Logical reasoning PrepTest 105 · Section 2 · Question 17

Question prompt

Whenever a company loses Remaining source text redacted.
Why the credited answer is right

Credited answer: D

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

Argument or Facts

Argument

Valid or Flawed

Flawed

Question Type

Flawed Parallel Reasoning Questions

Stimulus Summary

Loses lawsuit → Stock falls Cotoy - Has been involved in a lawsuit, and their stock fell Therefore - Cotoy must have lost the lawsuit

Answer Anticipation

Many Parallel Reasoning questions of either type feature conditional logic, and this one is no different. It starts with, “Whenever,” which is a sufficient condition indicator. Noting that, we can draw out the conditional, as we did in our summary. From there, the stimulus brings up information about a specific case - that of Cotoy. We are told that they’re involved in a lawsuit - and losing such a lawsuit is the sufficient condition - and that their stock fell - the necessary condition. So the premises here establish that the sufficient condition is possible but that the necessary condition definitely happened. From that, it concludes that the sufficient condition did happen, and that the judgment handed down was a loss for Cotoy. That’s using the necessary condition to conclude a sufficient condition, so this argument features an illegal reverals. Let’s find an answer that does the same.

Answer choices

  1. A
    Whenever a business treats Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice A is not credited
    Treat customers discourteously → Shop elsewhere

    Wants to keep customers...we’re out. While this premise is related to the necessary condition, it’s about what the company wants, not what actually happened, so it fails to establish the necessary condition. Since the argument in the premise did establish it, this answer isn’t parallel.
  2. B
    Whenever the large airlines Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice B is not credited
    The conclusion here just restates the premise, so this argument has a Circular Reasoning flaw, not an illegal reversal.
  3. C
    Whenever a country shows Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice C is not credited
    This argument doesn’t have a second premise, so it can’t conclude a sufficient condition based on a necessary condition. Instead, this argument features a term shift (from respect not declining to gaining respect).
  4. D
    Whenever an entering student Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice D matches the stem
    Cashman Performance Fellowship → $10k

    Eula - Cashman student who received $10k from college

    Therefore - She must have won the Cashman Performance Fellowship

    This argument puts forward a conditional rule and then uses the necessary condition as the basis for concluding the sufficient condition. That’s the same illegal reversal as the stimulus, so this is the correct answer.
  5. E
    Whenever a company advertises Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice E is not credited
    This argument validly applies the contrapositive of the rule (though it does conclude something weaker than it could have in stating that it’s only “likely” the sufficient condition wasn’t met).

What this tests

Question analytics

Based on historical answer selection rates for this question.

Answer choice distribution

  1. A 5%
  2. B 4%
  3. C 1%
  4. D Credited 84%
  5. E 5%

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