Logical reasoning PrepTest 140 · Section 3 · Question 26

Incorrect. By drawing a similarity between now and the past, this answer makes an increasing number of infections more curious.

Incorrect. This answer doesn't explain the increase in infections at a time when medicine is improving.

Incorrect. While this answer would explain how people are surviving these infections, it doesn't explain why they're increasing to begin with.

Incorrect. The paradox is that the rate of serious infections is increasing. Since it's a rate, it takes into account population increases and the number of serious infections, so this answer doesn't resolve the issue. If you picked this answer, you fell for a percent (rate) to amount (number) trap!

Correct. Argument or Facts:
Facts

Question Type:
Paradox

Stimulus Summary:
Medical research and technology have improved, increasing life expectancy and overall health. At the same time, serious infection rates have gone up.

Answer Anticipation:
The stimulus highlights one change leading to another—better technology leading to longer life expectancies and better overall health—with an unexpected outcome—higher rate of serious infection. That paradox is what we need to explain—how technology could increase overall health while a subset of that (serious infection rate) has increased. The correct answer, therefore, should explain how the new technology/medicine can improve health and life expectancy while also leading to higher infection rates. Since this suggests a shift from dying to having infections, any answer that explains that shift will be correct.

Answer Explanation:
This answer highlights a relevant difference between modern treatments and older treatments. Then, you'd die before you got an infection. Now, you live but get a serious infection. That explains how life expectancy and recovery rates are up, but so are infection rates.

Key Takeaway:
When a change brings about both positive and negative consequences, correct Paradox answers will generally highlight a shift from a worse outcome to a bad but better outcome. Here, the old outcome was death. The new outcome was a serious infection. That's better for overall health even if it's still bad, and the correct answer highlighted that.