PrepTest 141

Incorrect. This answer choice reverses the connection needed for the stimulus to work. The stimulus requires enabling people to view a better future as driving them to have motivation to change, not creating the motive in order to make people more optimistic.

Correct. Argument or Facts:
Argument

Valid or Flawed:
Flawed

Question Type:
Strengthen with Necessary Premise

Stimulus Summary:
Problem: Young people are pessimistic about the future, so they lack motivation to improve the world.
Solution: Make young people think better futures are possible.

Answer Anticipation:
The argument highlights a problem and concludes one potential solution to that problem. The problem is that young people are pessimistic and thus aren't motivated to improve the world. The solution offered by the argument is to find a way to make young people believe better futures are possible. However, there's no indication that this will actually solve the problem—there's no connection between optimism and being motivated to make the future better. Maybe a belief that the future can be better breeds complacency, so people lack motivation to actually be a part of that change. The correct answer, therefore, needs to connect the solution offered to the problem states—that enabling people to see a better future prevents them from losing their motivation to bring it about.

It's also likely important to note that this entire argument is about beliefs and viewpoints—not fact. It uses language like "believe," "think" and "believe" again—so answer choices about what is actually true are likely out of scope, and answers about what people believe are more likely to be correct.

Answer Explanation:
This answer choice connects the proposed solution to the problem—making people more optimistic prevents a loss of motivation to make the world a better place. If enabling people to view a better future doesn't prevent that loss of motivation, then the proposed solution from the stimulus won't work to solve the problem.

Key Takeaway:
Noting key elements in a stimulus can help get rid of answer choices that are in the right area but have a fundamental issue. The stimulus was grounded in what people believe and think, so answers about what is actually true could be discounted as being out of scope. This isn't the first time we've seen the difference between subjective belief and objective fact as relevant to an argument, and it certainly won't be the last!

Incorrect. The argument doesn't require one view to be "better" than another—just to lead to a certain outcome (motivation to make the world a better place).

Incorrect. The argument is about motivation and viewpoint, not actually solving these problems, so this answer is out of scope. Even when discussing these specific problems, it's framed as what young people "believe"—not whether they're actually solvable.

Incorrect. The cause of the problems that young people view as unsolvable are out of scope of an argument about motivation to solve those problems.