PrepTest 150

[lcid:3699] Prep Test 150 LSAT — Reading Comp — S4 Reading comp

Passage

Questions 8-14  .       Common sense suggests that we know our own  . thoughts directly, but that we infer the thoughts Remaining source text redacted.
Passage walkthrough
Passage Summary

Topic: Science


Paragraph 1

  • Paragraph note
    • Recent psychological research challenges common beliefs about our access to our thoughts
  • Views, minor Meta-Structures, and the author's attitude
    • Comparisons regarding our access to our thoughts, according to the common view:
      • We "know" our thoughts but have to "infer" the thoughts of others (first sentence)
      • Our knowledge of our thoughts is infallible, but our inferences of others' thoughts are based on their behavior and can be wrong (second sentence)
    • Comparisons between children's access to their thoughts, according to recent psychological research:
      • Children can correctly describe phenomena but misdescribe their thoughts on the same phenomena (third sentence)
      • Children are worse at identifying their thoughts than adults (fourth sentence)
    • Some psychologists' views:
      • We have to infer our thoughts, and we can make wrong inferences (fifth through last sentences)
    • Author's attitude: "challenged" (third sentence); "seems" (fourth sentence); "much less capable" (fourth sentence)

Paragraph 2

  • Paragraph note
    • Psychologists' view: We do not notice our inferences because we are "experts" on our thoughts
  • Views, minor Meta-Structures, and the author's attitude
    • Comparisons, according to psychologists:
      • Our belief that we "know" our thoughts is similar to becoming an expert in an area (first sentence)
      • As we become more "expert," we no longer notice that we are making inferences but instead feel like we have direct knowledge (third sentence)
    • Example of perception-changing expertise, according to psychologists:
      • Chess experts who claim they do not make inferences when assessing whether a position is weak or strong (fourth sentence)
    • Cause-and-effect relationship, according to psychologists:
      • We make inferences about our thoughts very quickly, which causes us not to notice that we are making inferences, which causes us to feel that we have direct knowledge about our thoughts, which causes us to believe we cannot be wrong about our thoughts (fifth through last sentences)

Paragraph 3

  • Paragraph note
    • Author's positive evaluation of psychologists' view
  • Views, minor Meta-Structures, and the author's attitude
    • The author's views:
      • The psychologists almost make the facile claim that we make inferences about our thoughts based on our observations of our internal behavior (first sentence)
      • In reality, they actually say we make our inferences based on cognitive activity that is not thought (second sentence)
      • We make these inferences quickly, and no one can contradict these inferences, so we believe we have direct, infallible knowledge of these thoughts (third through last sentences)
    • Examples of cognitive activity that is not thought, according to the author and psychologists:
      • Fleeting sensations and emotions (second sentence)
    • Cause-and-effect relationships, according to the author:
      • We make inferences about our thoughts very often, which causes us to make quick and reliable inferences (third sentence)
      • No one can contradict our internal thoughts, which causes us to think that our thoughts are not inferences and infallible (fourth through last sentence)
    • Author's attitude: "perilously close" (first sentence); "in fact, their arguments do not commit them" (second sentence); "crucial in creating the illusion" (last sentence)

Main Point: Recent psychological research suggests that we may unknowingly infer our thoughts rather than "know" them directly.

Key Lines?

Paragraph 1, Sentence 1 (P1, S1) - Common belief

P1, S5 - Psychologists' alternative explanation

P2, S5 - Support for psychologists' explanation

Meta-Structure?

Phenomenon/Explanation - We think — or, perhaps, we infer from our fleeting cognitive activity — that this passage best fits the Phenomenon/Explanation Meta-Structure*. In such a passage, the author will describe an observable fact, behavior, or situation. In this case, it's a behavior — our thought process. Then, the author describes one or more explanations of that phenomenon. In this case, we get two explanations for our thought processes. First, we learn about the old view that we know our thoughts directly (P1, S1). Then, we learn about psychologists' recent argument that we unknowingly infer our thoughts. The discussion of this second explanation takes up the entire passage.

In a Phenomenon/Explanation passage, the main point is generally the explanation the author agrees with. The author offers a positive evaluation of the psychologists' explanation in the third paragraph, so their explanation is the main point. This explanation was summarized in the fifth sentence of the first paragraph, so we can use that for any question that requires us to use the main point. Or, we can go with our own summary: "Recent psychological research suggests that we may unknowingly infer our thoughts rather than 'know' them directly."

*That said, many Meta-Structures could describe this passage. If you think this passage has a Reporting a Viewpoint, Correcting the Record, Old Approach/New Approach, or Proposing a Hypothesis Meta-Structure, you'll likely come up with the same main point and big-picture understanding of the passage that we did. Remember that the Meta-Structures are here to help us think about and describe the passage's structure. We don't need to be 100% correct in which Meta-Structure we choose to develop a strong understanding of the passage's argument.

Comparison: The most prominent minor Meta-Structure is the comparison. (That said, this passage makes liberal use of the minor Meta-Structures, including several examples and cause-and-effect relationships.) In the first and second paragraphs, especially, we get several comparisons about our thought processes. These comparisons are too numerous to outline here (they're all in the Passage Summary above). But we'll get at least a couple of questions related to these, so it's a good idea to highlight or underline the comparative words like "but" (P1, S1; P1, S4), "while" (P1, S2; P1, S3), "analogous" (P2, S1), and "whereas" (P2, S3).

