LSAT 128 | Section 2 | Logical Reasoning: Q6

LR Question 6 Explanation

QUESTION TEXT: The effect of technology on language and the effects of …

QUESTION TYPE: Principle – Conform

CONCLUSION: Relationships between people are more casual than ever.

REASONING: The advent of technology has changed the way people speak to one another, and loosened language rules.

ANALYSIS: The stimulus is essentially saying that: new communication technology –> looser language rules –> relationships more casual. It references multiple types of technology, but says the best example is email.

The correct answer will capture the link between communication methods and social change in some way. You usually won’t be able to (and don’t need to) predict the exact phrasing of the answer choice, so just keep this general idea in mind when scanning the answer choices.

___________

1. We know technology affects relationships, but we don’t know whether this effect is negative. “Adversely” is unsupported.
2. CORRECT. This directly matches the stimulus – changes in media cause relationships to change (become more casual).
3. You could reasonably interpret a loosening of language rules to mean a decrease in linguistic sophistication. But still, this reverses the causal relationship. In the stimulus, new technology -> looser language rules. Here, it says: looser language rules -> new technology.
4. This is making too many unsupported claims. The argument never says the original rules were overly rigid, and we also don’t know the effect of loosening on communication overall.
5. This also reverses the causation. The argument states that language shifts affect relationships, not the other way around.