This question was so straightforward that I convinced myself I was missing something because I kept getting E as the answer. I thought it was a trick question, spent 10 minutes second-guessing myself, and eventually just chose E out of frustration.....I was so shocked when I saw the difficulty level.......BTW... if you got this question wrong, you probably just misread the stimulus because it's kind of confusing. (Same thing happened to me.)
I'm finding it hard to find the line between disproving a conclusion (hyp) or just weakening the conclusion. I still don't see the difference. Cause it seems the Correct AC should be a conclusion that will still make the premises make sense/work. Almost pretending that we never got the conclusion in the stimulus? #help
Also, is D trying to bait us into assuming that the high-spenders are bus users, and, if we grant this assumption, that Travallier is trying to target existing customers rather than new ones? Would be forced to make a lot of assumptions, but curious if that was the trap the test-makers were going for
My line of thinking: New stuff in conclusion = bad. The conclusion says it must be that they're looking for new customers based on their current customers' preferences. So, once I noted that relationship b/w current and new, and the hypothesis being about new, then I tried to search for one that affirms that it is actually the current customers who are being served. E does that.
@mthomas81 I think of these questions like a Jenga tower. You are trying to figure out where is the weak point in the argument is like in the Jenga tower you pull out the block that is weaker than the rest.
@Mina.G Really? I thought that (E) totally weakened the conclusion. Because the conc. says that by hiring the bus tour people they are trying to expand their NEW consumer base. But (E) says well actually no they're just trying to get their EXISTING consumers to change their habits.
I started to get the correct answers for RRE and WSE questions once I knew where to focus on the stimulus. For instance, in this question, the stimulus concludes "Travailler must be attempting to enlarge its consumer base by attracting new customers". This shows us that the LSAT writers want us to focus on that there should be an alternative explanation for the company to hire employees with experience in the bus tour industry. Despite the fact that their consumer base has always been traveling by air. By focusing on what the LSAT writers want us to focus on, I could easily cross out the answers that were completely irrelevant.
@iriswu84153 Okay, so it's good to know I am not the only one who thinks of the question like this. I always look at it like "Which one of these answer choices is the better conclusion for this stimulus?" .. I have found this to be extremely helpful.
Basically the company wants to expand their consumer base by accepting new clients. Why? Because they want to charter busses and do bus tours. Why is that an issue? Because Unfortunately their already existing clients prefer to travel via airplane. So the company believes that if they have new consumers then they will automatically prefer to travel via bus instead of by plane like the existing consumers. So, What weakens their Argument of “if our old consumers prefer to fly via plane then we’ll just get new customers and they’ll want to travel via bus?” It would be E because it was never stated that the existing consumers wouldn't change their mind and or be open to another method of travel so it would make sense for the company to implement new additions to the company with their already existing consumers first. Just because they prefer to travel 1 way doesn’t mean they can’t change their minds.
I suck at explaining but i like to translate everything in my own words and see what the phenomenon is. basically i like to get to the point and from there it is much easier to weaken their argument when you know what their argument actually is. I can explain better if i confused you but i hope i semi helped
E: Expand by introducing their current customers to new products and services.
The stimulus says their focus is on expanding its current customer base whereas E says their focus is on expanding their business via current customers, which is what makes it right.
This was a tricky question but something that recently helped me with these difficult weaken questions is to think about whether the conclusion can still be believable if the answer choice were to be added to the argument (obviously the first step in this case would be to confidently point out the conclusion of the argument). So, if it were true that the company was following the advice of their consultants to introduce new products to existing customers, rather than trying to tap into a whole new market (try to think of a real life example of this happening to make it easier to understand, maybe if Apple were to come out with a gaming console to attract iPhone lovers to gaming??) then it wouldn't reasonably follow that the corporation must have been trying to enlarge their consumer base by attracting NEW people ( we can infer that they're still focused on their traditional customers).
So while the information in the argument does mention the idea that the corporation is offering a new product (bus) to expand/enlarge, the point of the argument was not about whether the corporation is able to expand. The authors point (the conclusion) was that even though this corporation is trying to expand, they must be doing it so they can try to enlarge their consumer base and attract new customers. With E) being true, it is harder to believe this conclusion, and this answer choice provides an alternate explanation that make us want to doubt the authors conclusion in the argument, and instead believe that maybe this corporation is trying to expand for another reason, like trying to enlarge their services but change the minds of their current customers as opposed to attracting new ones. Hope this helps!
Conclusion says the corporation is trying to attract NEW customers. E undermines this conclusion by providing support for the alternate conclusion that Travallier is actually trying to market NEW SERVICES to their EXISTING CUSTOMER BASE. Not NEW SERVICES to a NEW CUSTOMER BASE (like the stimulus conclusion is arguing).
I dont understand how am i supposed to assume that E is referring to their existing customers. Its saying "expand" and then the conclusion says "enlarge" so to me that AC was strengthening the conclusion id don't understand how its even a weakened #solost
The key phrase that helped me identify that answer choice E was referring to existing customers was the mention of "current customers."
