Mechanisms for recognizing kin are found throughout the plant and animal kingdoms, regardless of an organism's social or mental complexity. ████████████ ██ ███ ███████ █████████████ ██ █████ ██████████ ████ ██████ ████ ███████████ █████████ ██ ███ ████████ ██ ███ ███ ███████████ ██████ ██ ████ ███
Phenomenon ·Many plants and animals can recognize "kin" (relatives)
Inclusive fitness hypothesis ·Organisms transmit genetic material through relatives (not just offspring)
Contrast inclusive fitness with traditional view of evolution. Under traditional view, natural selection favors those with the most offspring. Inclusive fitness suggests natural selection also favors organisms who help their relatives (because this helps spread the organism's own genes).
Example of theory applied to cannibals ·Spadefood toad tadpoles
Some tadpoles eat their own species. But they nip at other tadpoles before eating, and end up eating only nonsiblings. Suggests they're trying to avoid eating their kin. But, they're more likely to eat kin when they're very hungry.
Example showing other explanation ·Tiger salamander larva
Some larva are cannibals. The bacteria are more deadly to close relatives, because the relatives have a similar immune system to the infected larva. So, when tiger salamanders avoid eating their close relatives, it could be because they just don't want to die from the bacteria in their relatives. This is about the organism's individual self-interest, not about trying to increase overall genetic representation.
Passage Style
Phenomenon-hypothesis (RC)
Single position
10.
Based on the passage, the ██████ █████ ██ ████ ██████ ██ █████ ████ █████ ███ ██ ███ █████████ ██████████ █████ ████████████ ████████████ ██ ███ ████████████
Question Type
Author’s perspective
Implied
It’s difficult to predict the answer just based on the question stem, so let’s use process of elimination.
a
It is impossible ██ ██████████ ███ ██████████ ██████████ ███ ███████████ █████ ██ ████████████ ███████████ ██ ████ ███████████ ███ ████ █████████
Not supported, because the author never conditions an understanding of how kin recognition occurs on an understanding of the evolutionary reason kin recognition exists. In fact, the author indicates that we have had improvements in our understanding of mechanisms without fully understanding the purpose of kin recognition.
1%
b
Such explanations require ██ █████████████ ██ ███████████ ████████████ ███████
Anti-supported.
1%
c
For any such ███████████ ██ ██ █████ ████████ ██ ██████ ██████ ███ ███████████ ██ ██████ ██ ██████ ██████████ ██ ███ █████████ █████ █████████ ██ ██ ████████ ██ ████████
Not supported, because the author never conditions the adequacy of an explanation on ignoring differences in the complexity of organisms. Perhaps a theory explaining kin recognition can involve different purposes for different levels of complexity.
2%
d
Kin recognition may ████ █████████ ████████████ ████████████ ██ █████████ ████████
Supported. The author provides the example of tiger salamanders as an animal that may recognize kin for the purpose of self-preservation. This is different from the purpose of kin recognition in the spadefoot toad tadpoles.
Not supported, because the author doesn’t comment on explanations for other unusual phenomena. The passage is about kin recognition and what might explain it.
2%
Difficulty
94% of people who answer get this correct
This is a low-difficulty question.
It is significantly easier than other questions in this passage.
CURVE
Score of students with a 50% chance of getting this right
25%123
134
75%145
Analysis
Author’s perspective
Author’s perspective
Stems that ask us to find an answer the author is most likely to agree with.
Stems asking us to infer an idea implied by the claims in the passage (as opposed to identifying an idea that appears explicitly). Similar to most strongly supported questions in LR.
Passages that focus on describing or evaluating potential explanations for a given phenomenon. Causal reasoning features prominently in these passages.
