PTC.S2.Q3 - Columnist: Polls can influence voters'..

ohheythereLSAT

Weakening Question
I identified 3 premises here:
1. Subconclusion: Poll results can influence decisions and may distort outcomes. SubPremise: Poll results may not be as reliable as public thinks.
2. Publishing polls immediately before an election doesn´t allow enough opportunity to dispute findings.
3. A ban on polls during the week leading up to an election would not totally violate freedom of speech.

Conclusion: Polls during the week leading up to an election should be banned.

Goal: Find answers that show why one of the premises isn´t true, or why we shouldn´t believe the conclusion to be true.

Answers:
A. Few people are influenced by polls in the 2 weeks leading up to elections. THIS INCLUDES 1 WEEK LEADING UP TO THE POLL!!! I completely skipped over that obvious implication originally, but see now why it makes sense.
B. Uneven - too specific. What about close elections?
C. Remove motivation actually strengthens.
D. Gains in popularity - who cares? Irrelevant.
E. Informed citizens is a stretch to unaffected citizens. Also the comparison is weak - this is ONE country, and we don´t know anything about it.

My takeaway: Don´t read over answer choices too quickly. Maybe try to visualize even abstract answers and concepts like time - in this case, picture a timelines with a dot representing election. Scribbled out right before it is the 1 week without elections. Answer A says 2 weeks right before, there is no influence. I KNEW I could be looking for an answer showing polls don´t affect citizens, so think about how a bigger line right before your election dot would overlap with the part scribbled out, and see how A is actually giving you about a strong point about the 1 week before.