Q7 - Psychologist: Research has shown

[ohthatpatrick]

Question Type:
Necessary Assumption

Stimulus Breakdown:
Conclusion: Cancer support groups may have genuine therapeutic value.
Evidence: Participating in these groups reduces stress levels, and a weakened immune system increases vulnerability to cancer.

Answer Anticipation:
You have to arrive at the desired assumption in order to even understand what the heck this author is trying to argue.

The conclusion talks about whether or not [cancer support groups] have [therapeutic value]. What did we hear, if anything, about each of those concepts in the evidence?

[Cancer support groups] = [reduces stress]

We didn't hear anything about therapeutic value. The closest to that idea was
[therapeutic value] = [increased/decreased vulnerability to cancer].

It appears the author is envisioning this chain of thought:
cancer support group -> reduces stress -> bolsters immune system -> decreases vulnerability to cancer (i.e. provides genuine therapeutic value)

However, the author never connected stress to immune system strength, so the most glaring missing link in this argument is that "less stress is good for your immune system".

Correct Answer:
C

Answer Choice Analysis:
(A) What? "function well" and "extreme stress" are brand new ideas that are totally out of scope.

(B) Extreme: "not AT ALL" a biochemical phenomenon? The author is assuming that "disease is not entirely biochemical". The author assumes it's NOT 100% biochemical. This answer choice says the author assumes that it's 0% biochemical.

(C) Looks good! If we negate this, then the author has provided no evidence of support groups being a means of treating cancer.

(D) We are evaluating whether or not support groups have therapeutic value in treating cancer. This answer is evaluating HOW support groups reduce stress. Irrelevant.

(E) Tempting, but the author is assuming that stress is a CAUSE of weakened immune system, not an EFFECT.

Takeaway/Pattern: This argument probably seems hard to understand when we first read it. The three ideas are not presented in their most charitable order, and the assumption missing between "stress" and "weakened immune system" is vast enough people probably have a hard time following the author's thinking. Spend extra time digesting and matching up equivalent concepts on arguments that are hard to understand. Until we recognize that "increased vulnerability to cancer" is our meaning-match for "genuine therapeutic value", we might be a little lost. A little extra time understanding the train of thought the author is putting together can be more than made up for by arriving at the bridge idea we're missing, and thus having a very strong pre-phrase to quickly find your answer.

#officialexplanation

[jiyoonsim]

I was able to eliminate A,B, and E but stuck between C and D. In the end, I chose C, which turned out to be a wrong answer. While reviewing, I see that D is stronger answer than C, but I can't really explain why C is wrong answer.

Could someone clarify? Also, is the first sentence is kind of bait that isn't really important for solving this question?

[ohthatpatrick]

I think you just read the answer key wrong. C is the correct answer to #7, section 1, test 60.

Your instincts were correct to like C.

The conclusion was that
"Cancer-patient support groups may have genuine therapeutic value."

What did the evidence ever tell us about 'cancer-patient support groups'?
They reduce stress.

What did the evidence ever tell us about 'therapeutic value towards treating cancer'?
A strengthened immune system decreases vulnerability to cancer.

What do I need to assume to connect these dangling ideas?
Reducing stress is good for your immune system.

Hence, choice C correctly connects two parts of the argument that needed to be connected in order to reach the author's conclusion.

Choice D is what we would call a premise booster; it tries to strengthen the premise that the people in the support group had their stress reduced (we already accept that they had their stress reduced ... it's a premise)

You mentioned that D was 'stronger' than C. You're right that D is more strongly worded than C, but that's another part of it that's wrong. The author said that these support groups REDUCE stress; he doesn't have to assume that they ELIMINATE stress.

And the first sentence was not just bait, but actually quite relevant to the answer (as you originally suspected).

[jimmy902o]

hello, what makes C a better choice than E here? While I understand C is a good argument I feel the negation of E... stress is not a symptom of a weakened immune system.. should also destroy the argument

[ohthatpatrick]

Well, essentially, (C) and (E) are both making a connection between stress and a weakened immune system (which, if we evaluated the argument core correctly, is exactly the missing link this argument needs).

However (C) says that stress can cause a weakened immune system.

(E) says that a weakened immune system can cause stress.

"symptom" is basically the same thing as "effect".

So is this author thinking that stress causes low immune or that low immune causes stress?

Well, the author is arguing that support groups have therapeutic value in the fight against cancer by reducing patients' stress.

The first premise shows that weak immune causes more vulnerability to cancer.

In order for the author to think that lowering stress has an effect on cancer-risk, he must think of the causality as working this way:
stress --> weakened immune --> more vulnerable to cancer.

Don't think of these arrows as conditional logic, but as cause and effect.

If the author were to think like (E), he would be thinking:
weakened immune --> more vulnerable to cancer
and
weakened immune --> stress

But if both cancer-risk and stress were merely symptoms (effects) of weakened immune, then stress and and cancer-risk don't have any link to each other.

Whereas if stress causes weakened immune, which then causes cancer-risk to go up, then stress and cancer DO have a link to each other.

So (C) - saying that stress is the cause of low immune, not the effect of low immune - is the more logical match for how the author was arguing.

Hope this helps.

[jimmy902o]

got it the word choice in answer E kind of threw me off but now it makes sense. thanks!

[grill]

I had a bit of trouble with this question for a reason that has not been discussed...

I understand the argument core: a weakened immune system increases vulnerability to cancer and patient support groups reduce stress, therefore patient support groups have therapeutic value. At first glance I thought to connect stress to a weakened immune system; however, I took another look and decided otherwise. If someone is in a cancer-patient support group, we can assume they are a cancer patient....and if someone is already a cancer patient, they are undoubtedly vulnerable to the disease. So assuming stress can weaken the immune system (answer c) thereby establishing that a reduction in stress can make someone less vulnerable to a disease they already have seems a bit unrelated.

Am I overthinking the definition of vulnerable (in this context I consider to it to mean "likely to contract")? Let me know!

[tommywallach]

Interesting point. I agree with you, with two caveats. ONE, there's no answer choice that is relevant to your point, so it doesn't matter. TWO, even once you have cancer, the fear is that it will grow/spread, so it's still relevant how vulnerable you are.

-t

[MollyM188]

I do not understand this or the explanation. Why are we trying to connect the two premises? The conclusion involves therapeutic value of support group. Shouldnt we be trying to connect the premises to this?

[ohthatpatrick]

If we have a conclusion that is
A ---> Z

and our premise are
A --> B
and
Y --> Z

then what is our author assuming?


If she thinks that we get from A ---> Z
she must be thinking that
A --> B ---?---> Y ---> Z

There's no other way to make sense of the argument. When one premise deals with the subject of the conclusion and another premise deals with the predicate of the conclusion, then there's no "new guy" in the conclusion. We just need to tie together the internal tissue.

Consider this one:
The Constitution should never be worn as a blanket. After all, the Constitution is a sacred document, and things we want to save for posterity should never be worn as a blanket.

What's being assumed?
Sacred documents are things we want to save for posterity.

Again, the assumption is a missing link between premises.

Here's the analogous argument for Q7:
Cancer support groups have therapeutic value. After all, cancer support groups reduce stress, and strengthening the immune system has therapeutic value.

So what's missing?
We need to know that reducing stress can strengthen the immune system.

Hope this helps.

[JamesC733]

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