The way I approached this weakening question was by looking for any answer choice that was: 1) not aiming to expand to other consumers and 2) had to do solely with the Travaillier company.
When you look at Answer choice E overall, it meets those two criteria (which, in my opinion, greatly weakens the hypothesis in the stimulus: Travaillier is trying to attract new customers.)
How I broke down answer choice E (My thought process):
Answer choice (E): "The industry consultants employed by Travaillier typically recommend that companies expand by introducing their current customers to new products and services."
For the first bolded phrase: The industry consultants employed by Travaillier - I was able to meet the criteria of having to do with Travaillier.
For the second bolded phrase: introducing their current customers to new products and services - I was able to meet the criteria of staying within Travaillier's customer base and not other demographics like new customers.
Finally, the terms expand and enlarged can be understood in a way that is different from expanding or enlarging in size or quantity of people. You can understand expansion and enlargement in terms of total sales. For example, instead of solely offering airline sales, by adding truck sales, their current customers would now buy both packages instead of one, in turn expanding the company (through sales).
I believe the use of the words "expand" and "enlarge" was done on purpose so that test takers would assume that an expansion meant "other" or "new customers," so breaking down the question using the above criteria was helpful for me to ignore that trap and choose E as the final answer.
Please let me know if this helps at all; if not, I can try to explain it differently! Keep up the good work, we can do this! :)
Wow. I was so attracted to E but I made the same subconscious assumption that their preferences cannot change... and I literally picked C knowing that assumption too, but removing E left me with C.
Sheesh these weakening questions are kicking my butt comparable to MBT, MSS, and RRE.
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95 comments
This question was so straightforward that I convinced myself I was missing something because I kept getting E as the answer. I thought it was a trick question, spent 10 minutes second-guessing myself, and eventually just chose E out of frustration.....I was so shocked when I saw the difficulty level.......BTW... if you got this question wrong, you probably just misread the stimulus because it's kind of confusing. (Same thing happened to me.)
I picked C at first but got it on blind review. Realized I didn't read E carefully.
@SeanWolfe C) is like those ones that only resolve half the phenomena.
I'm finding it hard to find the line between disproving a conclusion (hyp) or just weakening the conclusion. I still don't see the difference. Cause it seems the Correct AC should be a conclusion that will still make the premises make sense/work. Almost pretending that we never got the conclusion in the stimulus? #help
Also, is D trying to bait us into assuming that the high-spenders are bus users, and, if we grant this assumption, that Travallier is trying to target existing customers rather than new ones? Would be forced to make a lot of assumptions, but curious if that was the trap the test-makers were going for
My line of thinking: New stuff in conclusion = bad. The conclusion says it must be that they're looking for new customers based on their current customers' preferences. So, once I noted that relationship b/w current and new, and the hypothesis being about new, then I tried to search for one that affirms that it is actually the current customers who are being served. E does that.
I think of these as the conclusion given is wrong. Which answer is what ACTUALLY happened. Might bite me in the butt? but it seems to work.
I do not understand the concept of these questions at all... what am I missing!
@mthomas81 I think of these questions like a Jenga tower. You are trying to figure out where is the weak point in the argument is like in the Jenga tower you pull out the block that is weaker than the rest.
Wow I’m surprised I got it right
I understood the stimulus and got it right, but - this seems like a strength question because AC, E explains the gap between the new employees.
@Mina.G Really? I thought that (E) totally weakened the conclusion. Because the conc. says that by hiring the bus tour people they are trying to expand their NEW consumer base. But (E) says well actually no they're just trying to get their EXISTING consumers to change their habits.
37 seconds over on timing but I got this one right!
I started to get the correct answers for RRE and WSE questions once I knew where to focus on the stimulus. For instance, in this question, the stimulus concludes "Travailler must be attempting to enlarge its consumer base by attracting new customers". This shows us that the LSAT writers want us to focus on that there should be an alternative explanation for the company to hire employees with experience in the bus tour industry. Despite the fact that their consumer base has always been traveling by air. By focusing on what the LSAT writers want us to focus on, I could easily cross out the answers that were completely irrelevant.
@JiyoonLim I agree, one thing I am reminding myself is which answer will offer an alternative hypothesis which aligns with the stimulus
this is confusing :/
It has been tremendously helpful for me to think "What is an alternative hypothesis to the stim?" rather than "what weakens the argument"
@iriswu84153 Okay, so it's good to know I am not the only one who thinks of the question like this. I always look at it like "Which one of these answer choices is the better conclusion for this stimulus?" .. I have found this to be extremely helpful.
I know these and flaws are my weakest sections on LR so right now I am not goiong for time but instead for unnderstanding.
I got this right!
Taught E Strength at first
Oh Weakening questions will be my downfall...
C was tempting. But I went with E. But the explanation for C being wrong is still confusing to me. Can someone please explain?
