According to a survey of graduating medical students conduct

[RonPurewal]

comparisons do not "omit" words.
do not try to "expand" comparison sentences; that's not how they work.

https://www.manhattanprep.com/gmat/foru ... ml#p113659

[YahiaA689]

In the original sentense, there is the "more likely than" construction. However, in answer C, the sentence contains " as likely as". My question is as follow: Since there is an obvious change in meaning, when do we stick to the original meaning?

[RonPurewal]

there is nothing special about choice A!
there is nothing special about the "original" sentence!

in terms of meaning, there are really only two things happening here:
• REASONABLE meaning = OK
• UNREASONABLE meaning = NOT OK
...and that's it.

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another way of thinking about this: if you imagine SWITCHING choice A with another choice... that should NEVER change the correct answer to the problem. (if the "original" meaning mattered, then, this sort of "switch" COULD change the answer to a problem.)

[EricH836]

Hi Experts,

Would it be acceptable to rule out answer choices (D) and (E) because the sentence starts with an opening modifier, but the main subject does not immediately follow the opening modifier?

Answers (A), (B), and (C), follow the opening modifier with "minority graduates" whereas answers (D) and (E) follow the opening modifier with "it is nearly..."

Trying to see if there is another way to eliminate answer choices.

Thanks!

[RonPurewal]

^^ no.
that only applies to opening modifiers that actually describe nouns.

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in fact, you should be able to reject this idea immediately, just by using common sense.

this modifier clearly does NOT describe "minority graduates". (it's a modifier of the ENTIRE FACT that follows it.)
...why would a modifier HAVE to be placed next to something it doesn't even describe? that'd be absurd, so, there's no way that could possibly be a rule.