, Mary Leakey contributed to archaeology through her discovery of the earliest direct evidence of hominid activity and through her painstaking documentation of East African cave paintings.

A. Mary Leakey contributed to archaeology through her discovery of the earliest direct evidence of hominid activity and through her painstaking documentation of

B. Mary Leakey contributed to archaeology by her discovery of the earliest direct evidence of hominid activity and painstakingly documenting

C. Mary Leakey was a contributor to archaeology by discovering the earliest direct evidence of hominid activity and with her painstaking documentation of

D. Mary Leakey's contributions to archaeology include her discovery of the earliest direct evidence of hominid activity and painstakingly documenting

E. Mary Leakey's contributions to archaeology include her discovering the earliest direct evidence of hominid activity and painstaking documentation of


OA is A.

Here seems like D and E have parrallelism errors

Can you explain this question to me?

[iongmat]

Hi @GMATGuruNY, I was under the impression that in option D, the pronoun "her" would incorrectly refer to contributions.

Can you please explain.

[GMATGuruNY]

Hi @GMATGuruNY, I was under the impression that in option D, the pronoun "her" would incorrectly refer to contributions.

Can you please explain.

A possessive such her may serve to refer to a preceding possessive.
More importantly, her is a personal pronoun.
Only a PERSON or PEOPLE may serve as referent for a personal pronoun (he, she, him, his, her).
Since only a person or people may serve as referent for a personal pronoun -- and a possessive such her may serve to refer to a preceding possessive -- it is crystal clear in D that the antecedent for her is Mary Leakey's.

[percows]

/imo D