This was tough but I understand now. E weakens the argument because the answer choice focuses on CURRENT CUSTOMERS and not NEW CUSTOMERS
@EthanSegerman That's what threw me. I didn't read it closely enough---I was trying for time. This was a hard one, too.
Can anyone help explain this?
@SoniaKulkarni
Basically the company wants to expand their consumer base by accepting new clients. Why? Because they want to charter busses and do bus tours. Why is that an issue? Because Unfortunately their already existing clients prefer to travel via airplane. So the company believes that if they have new consumers then they will automatically prefer to travel via bus instead of by plane like the existing consumers. So, What weakens their Argument of “if our old consumers prefer to fly via plane then we’ll just get new customers and they’ll want to travel via bus?” It would be E because it was never stated that the existing consumers wouldn't change their mind and or be open to another method of travel so it would make sense for the company to implement new additions to the company with their already existing consumers first. Just because they prefer to travel 1 way doesn’t mean they can’t change their minds.
I suck at explaining but i like to translate everything in my own words and see what the phenomenon is. basically i like to get to the point and from there it is much easier to weaken their argument when you know what their argument actually is. I can explain better if i confused you but i hope i semi helped
Feels good to get these higher difficulty questions in right around a minute!
Stimulus: Expand by attracting new customers.
E: Expand by introducing their current customers to new products and services.
The stimulus says their focus is on expanding its current customer base whereas E says their focus is on expanding their business via current customers, which is what makes it right.
@sheadongraham Great summary!
So proud of myself for getting this right WOOOOOO
how does this weaken? It only explains why they are offering a new product (bus) in order to expand/enlarge. In other words, it supports the argument.
This was a tricky question but something that recently helped me with these difficult weaken questions is to think about whether the conclusion can still be believable if the answer choice were to be added to the argument (obviously the first step in this case would be to confidently point out the conclusion of the argument). So, if it were true that the company was following the advice of their consultants to introduce new products to existing customers, rather than trying to tap into a whole new market (try to think of a real life example of this happening to make it easier to understand, maybe if Apple were to come out with a gaming console to attract iPhone lovers to gaming??) then it wouldn't reasonably follow that the corporation must have been trying to enlarge their consumer base by attracting NEW people ( we can infer that they're still focused on their traditional customers).
So while the information in the argument does mention the idea that the corporation is offering a new product (bus) to expand/enlarge, the point of the argument was not about whether the corporation is able to expand. The authors point (the conclusion) was that even though this corporation is trying to expand, they must be doing it so they can try to enlarge their consumer base and attract new customers. With E) being true, it is harder to believe this conclusion, and this answer choice provides an alternate explanation that make us want to doubt the authors conclusion in the argument, and instead believe that maybe this corporation is trying to expand for another reason, like trying to enlarge their services but change the minds of their current customers as opposed to attracting new ones. Hope this helps!
Thanks! I can see that now.
Conclusion says the corporation is trying to attract NEW customers. E undermines this conclusion by providing support for the alternate conclusion that Travallier is actually trying to market NEW SERVICES to their EXISTING CUSTOMER BASE. Not NEW SERVICES to a NEW CUSTOMER BASE (like the stimulus conclusion is arguing).
I dont understand how am i supposed to assume that E is referring to their existing customers. Its saying "expand" and then the conclusion says "enlarge" so to me that AC was strengthening the conclusion id don't understand how its even a weakened #solost
The key phrase that helped me identify that answer choice E was referring to existing customers was the mention of "current customers."
The way I approached this weakening question was by looking for any answer choice that was: 1) not aiming to expand to other consumers and 2) had to do solely with the Travaillier company.
When you look at Answer choice E overall, it meets those two criteria (which, in my opinion, greatly weakens the hypothesis in the stimulus: Travaillier is trying to attract new customers.)
How I broke down answer choice E (My thought process):
Answer choice (E): "The industry consultants employed by Travaillier typically recommend that companies expand by introducing their current customers to new products and services."
For the first bolded phrase: The industry consultants employed by Travaillier - I was able to meet the criteria of having to do with Travaillier.
For the second bolded phrase: introducing their current customers to new products and services - I was able to meet the criteria of staying within Travaillier's customer base and not other demographics like new customers.
Finally, the terms expand and enlarged can be understood in a way that is different from expanding or enlarging in size or quantity of people. You can understand expansion and enlargement in terms of total sales. For example, instead of solely offering airline sales, by adding truck sales, their current customers would now buy both packages instead of one, in turn expanding the company (through sales).
I believe the use of the words "expand" and "enlarge" was done on purpose so that test takers would assume that an expansion meant "other" or "new customers," so breaking down the question using the above criteria was helpful for me to ignore that trap and choose E as the final answer.
Please let me know if this helps at all; if not, I can try to explain it differently! Keep up the good work, we can do this! :)
Thank you for this explanation! it makes more sense than the video!
Wow. I was so attracted to E but I made the same subconscious assumption that their preferences cannot change... and I literally picked C knowing that assumption too, but removing E left me with C.
Sheesh these weakening questions are kicking my butt comparable to MBT, MSS, and RRE.