Q3 - Statistics from the national

[ohthatpatrick]

What does the Question Stem tell us?
Weaken

Break down the Stimulus:
Conclusion: Reading campaigns have been largely unsuccessful in getting people to read more fiction.
Evidence: Most bookstores over the past five years have seen a decline in revenue from sales of fiction.

Any prephrase?
DEBATE IT: Given that "most bookstores have had declining revenue from the sale of fiction", how could we argue that "campaings WERE successful at getting people to read more fiction"? Perhaps the average price of books has gone down, so that even though people are reading MORE books, there's LESS revenue. Perhaps 51% of bookstores have seen a decline in fiction revenue, but the other 49% have seen a much larger boost in fiction revenue (maybe people are just changing where they buy their fiction, with the result that most fiction sales now come from a minority of bookstores). Perhaps people are just checking out fiction from the library. Perhaps people are just reading the fiction books they already owned, that have sat lonely on the bookshelf.

Correct answer:
A

Answer choice analysis:
A) This allows us to argue that fiction might still be thriving, even if most bookstores aren't selling as much of it.

B) This drifts in a strengthen direction.

C) This sounds like the "maybe fiction is just CHEAPER to buy" objection, but this answer is about biographies, which are nonfiction.

D) This sounds like the "maybe they're just getting their fiction from the library" objection, but this answer is about nonfiction as well.

E) This is about 'profits', not 'revenues', so it's not pointing to an overlooked source of fiction revenue. Also, the campaigns we're analyzing NATIONAL reading campaigns, so if readership is increasing abroad, it doesn't point to the success of the campaign domestically encouraging people to read more fiction.

Takeaway/Pattern: Armed with the mindset of the anti-conclusion, "These campaigns DID get people to read more fiction", we really need to find a way to answer the author's premise: "oh, yeah? Then why has fiction revenue gone down at most bookstores?" Because, Author, people are buying their fiction more and more through mail order book clubs!

#officialexplanation

[jamiejames]

Could someone explain why A is correct, and why the other 4 are wrong. For an intro question I'm having a hard time understanding how A weakens the argument.

Is it because despite book stores sales decreasing, mail order fiction sales of increased so the campaign may not have been unsuccessful?

[timmydoeslsat]

During the past 5 years, most bookstores have seen the revenues from fiction books drop in the nation.

There was also a national campaign for people to read more fiction.

Does this mean that national campaign was unsuccessful as the argument concludes?

Not necessarily.

Notice the jumps. The campaign wanted people to read more fiction. Could it not be true that people are reading more fiction without buying fiction books at bookstores?

Answer choice A hits at this idea. It goes after the assumption of the argument, which almost all weaken questions do.

Another way to have weakened this argument is that more people than ever in the nation are checking out fiction books at the library. Or perhaps reading fiction material online.

Or we could even suggest that people are reading fiction books they already own. So they are still reading fiction yet not buying fiction books at the bookstore.

[sukim764]

I ended up with choice A and E and wrongly chose the latter. Is the answer choice E wrong mainly because it's speaking of customers overseas? or also because "profits" can't be assumed to be substantial?

[kpopstar123]

The conclusion is that the campaign sucks.
Why? Because there has been a decline revenues from the sales of fictions.
We need to weaken this argument.
Let's start from the bottom:

E) E is wrong because it says "NOVELS" not FICTIONS. A novel is a type of fiction but not a collective term that describe all fictions. Irrelevant.
D) Who cares about an increase in number of patrons? Irrelevant
C) Again, it talks about biographies. The argument is about FICTIONS
B) Who cares about the profitability of newspapers? Also, it compares those with novels, again like E. Irrelevant
A) is the only right answer: first of all, it says Fictions. Second of all, the argument only talked about the sales from the store; this one talks about mail order like Amazon. Totally cool answer.

[vania_apple]

The conclusion is that the campaign sucks.
Why? Because there has been a decline revenues from the sales of fictions.
We need to weaken this argument.
Let's start from the bottom:

E) E is wrong because it says "NOVELS" not FICTIONS. A novel is a type of fiction but not a collective term that describe all fictions. Irrelevant.

I think you might be missing something here. Like you said, a novel is a type of fiction. If there's a significant increase in the readership of novels we can definitely conclude that people are reading more fiction.

A better way to eliminate E would be to focus on the 'national campaign' mentioned in the stimulus. An increase/decrease in profits from selling novels to overseas customers would not impact on the results of the national campaign, since it's directed at domestic residents. If we are factoring in overseas customers then we'd be looking at an international campaign.

