PrepTest 110

Incorrect. This answer is too broad in applying to "[a]nyone"—the argument discusses bonds of trust between citizens not between citizens and non—citizens.

Incorrect. The goals of civic organizations are out of scope—it's a specific benefit of them that the stimulus discusses. There's no indication that building bonds of mutual trust is a goal of these organizations.

Incorrect. The argument relies on electronic media weakening these bonds so it doesn't require the assumption that non—electronic media strengthens these bonds. That's an illegal negation of the assumption.

Correct. Argument or Facts:
Argument

Valid or Flawed:
Flawed

Question Type:
Strengthen with Necessary Premise

Stimulus Summary:
not Strong bonds of trust between citizens → not Democratic society
Strong bonds of trust between citizens → Participation in civic organizations
Therefore — Electronic entertainment is corroding democracy

Answer Anticipation:
When a Strengthen with Necessary Premise question includes conditional logic ("unless" "only") you should diagram out the statements see if they chain together and figure out how they relate to the conclusion. In general the conclusion will either chain the statements together itself a conditional statement; or it'll attempt to apply the conditional to a specific case.

Here the conclusion falls into the latter category—it isn't a conditional but it attempts to apply the conditionals from the premises to the specific case of electronic entertainment. We should see if we can combine the premises and we should make sure that the conditionals line up with the conclusion.

That conclusion is that electronic entertainment corrodes democracy. The term in the premises that matches up with that? not Democratic society. (We diagrammed this first premise by treating "unless" as "if not." If you used another method and ended up with the contrapositive you would need to take the contrapositive here to get it to line up with the conclusion.) Since that already lines up with the conclusion and since we need to take the contrapositive of one of the premises to get them to combine we should contrapose the second conditional. Doing so we get:
not Participation in civic organizations → not Strong bonds of trust between citizens → not Democratic society

So the premises establish that a failure to participate in civic organizations is corrosive to democracy and it concludes that electronic entertainment is corrosive to democracy. The missing piece of the argument will connect the different terms—electronic entertainment prevents (or replaces) participation in civic organizations.

Answer Explanation:
This answer connects the new concept in the conclusion to the conditional chain from the premises. If electronic media doesn't make people less likely to participate in civic organizations then we don't know it prevents the formation of bonds of mutual trust and the conclusion can't be supported.

Key Takeaway:
When a Strengthen with Necessary Premise question features conditional logic diagram it out and see what's missing. It'll usually be a connection between a new concept in the conclusion and the sufficient or necessary condition of the premises (as it was here) but it could also be a missing link in the premise chain.

Incorrect. In bringing up a positive effect of electronic media on specific social bonds of trust, this answer cuts against the argument.