PrepTest 127

Incorrect. If anything, this makes the paradox worse, and removing the coyotes should therefore have helped the plover survive.

Incorrect. A fluctuation doesn't explain a complete collapse of the population.

Incorrect. This answer is out of scope. It doesn't even tell us that coyotes are particularly healthy on the island—there could be other, coyote-specific diseases on the island. This can't even serve as an alternative cause because it doesn't explain why, without the coyotes, these existing diseases would suddenly cause the plover population to collapse.

Incorrect. This answer might align with the paradox by hinting that something was causing animal populations on the island to decrease, it doesn't explain what that thing is or why it hit the plover population hard enough to cause it to collapse, so it doesn't resolve the paradox.

Correct. Argument or Facts:
Facts

Question Type:
Paradox

Stimulus Summary:
Goal: Save the plover! (It's a type of bird. We had to look it up.)
Approach: Remove the coyotes that were eating birds and plover from the islandOutcome: No more plover

Answer Anticipation:
This Paradox question follows a classic pattern—a change is implemented that was intended to have a certain effect, but it actually ended up having the opposite effect. The correct answer will need to explain how the unexpected outcome ended up happening.

That usually means identifying something else that changed along with the approach taken that could result in the given effect, so we can take that general anticipation and head to the answer choices.

However, in this stimulus, they actually give us an additional hint as to what the correct answer is going to say—it's not just plover that the coyotes hunt, but also wild cats. So removing the coyotes would be expected to increase the wild cat population, and if they hunt the plover as well, then an increase in that population could result in the collapse of the plover population.

Answer Explanation:
This answer highlights another change effected by the removal of the coyotes that could explain why the plover population collapsed. If the coyotes were keeping the wild cats in check, and it's the wild cats that primarily eat the plover, then removing the coyotes would likely result in an increase in the wild cat population, which would then result in more animals hunting the plover and the eventual collapse of that population.

Key Takeaway:
Arguments that describe a change that had an unexpected outcome/effect will frequently throw in what seems like an extraneous detail. In reality, that extraneous detail frequently suggests a separate change or potential cause of the unexpected outcome, so pay attention to it!