Logical reasoning PrepTest 131 · Section 2 · Question 17

Incorrect. Effectiveness is never mentioned in the argument, so it's out of scope.

Incorrect. The argument needs to establish that being dishonest will cause students to lose respect for a teacher. Failing to live up to what they respect the most doesn't guarantee that they'll lose respect for a teacher—that teacher might gain respect through other means.

Incorrect. This answer doesn't establish what would cause students to have a lower level of respect for a teacher, which is what needs to be justified.

Incorrect. Whether teachers are aware of students losing respect for them is out of scope for an argument that's just about whether the students are losing respect for them.

Correct. Argument or Facts:
Argument

Valid or Flawed:
Flawed

Question Type:
Strengthen with Sufficient Premise

Stimulus Summary:
Principle: If something would cause students to lose respect for a teacher, then the teacher shouldn't do it.
Situation: Students know when a teacher is making stuff up.
Conclusion: If a teacher doesn't know the answer to a question, then they shouldn't make something up.

Answer Anticipation:
This stimulus is interesting in that it features a "should" statement that's a premise (as well as one that's a conclusion). That first "should" statement here serves as a general principle that is then applied to the conclusion.

And it can apply to the conclusion. The principle can justify a conclusion that teachers shouldn't do something, and the conclusion brings up something teachers shouldn't do. Since that matches up, it must be the details that have a gap in them, so we need to dig into those.

The principle says teachers shouldn't do anything that causes their teachers to lose respect for them. The conclusion says that teachers shouldn't make answers up if they don't know the answer to a student's question. Those ideas aren't connected, however, so the correct answer will have to connect them—teachers making up answers to questions they don't know the answer to (or trying to hide their ignorance, as the stimulus also calls it) will cause students to lose respect for them.

Answer Explanation:
Teachers pretending to know the answer to a question when they don't is connected in the stimulus to hiding ignorance, and students can tell when they're doing this. If, as this answer states, this causes those students to lose respect for the teachers, and, as the principle in the stimulus states, teachers shouldn't do anything that causes their students to lose respect for them, then the conclusion of the argument holds.

Key Takeaway:
"Should"/"Shouldn't" statements are generally conclusions of arguments, but they do sometimes show up as premises. When they do, they'll generally take the form of a principle that's applied to a specific situation to reach a conclusion. The flaw there is generally in the details—the specific situation doesn't actually match the sufficient condition of the general rule. The answer will, therefore, connect those ideas.