Q11 - Contrary to recent

[ohthatpatrick]

Question Type:
Main Conclusion

Stimulus Breakdown:
Conclusion: No hardware store will be opening in the shopping plaza.
Evidence: If there WERE going to be a store there, we'd already be seeing publicity. But we haven't seen publicity.

Answer Anticipation:
When you read Main Conclusion stimuli, remind yourselves that the Conclusion almost always appears BEFORE the evidence. It's usually the first sentence or found attached to some but/yet/however Rebuttal. This argument is a simple contrapositive argument. "If A, then B. But there isn't B. Therefore, there isn't A." We just need a match for the first sentence.

Correct Answer:
B

Answer Choice Analysis:
(A) The first sentence is about whether or not there will be a hardware store, not about whether people have speculated.

(B) Yes! This matches the first sentence.

(C) Premise.

(D) Never stated.

(E) Premise.

Takeaway/Pattern: Confirm you have found a conclusion by verifying:
1. It's an opinion.
2. It's supported

Trap answers on these questions will either be other explicit sentences or they will try to fish people in with things that sound like Inferences or Assumptions. Just find and bracket the conclusion and pick the answer choice that best matches what you bracketed.

#officialexplanation

[aramire2]

I got the correct answer for this question, but I was just wondering if anyone would be able to explain the thought process behind choosing this answer just to make sure that I am doing this correctly. Thank you in advance.

[rinagoldfield]

Thanks for your post, aramire2. This is an “identify the conclusion” question. For these questions, find the argument core, paying special attention to conclusion keywords like “therefore” “thus” etc. Then, find the answer choice that best matches the conclusion you identified.

This argument doesn’t have any “therefore”-like indicators. Find the conclusion by looking for big claims. The first sentence includes a big claim: no hardware store will be opening. This is the conclusion. (B) matches this almost exactly, and is the correct answer.