Logical reasoning PrepTest 126 · Section 3 · Question 12

Question prompt

The total number of 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

Facts

Valid or Flawed

NA

Question Type

Must Be True Questions

Stimulus Summary

Post-TV - Total number of book titles published each year has quadrupled
Early days post-TV - Number of copies sold per book increased rapidly
Recent years 1 - Number of copies sold per book still increasing, but less rapidly
Recent years 2 - Library rentals are flat/down

Answer Anticipation

This Must be True stimulus very much falls into the category of providing information with subtle details that need to be paid attention to in order to find the right answer. Contrast this with a stimulus that features all conditional statements, or quantifier statements, or one that describes a scenario with a “missing” piece of information that can be inferred.
Here, there are two things to track - the timeline, and the comparisons.
For the timeline, we have the time after the introduction of the TV, the time immediately after the introduction of the TV, and recent years. Note that the first encompasses the latter two. We sketched out this timeline in our Summary - you don’t need to do that, but you should have an idea of that progression, and of the overlap.
For the comparisons, a few important things to note. The first statement is about the number of new titles; the second is about the number of copies sold of new titles. That’s a subtle shift that may come into play. Also, the note about recent year book sales doesn’t say that those sales are going down or are flat - it says that they’re still increasing, just not as fast (“the rate of increase has slowed” - if your acceleration slows, you’re still speeding up, as you’re accelerating, just not as fast).
These are all mostly just notes on the stimulus, though - we don’t have a solid anticipation, so let’s head to the answer and be careful with the details!

Answer choices

  1. A
    Television has, over the Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice A is not credited
    The stimulus is about titles released, purchased, and borrowed - not about reading. You can assume that more books sold = more reading, but how many books do you own that you’ve never read? The two aren’t equivalent, so this answer is out of scope. Additionally, there’s no information about population, which would be necessary to determine per capita reading. Also, the flat/declining library borrowing may or may not balance out the books purchased.
  2. B
    The introduction of television Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice B is not credited
    The stimulus discusses only what happened in North America, so this answer that generalizes to what “usually” happens is incorrect. Additionally, the library use is noted as being “flat or declining,” so we don’t even know if it definitely has declined in North America. And this didn’t happen until “recent years,” whereas the TV was introduced decades ago, so it looks like we can say this didn’t necessarily happen in North America.
  3. C
    Book publishers in North Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice C is not credited
    The copies per title sold increased rapidly in the early days of TV, and that rate of increase has slowed recently, but that means it’s still increasing. Therefore, copies sold per new release must be higher than it was in the early days of TV, even if the year-over-year increase is smaller.
  4. D
    The availability of television Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice D matches the stem
    The stimulus points to an example - in North America - of TV being introduced and then the number of book titles increasing and the copies sold per new book title increasing. As such, this answer is supported. One example of something increasing is enough to show that it doesn’t always decrease.
  5. E
    The introduction of television Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice E is not credited
    While more titles are being produced and more copies are being sold per new title since the introduction of TV, that’s a correlation. This answer states that the introduction of TV caused this expansion (“expanded”), so picking this answer would mean committing a correlation/causation flaw.

What this tests

Question analytics

Based on historical answer selection rates for this question.

Answer choice distribution

  1. A 7%
  2. B 5%
  3. C 20%
  4. D Credited 55%
  5. E 13%

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Discussion

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