Also, D is irrelevant because it's talking about 'changing careers' and 'starting new businesses' books, which are generally self-help/non-fiction.

[amil91]

The conclusion is that the campaign sucks.
Why? Because there has been a decline revenues from the sales of fictions.
We need to weaken this argument.
Let's start from the bottom:

E) E is wrong because it says "NOVELS" not FICTIONS. A novel is a type of fiction but not a collective term that describe all fictions. Irrelevant.

I think you might be missing something here. Like you said, a novel is a type of fiction. If there's a significant increase in the readership of novels we can definitely conclude that people are reading more fiction.

A better way to eliminate E would be to focus on the 'national campaign' mentioned in the stimulus. An increase/decrease in profits from selling novels to overseas customers would not impact on the results of the national campaign, since it's directed at domestic residents. If we are factoring in overseas customers then we'd be looking at an international campaign.

Also, D is irrelevant because it's talking about 'changing careers' and 'starting new businesses' books, which are generally self-help/non-fiction.

I agree with you in regards to E, I eliminated because international customers would not be exposed to a national reading campaign, not because of the use of the word novels.

I do have a question about choice C, I did pick A, but am still having trouble eliminating C as definitely wrong. In my mind, if the price of a different genre is significantly lowered, that would encourage more people to purchase this genre over the other. So in this hypothetical case, people would read more fiction, except because of the drastic markdowns on the price of biographies they are spending their money buying those books instead, thus suggesting an alternative reason for why people are buying less fiction and reading less fiction other than the effectiveness of the reading campaign.

[christine.defenbaugh]

You raise a very interesting point in regards to (C), amil91. Let's analyze that fully!

Our simplified core is:

PREMISE: Revenue from fiction books at major bookstores is decreasing
CONCLUSION: National campaign to increase the reading of fiction was unsuccessful.

Notice that the conclusion is not that the campaign failed because it was a terrible campaign. It might have been the most amazing campaign ever to grace the earth, but the conclusion just focuses on the alleged results: it failed in its objective. As long as the targets of the campaign (in the nation) are reading less fiction, it failed.

So let's take your idea that the markdown on biographies encouraged more people to buy biographies instead of fiction. The result of this scenario would still be fewer people buying fiction books, which would still mean the campaign failed! It might make it more likely it was not the campaign's fault, but it still failed.

So that's the concrete reason why (C) is not a weakener - it being true does not damage the conclusion. But there's another, more subtle issue at play here you should be sensitive to. A weakener should easily explain why the conclusion can't be validly reached.

For example, if people are still reading a ton of fiction, but at the library, that would directly undermine the conclusion that people are reading less fiction, without having to make any other leaps or create connections. Connecting the biography markdowns requires an assumption that such markdowns could and would lead to decreased fiction sales - a possible scenario, but certainly not an automatic one.

Always remember to characterize the conclusion carefully, and be careful that you are not adding in unwarranted assumptions to answer choice to 'help' them weaken!

Please let me know if this completely answers your question!

[amil91]

You raise a very interesting point in regards to (C), amil91. Let's analyze that fully!

Our simplified core is:

PREMISE: Revenue from fiction books at major bookstores is decreasing
CONCLUSION: National campaign to increase the reading of fiction was unsuccessful.

Notice that the conclusion is not that the campaign failed because it was a terrible campaign. It might have been the most amazing campaign ever to grace the earth, but the conclusion just focuses on the alleged results: it failed in its objective. As long as the targets of the campaign (in the nation) are reading less fiction, it failed.

So let's take your idea that the markdown on biographies encouraged more people to buy biographies instead of fiction. The result of this scenario would still be fewer people buying fiction books, which would still mean the campaign failed! It might make it more likely it was not the campaign's fault, but it still failed.

So that's the concrete reason why (C) is not a weakener - it being true does not damage the conclusion. But there's another, more subtle issue at play here you should be sensitive to. A weakener should easily explain why the conclusion can't be validly reached.

For example, if people are still reading a ton of fiction, but at the library, that would directly undermine the conclusion that people are reading less fiction, without having to make any other leaps or create connections. Connecting the biography markdowns requires an assumption that such markdowns could and would lead to decreased fiction sales - a possible scenario, but certainly not an automatic one.

Always remember to characterize the conclusion carefully, and be careful that you are not adding in unwarranted assumptions to answer choice to 'help' them weaken!

Please let me know if this completely answers your question!

Thank you! This makes perfect sense, I think I lost track of the conclusion a bit in thinking it had to be the 'fault' of the campaign for not working.

