Q10

[GracieO305]

Hello! I'm new here, but I was hoping to get some clarification on this question. I was able to eliminate B, C, and E as they do not seem to be supported by anything in the passage. Since this is an inference question, I understand that the answer choice will likely not be explicitly stated. I was down to A and D. In my review, I see how D is supported by lines 34-37 with the idea that hypnotic interviews give rise to "false confidence." I was hoping to better understand why A is incorrect. Is it because the passage states that accuracy is not generally improved (lines 31 to 34), meaning it's not more accurate. It could be AS accurate (and maybe sometimes less accurate). The question stem does say we are looking for a "most likely" consequence. Is this the correct distinction or reason to eliminate A, or am I missing something?

I appreciate any insight you are able to provide! Thanks!

[ohthatpatrick]

I would start this question by revisiting the part of the passage about hypnotic interviewing and look for a "consequence".

If we re-read 27-39, what consequences of hypnotic interviewing do we see?
- overall accuracy is usually not improved (sometimes gets worse)
- may give rise to a "false confidence" effect
- witness might not be susceptible to hypnosis (so consequence would be waste of time?)

(A) this is a strong, sweeping claim. our evidence for it is a line that says "accuracy is usually not improved and sometimes gets worse". So "most likely", per the question stem, the accuracy is not improved and thus stays the same.

More importantly, (A) is talking about whether the number of true facts outnumber or are outnumbered by the number of false 'facts'.

The passage, meanwhile, was talking about whether the % of true facts went up or down.

Let's say prior to hypnosis, the witness recalled 10 things: 8 were true, 2 were false.
The passage is saying that after hypnosis, sometimes accuracy got worse.
Maybe out of 10 things, now 7 were true, 3 were false.

Or maybe the hypnosis allowed the person to remember more things, but the ratio still leaned more towards false than it had before.
The witness recalled 20 things, 15 were true, 5 were false (a 3 : 1 ratio of true to false),
whereas the original 8 true, 2 false was a 4 : 1 ratio.

(A), meanwhile, is saying that hypnosis took it all the way to there being a HIGHER NUMBER of false facts than true facts. That is overly specific and overly strong, given what we were told in the passage. It never said that post-hypnosis, THE MAJORITY of things that the person remembered were untrue.

(B) has nothing to do with "accuracy was same or worse / false confidence increased / some people weren't susceptible".

(C) has nothing to do with "accuracy was same or worse / false confidence increased / some people weren't susceptible".

(E) is talking about becoming LESS susceptible, whereas we heard about being NOT susceptible.


(D) reinforces the "false confidence increased" detail, from 34-37.

Hope this helps.