QUESTION TEXT: Critics worry that pessimistic news reports about…
QUESTION TYPE: Most Strongly Supported
FACTS:
- Everyone has direct experience of the economy.
- If people have direct experience, they don’t defer to journalists.
- Some critics worry that pessimistic economic journalism will affect people’s perception of the economy.
- Journalists say they can’t worry about the effects of their work.
ANALYSIS: I rearranged the facts to make the deduction more obvious. Facts 1 and 2 combine to show that it’s unlikely that people will be influenced by journalism about the economy.
___________
- This is a trap answer. It would have been right if it had said “by the extent of negative reporting” or something like that.
But it says “by the extent of people’s confidence in it” - Careful. The stimulus said that people only defer to journalists when they lack direct experience. But the stimulus did not say that people always defer to journalists when they lack experience.
Lack of experience is a necessary condition, but not a sufficient condition. - The stimulus supports the opposite of this.
- CORRECT. This seems probable. People have direct experience of the economy, so they won’t defer to journalists.
- This isn’t supported. We know people don’t defer to journalists if they have direct experience, but journalists could still be harming people in some other way.
Journalists say they can’t worry about the effects of their work, but that doesn’t mean they’re right not to worry.
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Lyndsie says
I’m curious about the word “likely” on the LSAT. I caught on that people don’t always defer to a journalist but I think the word “likely” on both answers B and D tripped me up.
Your explanation on why B is incorrect makes it seem like “likely” equals a sufficient condition. Is that correct?
TutorRosalie (LSATHacks) says
In this case, “likely” and “unlikely”, while confusing, aren’t there to suggest a sufficient condition. They’re just quantifying language on the LSAT, like “some”, “most”, etc. The sufficient and necessary conditions for this question look like this:
If Defer to Journalists –> ~Direct Experience; and its contrapositive would be
If Direct Experience –> ~ Defer to Journalists
D is correct because, in the first sentence, the stimulus says that people have Direct Experience with the economy. Thus, people won’t defer to journalists on economic matters, so the journalists can write all the pessimistic reports they want, and it won’t have a significant effect on people’s opinions.
Memberzhanghjn@gmail.com says
Hi Graeme,
I think your analysis of why answer D is correct misses a point.
Instead invoking the common sense that people have experience with the economy, I believe a more significant reason why answer D is correct is that it says that “the news reports… are unlikely to have a significant effect on people’s opinion…” Which limits the applied group to people who have already formed an opinion. Furthermore, the argument stem expresses that people defer only when “they have no direct experience”
TutorLucas (LSAT Hacks) says
The stimulus tells us that everyone has “direct experience” of the economy every day, so it’s common sense to assume that “the people who have an opinion” are “all people” — an opinion is just a viewpoint or judgment, and when you have everyday exposure to something, it’s almost impossible to have literally opinion on it. You could even moderate that assumption and just say it’s safe to assume that at least a majority of people with everyday exposure must have some opinion.
The explanation for (D) is correct because of the conditional reasoning in the stimulus.
(1) Defer to journalists –> ~Direct experience
(2) Direct experience –> ~Defer to journalists
We know that people have direct experience everyday, which, as the explanation points out, means that people will not defer to journalists. So, we can say it’s unlikely that news reports are going to have a significant effect on people’s opinions about the economy.