Logical reasoning PrepTest 101 · Section 3 · Question 7

Incorrect. There's no indication of what direction the government is leaning for approval, nor of what they're considering, so this answer is out of scope.

Incorrect. This is about what is currently true, and we only learn about these effects on a dairy that's using BST (which isn't currently in use, since it's not approved).

Incorrect. There's no discussion of the current safety of milk from different sizes of farms, so this answer is out of scope.

Incorrect. The effects listed of BST are all on cows, not on the safety of milk or on people who drink it, so this answer is out of scope.

Correct. Argument or Facts:
Facts

Question Type:
Must Be True

Stimulus Summary:
BST effects on cows - Increases milk, udder inflammation, and stress; decreases fertility
The effects can be controlled by vets
Bigger farms would pay less per cow than smaller farms

Answer Anticipation:
What a mix of logic in this stimulus! We're normally on the lookout for causality, comparisons, and conditional statements—and we get, essentially, all three here!

The argument starts with some background before heading into causality—several effects of BST are listed. It then goes into a conditional statement (though if you didn't view it as one, that's fine—we didn't even diagram it)—all of the effects can be controlled by vets. Finally, we end with a comparison—vets cost less per cow for big farms than small farms.

Since these statements are all logically relevant and overlap with each other, we should try to bring them together. We can say that a big farm using BST is, overall, going to see more of a benefit than the smaller farms since they'll be seeing the same benefit but paying less to mitigate the negative effects. Let's find an answer stating that.

Answer Explanation:
This answer brings all the statements together. BST has some upsides for milk production, but there are downsides that need to be addressed. These downsides are cheaper for big farms to deal with than small farms, so big farms have more to gain from the BST approval than small farms, as this answer states.

Key Takeaway:
In Must Be True questions, causality, comparisons, and conditional statements tend to lead to correct answers. Additionally, when multiple statements overlap, see if you can draw an inference by combining them.