Reading comp PrepTest 101 · Section 1 · Question 17

Passage

Questions 14-20  .        In recent years, scholars have begun to use social  . science tools to analyze court opinions. Remaining source text redacted.
Passage walkthrough
Passage Summary

Topic: Legal


Paragraph 1

  • Paragraph note
    • Author's view on using social science techniques to analyze court cases (example in sex-discrimination cases, but the potential of its "outcomes analysis" is exaggerated)
  • Views, minor Meta-Structures, and the author's attitude
    • Views of scholars who have recently used social science techniques to analyze court opinions:
      • Traditional legal research doesn't help real people with legal problems (second sentence)
    • Example of a study using social science techniques:
      • Zirkel and Schoenfeld have used social science tools to analyze case law surrounding discrimination against women employees in higher ed (third sentence)
    • Author's view on Zirkel and Schoenfeld's studies:
      • Their studies show that social science tools can help scholars, lawyers, and prospective plaintiffs (fourth sentence)
      • Their endorsement of "outcomes analysis" is mistaken (last sentence)
    • Author's attitude: "justifiably criticized" (second sentence); "may not be representative" (second sentence); "arcane matters" (second sentence); "studies have demonstrated" (fourth sentence); "may be used" (fourth sentence); "seems misguided" (last sentence)

Paragraph 2

  • Paragraph note
    • Author's criticism of outcomes analysis (ignores differences between cases, so it's not useful to plaintiffs)
  • Views, minor Meta-Structures, and the author's attitude
    • List of problems with outcomes analysis, according to the author:
      • Problem 1: It's not useful to simply count the number of successful and unsuccessful plaintiffs because prospective plaintiffs will believe they are right and will prevail anyway (first through second sentences)
      • Problem 2: The details of cases are very different from each other (
      • Certain factors can make it much more likely the plaintiff will win in academic sex discrimination cases (fourth sentence)
    • Examples of differences between cases, according to the author:
      • The quality of evidence and attitude of the judge (third sentence)
    • Examples of meaningful differences between cases that make it much more likely the plaintiff will win in academic sex discrimination cases, according to the author:
      • Serious procedural violations and written admissions of discriminatory practices (fourth sentence)
    • Author's attitude: "fundamental concern" (first sentence); "assumption" (first sentence) "odds are clearly against" (second sentence); "not swayed" (second sentence); "lawsuits are so different" (third sentence); "is of marginal assistance" (third sentence); "ignores the fact" (fourth sentence)

Paragraph 3

  • Paragraph note
    • Author on advantages two new approaches ("policy capturing" and analyzing trial transcripts over a specific period)
  • Views, minor Meta-Structures, and the author's attitude
    • Author's list of two new, more advantageous approaches to sex-discrimination cases:
      • Approach 1: "Policy capturing," in which variables in each opinion are identified and analyzed using multivariate analysis to determine whether variables predict the outcome of the lawsuit (second sentence)
      • Approach 2: Analyzing trial transcripts of a particular kind of case during a specified period (fourth sentence)
    • Examples of variables in "policy capturing," according to the author:
      • The frequency of employer evaluations of the plaintiff's performance, training of evaluators, and kind of evaluation (second sentence)
    • Examples of variables in the second approach, according to the author:
      • Nature of conduct, consequences for employers, nature of the remedy, factors that contributed to verdict, kind of evidence necessary for the plaintiff to win (fourth sentence)
    • Author's views on the advantages of the two approaches:
      • Policy capturing identifies factors that contribute to plaintiff's success or failure and attempts to explain why a suit came out the way it did (third sentence)
      • The second approach's timescale limited, but is helpful (last sentence)
    • Author's attitude: "more useful applications" (first sentence); "advantage of policy-capturing research" (third sentence); "attempts to explain the reason" (third sentence); "identifies factors that contribute" (third sentence); "identify variables" (fourth sentence); "assist potential plaintiffs" (fifth sentence)

Main Point: The utility of outcomes analysis for plaintiffs in sex discrimination cases has been exaggerated, while policy capturing and review of trial transcripts are two more promising ways of deploying social science techniques to assist such plaintiffs.

Key Lines?

Paragraph 1, Sentence 1 (P1, S1) - Statement of topic

P1, S5 - Old approach: outcomes analysis

P2, S1 - First problem with outcomes analysis

P2, S3 - Second problem with outcomes analysis

P3, S2 - New approach1: policy capturing

P3, S4 - New approach 2: trial transcript analysis

Meta-Structure?

Old Approach/New Approach: This passage uses an Old Approach/New Approach Meta-Structure.* The author describes Zirkel and Schoenfeld's enthusiasm for outcomes analysis in the effort to analyze higher education sex discrimination cases, but the author says their enthusiasm for this approach is misplaced. The author then describes two "new" approaches to predicting sex discrimination cases with social science methods, "policy capturing" and review of trial transcripts. The author argues that approaches are more helpful than the "old" approach.

When a passage utilizes an Old Approach/New Approach Meta-Structure, the main point is generally the author’s opinion on the new approach. The author didn't summarize their opinion on the new approaches for us, so we summarized the author’s opinions ourselves: "The utility of outcomes analysis for plaintiffs in sex discrimination cases has been exaggerated, while policy capturing and review of trial transcripts are two more promising ways of deploying social science techniques to assist such plaintiffs."

