Q11 - A new treatment for muscle pain

[ohthatpatrick]

Question Type:
Match the Flaw

Stimulus Breakdown:
Conclusion: The treatment is probably not actually effective.
Evidence: The treatment was used in three separate studies, whose results were positive but which each had critical methodological flaws.

Answer Anticipation:
I would be tempted to simply pre-phrase the classic,
"EVEN THOUGH premise, COULDN'T IT BE TRUE THAT anti-conc".

"Even though the studies had methodological flaws, isn't it possible that the treatment was still effective?"

How would we put this into something abstract? Maybe they want an author thinking, "Because the PROCESS was flawed, the RESULTS can't be positive/trusted."

Correct Answer:
A

Answer Choice Analysis:
(A) Maybe? This sounds like "because process was flawed, outcome was negative."

(B) This would almost work if you reversed the pieces. Here, the PREMISE is about a bad outcome and the CONCLUSION is about a questionable methodology.

(C) This premise doesn't sound anything like bad process / method.

(D) This premise doesn't sound anything like bad process / method.

(E) Definitely not as good as (A). We might be able to say that "having people with a financial stake involved" is a bad methodology for city development, but that's a stretch. This flaw sounds more like, "Because a decision maker has a selfish motivation, the decision will be purely selfish."

Takeaway/Pattern: It's easy to imagine how the same objection would work with (A):
"EVEN THOUGH they didn't have uniform criteria, COULDN'T IT BE TRUE that they still selected a good cake?"

You might get to a good outcome through a sloppy process.

#officialexplanation

[ZarkaS555]

I'm going to try to take a shot at this question, would appreciate any feedback!

Answer A is correct.

Flaw: Takes for granted that just because one aspect of a process is flawed, so is the entire process. (One could also make the case that three studies does not comprise a good enough sample to test a treatment, so the argument generalizes from a small subset).

A-Contains the same flaw. Makes the claim that just because one aspect of the process (having uniform criteria) was missing, the entire process was flawed (the cake that won was bad).

B- Doesn't match the flaw.

C-This was tempting for me. But it makes a leap from "food" to "people". For it to match, it might have said something like, since some foods have little nutritional value, the food that most people choose is not nutritious. Instead, it makes a claim about the people themselves, which doesn't match.

D-Doesn't make a claim about a small subset or an aspect. Instead, it says all scarves.Eliminate.

E-Again, doesn't make a claim about a small subset or an aspect. Instead, it says all members. Also makes a leap from financial stake to self-interest. Eliminate.

[loladerewerg273]

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