Last Thoughts?

After this passage was administered on the June 2017 LSAT, many test-takers expressed frustration over how difficult this passage was. Much of this frustration can likely be chalked up to its placement — we generally do not think the second passage will be the most difficult. That said, most would agree the passage is not unusually difficult to understand, despite its abstract subject matter. There are a few analogies to help us understand the topic, and the author repeats several of the key points. A lot of the difficulty with this passage, then, will come through the questions. To help us work through these difficult questions, we should rely on the passage as much as we can. If we have to review or check the passage more than we typically would, that's OK!

Question prompt

It can most reasonably 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.

Question Type

Social Science

Strategy Overview

Refer to notes or what you highlighted/underlined to identify why the researchers chose children as subjects of the psychology experiments, according to the psychologists, and refer to the relevant part of the passage as needed to find that answer choice that must be true

Answer Anticipation

This is yet another question that asks us to make an inference that must be true. This time, it asks why the researchers chose to use children in the psychology experiments described in the first paragraph. Many test-takers will review the second half of the first paragraph, which describes the experiment. However, that excerpt never states why the researchers used children as their subjects. So, rather than asking us to find something explicitly mentioned in the passage, this question invites us to think critically about the experiment and identify a plausible reason why the researchers used children as the subjects.Some test-takers may find it too difficult or time-consuming to anticipate a reason; such test-takers would go straight to the answer choices. That's an OK strategy. For each question, we could simply ask, "Does this present a plausible reason why the researchers used children as the subjects?"However, we think the answer to this question is anticipatable. Let's think about the differences between children and adults, as described in the passage. According to the passage, adults acquire so much expertise inferring their thoughts that they stop noticing these inferences (P2, S5). Do children have this expertise? Probably not. Remember, the author says that the children misdescribe their thoughts about the phenomena (P1, S4). From this, the psychologists conclude that children, like all people, have to infer their thoughts (P1, S5). However, children have simply had less time than adults to attain this expertise in inferring their thoughts. This would make children more fruitful subjects for a psychological experiment. Adults would accurately identify their thoughts far more often, so researchers would have fewer opportunities to conclude if adults knew their thoughts directly or had to infer their thoughts. If children, who lack adults' expertise, always identify their thoughts accurately, it could suggest that they know their thoughts directly. Alternatively, if children consistently misidentified their thoughts, that might suggest that they infer their thoughts inexpertly.So, the correct answer will likely say that children's lack of expertise helps researchers make conclusions about the children's thought processes.

Answer choices

  1. A
    Experiments involving children are Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice A is not credited

    (A) Is this answer choice consistent with our anticipation — that children's lack of expertise helps researchers make conclusions about the children's thought processes?

    Nope. This brings up creativity. The passage never discussed children's creativity or implied that creativity would make someone a better subject for psychological studies. Therefore, this answer choice is unsupported.

  2. B
    Adults are more likely Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice B is not credited

    (B) Is this answer choice consistent with our anticipation — that children's lack of expertise helps researchers make conclusions about the children's thought processes?

    No. This directly contradicts the passage. The passage says that children are more likely to give inaccurate reports of their thought processes (P1, S4). Therefore, this cannot describe why children were chosen as subjects of this research.

  3. C
    Since adults are infallible Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice C is not credited

    (C) Is this answer choice consistent with our anticipation — that children's lack of expertise helps researchers make conclusions about the children's thought processes?

    Negative. The passage implies that adults are not infallible in their access to their thoughts. Although the author claims adults' inferences are "reliable" (P3, S4), the author also says that adults have an "illusion" that their inferences are "infallible" (P3, S5). The term "illusion" suggests that adults do not have infallible access to their thoughts.

  4. D
    Mental processes are sometimes Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice D matches the stem

    (D) Is this answer choice consistent with our anticipation — that children's lack of expertise helps researchers make conclusions about the children's thought processes?

    Yes, this is consistent with our anticipation. Children lack expertise, so it makes sense that they are more likely than adults to make some cognitive errors. Indeed, the passage describes a cognitive error children make — they misdescribe their thoughts about phenomena they observe (P1, S4). As discussed in the Answer Anticipation section, these errors make studying their mental processes easier. If they didn't make any errors, it might be challenging to determine whether they inferred their thoughts or possessed direct knowledge of their thoughts. These errors make studying the limits of their mental processes easier. Therefore, this answer choice is consistent with our anticipation and, crucially, doesn't make any demonstrably false statements. Therefore, we can be satisfied that this is correct.

  5. E
    Children are less experienced Remaining source text redacted.
    Why choice E is not credited

    (E) Is this answer choice consistent with our anticipation — that children's lack of expertise helps researchers make conclusions about the children's thought processes?

    A plurality of test-takers pick this answer choice. If you liked it, read it again, slowly. Pause over every word. Notice any issues?

    If we had read it this carefully initially, we may have stopped reading once we reached the word "others." Psychologists do not use the experiment to test whether we can infer the thoughts of "others." The experiment tests whether we infer our thoughts. Children's experience inferring other people's thoughts is irrelevant to the experiment. Perhaps this would be correct if it said, "Children are less experienced than adults in inferring their thoughts." As written, this does not provide a reason why the psychologists would have chosen children for this experiment.

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