[lsatzen]

I was hoping someone could correct my misguided thinking on this question. I got it correct, but I spent far too much time deliberating between (A) and (D).

The core, as I understood it is:

Conclusion: National reading campaigns to increase fiction readership have been largely unsuccessful
Why?
Premise: In the last five years, most bookstores have started experiencing declining revenues from sales of fiction.

I read this as: because of the declining revenues from sales of fiction, we can conclude that the national reading campaign to increase fiction readership has been largely unsuccessful.

The first mode of thought that I entered was "what else could have produced this result?" (neglected alternative).

When I came across (D), given my frame of mind at that moment, it looked like a very attractive answer. I thought, that this presented a pretty feasible alternative explanation, by saying, "No, it was not the declining revenues that caused the reading campaign to flop, it might have been caused by a shift in the key interests of consumers due to poor economic conditions."

However, is this answer incorrect because 1) this answer choice only establishes that patrons are seeking these career / business books (we don't know if they are actually buying them) and 2) even if we do infer that their 'seeking' leads them to buy (an unsupported inference) who is to say that they aren't still buying both fiction and career/business books?

EDIT:
Am I interpreting the relationship between premise and conclusion too strongly? Structurally speaking, are we dealing with a Pro/Con argument, in which the author gives one negative aspect and uses it to make a negative overarching claim about the entire campaign, without exploring any of the positives? If so, removing the causal aspect from the stimulus makes answer choice (D) much easier to eliminate.

[kyuya]

Okay so we know:

- Most book stores have reported declining revenues from the sale of fiction, even though national campaigns have been encouraging people to read more
- therefore, the campaigns have been unsuccessful

Okay so firstly when I read this, I thought this easily could have been a flaw question. The flaw that stuck out to me was, no - this does not necessarily mean that the campaigns have been ineffective.. because how do we know if the campaigns weren't running, things would be way worse? But, I don't think that actually helps us answer the question in this particular case, just thought I'd throw that in there.

(A) Okay so this looks pretty good. If mail order book clubs have enjoyed substantial growth, that means that the stimulus isn't necessarily true since we have an example of fiction sales going up rather quickly. It suggests that perhaps the venue where people buy books has changed rather than the sale of fiction as a whole being the reason.

(B) This is irrelevant. This tells us a random fact about what has been profitable, but nothing about fiction books. Eliminate.

(C) Just like (B), its irrelevant. Tells us nothing about fiction books!

(D) Again, pretty irrelevant. Tells us nothing about fiction books.

(E) This again, is irrelevant. It just tells us what the NBA doesn't use to calculate profits... but what does this tell us about fiction? Nothing.

[phoebster21]

The conclusion is that the campaign sucks.
Why? Because there has been a decline revenues from the sales of fictions.
We need to weaken this argument.
Let's start from the bottom:

E) E is wrong because it says "NOVELS" not FICTIONS. A novel is a type of fiction but not a collective term that describe all fictions. Irrelevant.

I think you might be missing something here. Like you said, a novel is a type of fiction. If there's a significant increase in the readership of novels we can definitely conclude that people are reading more fiction.

A better way to eliminate E would be to focus on the 'national campaign' mentioned in the stimulus. An increase/decrease in profits from selling novels to overseas customers would not impact on the results of the national campaign, since it's directed at domestic residents. If we are factoring in overseas customers then we'd be looking at an international campaign.

Also, D is irrelevant because it's talking about 'changing careers' and 'starting new businesses' books, which are generally self-help/non-fiction.

Can someone please verify if my reasoning is correct here? Another reason E is irrelevant (apart from the fact that it's talking about oversea's customers when the conclusion is about a national audience) is because it's only trying to weaken the premise, which ALREADY has the gap/assumption in it, as opposed to weakening the connection between the premise and the conclusion.

The assumption is that SOMEHOW profits are related to the amount of reading (i.e. the success or failure of the campaign). So, regardless of whether profits DID or DIDN'T go up after taking into account mail to overseas customers, it's still NOT bridging the gap between profits and amount of reading.

(A) also seems like it's only talking about the premise as oppose to the gap between premise and conclusion BUT the difference is that A explicitly says "growth in fiction SALES" as opposed to "include PROFITS from..." The sales part is more important than the actual profit part.

It's COULD EVEN BE entirely consistent with answer A that these mail order book clubs are ALSO experiencing declining profits YET still have substantial growth in fiction sales (because perhaps they reduced the price of every book to 1 penny, and are selling a ton more books but not making as much in profit)