Logical reasoning PrepTest 102 · Section 3 · Question 19

Question prompt

When an ordinary piece Remaining source text redacted.
Why the credited answer is right

Credited answer: E

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

Argument or Facts

Facts

Valid or Flawed

NA

Question Type

Argument Completion Questions

Stimulus Summary

Glass is a liquid, so areas under pressure will flow to areas not under pressure. So put something heavy in the middle of a sheet of glass that doesn’t crack under the pressure, and it’ll eventually __________.

Answer Anticipation

This Argument Completion question presents us with a set of facts and leads into the fill-in with “Therefore” (albeit with several conditions between it and the fill-in), so we’re looking for a conclusion. With that noted, we should head into the stimulus and see what information builds together. Reading through it, however, we really only get a single premise - glass is a liquid, which means that parts under pressure flow to parts that aren’t under pressure. With that noted, we can see how the conditions in the conclusion play into this information. If a horizontal sheet of glass has a heavy object placed on it and it doesn’t crack then the area under the heavy object should flow to areas that aren’t under pressure. Let’s find an answer that reflects that inference.

Answer choices

  1. A
    become larger in size Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice A is not credited
    The stimulus notes that the volume of glass doesn’t change, so it won’t get larger in size.
  2. B
    flow toward the point Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice B is not credited
    This answer is the opposite of what the stimulus says, where the portions of the glass will flow to the areas under less pressure.
  3. C
    compress, although not as Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice C is not credited
    Steel compresses, but glass flows instead of compressing.
  4. D
    divide into exactly two Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice D is not credited
    There’s no indication that the heavy object will result in the glass splitting in half. That might be inferrable if we were told that the heavy object spanned the sheet of glass completely, but we weren’t told that.
  5. E
    be thinner in the Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice E matches the stem
    The stimulus notes that glass flows from areas of high pressure to low pressure. That means the remaining glass under pressure will be thinner than at the other areas the glass under pressure flowed to. This answer is therefore correct.

What this tests

Question analytics

Based on historical answer selection rates for this question.

Answer choice distribution

  1. A 7%
  2. B 9%
  3. C 3%
  4. D 3%
  5. E Credited 79%

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