Self-study
As part of a survey, approximately 10,000 randomly selected individuals were telephoned and asked a number of questions about their income and savings. █████ ██████████ ███ ██████ ████████ ████ ███ █████ ███ ██████ █████ ████████ ███ ████ ██████ ██ ███ ████ ██ ██ ███ █████ ██████ ██ ██████ ███ ██ ███ ██████████ ████ ███████ ███████ ████████████ █████ ██ ████████ ██████ ███ ████ ███████ ████ ████ ███ ███████ ████ ████ ████ ███ █████ ██ ██████ ████████ █████████ ███████████ ██ █████████ ████ ███ ██████████
Summarize Argument: Phenomenon-Hypothesis
The argument concludes that people become more unwilling to discuss personal finances with strangers over the phone throughout their lifetime. The author bases his conclusion on a survey that found that older people are more unwilling to discuss their personal finances with a surveyor over the phone than younger people are.
Identify and Describe Flaw
Our argument uses survey results about different generations of people to support a claim about how people change as they age. This conclusion doesn’t follow; if you want to make a claim about how people’s behaviors change throughout their lives, you should interview the same people at different points in their lives. All that the survey results tell us is how different generations differ behaviorally, not how one generation will change in the future.
9.
The argument above is vulnerable ██ █████████ ██ ███ ███████ ████ ███ ████████
a
offers no evidence ████ ███ ███████████ ███████ █████ ████ █████████ ███████████ ███ ████ ████ █████ ███ ████ █████████ ██ █████ █████ ██ ███ ██████
This addresses the issue of change over time. If we don’t know how the answers of the people surveyed would change over time, we cannot draw the conclusion about how anyone’s behavior from earlier in their life to later.
b
fails to specify ███ █████ ██████ ██ ██████ ███ ████ ██████████ ██ ████ ██ ███ ██████
Knowing the exact number of people telephoned does not help our argument—it would not help us establish a connection between the older and younger people surveyed and how people change throughout their lives.
c
assumes without warrant ████ ███ ██ ███ ████ ███████████ ██ ████████ ██████ ███ ███████ ██████
Even if it were untrue that age was the main determinant of these factors, that would not damage the argument. Our argument is not focused on the level of income or savings, but rather on how forthcoming people of certain ages are with this information.
d
assumes from the ██████ ████ ██ ████████ ██ █████████ ██ ███ █████ ██ █ ████ ██ ███████████ ████████
This “cookie-cutter” answer choice refers to circular reasoning, which is not present in this argument. The study would have had to assume that people become less likely to share this information as they age. Since this was not the case, we can reject this answer choice.
e
provides no reason ██ ███████ ████ ████ ██ ████ ██ █ █████ ███ █████ ██ ███████ ██ ████ ████ ██ ███ ███████████ ██████ ████ ███ █████
Our argument is concerned with the difference between different age groups and how people change throughout their lives, not with whether or not generalizations are universally true within a group. This answer choice misses the mark.