*OK, OK. It seems like all the approaches described in this passage are relatively new. Still, this passage fits the basic model of Old Approach (that the author doesn't like)/New Approach (that the author prefers). But, as is often the case with passages that use a Critical Meta-Structure, other Meta-Structures in this family could describe this passage. We could certainly call this passage a Correcting the Record passage. You could even stretch a bit and call this a Problem/Solution passage (problem: predicting outcomes in sex-discrimination cases; solutions: the three approaches described).

Last Thoughts?

This is a passage that has a largely legal topic but that brings in elements of social science. The author has a clear viewpoint and lays out their reasons for it while criticizing one method of legal analysis and endorsing two others. It is a somewhat dry passage, but the author's intention is clear, and the passage's organization plays directly to that intention.

Question prompt

The author's characterization of Remaining source text redacted.
Why the credited answer is right

Credited answer: A

The notes below walk through why it fits the stem and how to eliminate the rest.

Question Type

Legal

Strategy Overview

Review the author’s characterization of traditional legal research in passage, consult notes, and choose an answer choice based on your understanding of that reference in the passage’s overall argument.

Answer Anticipation

This question asks us why the author inserted the discussion of traditional legal research into the first paragraph. Unless a detail conflicts with the paragraph's purpose, the author probably mentioned that detail to advance the paragraph's role. So reviewing the first paragraph’s role, which we hopefully wrote down in the notes on our scratch paper, will generally reveal why the author included that detail.In this case, our note for the first paragarph is, "Author's view on using social science techniques to analyze court cases (example in sex-discrimination cases, but the potential of its "outcomes analysis" is exaggerated)." Notice how we didn't mention "traditional legal research" at all there? That strongly suggests that its role is not an important one in the author's argument. It's probably just "background information" or there "to provide a contrast" with the approaches that use social science techniques.Let's review the reference to traditional legal research to see if we can confirm this prediction. The author brings up traditional legal research in the second sentence of the paragraph to show that it is inadequate to help scholars and plaintiffs predict the outcome of sex discrimination cases (P1, S2). After this discussion, the author pivots into a discussion of Zirkel and Schoenfeld's response — using social science analysis. That discussion continues for the rest of the paragraph. Traditional legal research isn't the focus — it's just the entry point to the passage's real topic. So, the author definitely references traditional legal research to provide "background information" or "a contrast" to the approaches that use social science techniques.

Answer choices

  1. A
    provide background information for Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice A matches the stem

    (A) Does this answer choice say the references traditional legal research to provide "background information" or "a contrast" to the approaches that use social science techniques?

    Yes! This matches our anticipation of "background information" so we can confidently select it and move on.

    Traditional legal research, as a topic, is not touched after the beginning of the first paragraph, where the author explains it doesn't help scholars and plaintiffs analyze legal cases when predicting the outcome of new cases. The author doesn't mention traditional legal research after that. So we can see that, rather than being a key player in the passage, traditional legal research is just a bit of the background to the real topics under discussion — the three social science techniques discussed in paragraphs 2 and 3.

  2. B
    summarize an opponent's position
    Why choice B is not credited

    (B) Does this answer choice say the references traditional legal research to provide "background information" or "a contrast" to the approaches that use social science techniques?

    No. We can eliminate this once we realize it's not a match for our anticipation.

    Besides, the author’s only opponents in the passage are Zirkel and Schoenfeld, who champion the social science technique of outcomes analysis (P1, S5). The author doesn’t name the people who championed traditional legal research, and Zirkel and Schoenfeld are as critical of traditional legal research as the author (P1, S2-3). So, this answer choice is inaccurate.

  3. C
    argue against the use Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice C is not credited

    (C) Does this answer choice say the references traditional legal research to provide "background information" or "a contrast" to the approaches that use social science techniques?

    No. Not only does this not match our anticipation, but it also contradicts the author's main point. The author advocates using two recent social-science-analysis approaches to help plaintiffs in sex discrimination cases (P1, S1; P1, S4; P3, S1). The author never argues against the use of any of these approaches. For this reason, we can cross off (C).

  4. D
    emphasize the fact that Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice D is not credited

    (D) Does this answer choice say the references traditional legal research to provide "background information" or "a contrast" to the approaches that use social science techniques?

    No. We can cross off (D) as soon as we notice it doesn't match our anticipation.

    Besides, the author never says that legal researchers act to the detriment of plaintiffs. The author says that traditional legal research focuses on topics that are not helpful to plaintiffs (P1, S2). But the author also spotlights two new approaches that will help plaintiffs. So, the author thinks there are at least some legal researchers whose actions benefit potential plaintiffs.

  5. E
    reconcile traditional legal researchers Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice E is not credited

    (E) Does this answer choice say the references traditional legal research to provide "background information" or "a contrast" to the approaches that use social science techniques?

    No. We didn't say that the author wanted to "reconcile" traditional methods with methods that use social science tools. We can eliminate (E) for this reason.

    In fact, the author says traditional legal research is fundamentally flawed when it comes to practically helping real-world plaintiffs — it is too narrowly focused and obscure to be relevant to people trying to decide whether or not to bring sex discrimination cases (P1, S2). That would suggest the author wouldn't want traditional legal research to be combined with better legal research methods!

What this tests

Question analytics

Based on historical answer selection rates for this question.

Answer choice distribution

  1. A Credited 78%
  2. B 7%
  3. C 3%
  4. D 4%
  5. E 8%

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