PT120.S3.Q16 > Question

SECTION 1 · lr

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SECTION 2 · rc

PASSAGE 1

Question 1 Question 2 Question 3 Question 4 Question 5

PASSAGE 2

Question 6 Question 7 Question 8 Question 9 Question 10 Question 11

PASSAGE 3

Question 12 Question 13 Question 14 Question 15 Question 16 Question 17 Question 18

PASSAGE 4

Question 19 Question 20 Question 21 Question 22 Question 23 Question 24 Question 25 Question 26

SECTION 3 · lr

SECTION 4 · lr

The author concludes that reporters’ personal biases affected news coverage of an election. Why? Because most of them voted for the incumbent, and there was less negative coverage of the incumbent than the challenger.

The basis for the author’s conclusion is that reporters devoted more negative coverage to the challenger than the incumbent. But what if the challenger deserved more negative coverage than the incumbent? If that were the case, the media would be devoting more negative coverage to the challenger, even if reporters were completely unbiased.

The author never presumes this: his argument is about the ratio of positive/negative coverage for each candidate, not the total amount of coverage (e.g. number of newspaper articles) they received. The ratio isn’t affected by the total.

If this were the case, reporters might devote more negative coverage to the challenger than the incumbent—even if they’re completely unbiased. This undermines the author’s conclusion that the discrepancy in negative coverage is evidence of bias.

The author doesn’t presume this: he’s alleging the existence of bias, not making a value judgment about its effects.

The conclusion is about bias in news coverage itself; the potential effects of news coverage on voting are irrelevant. We’re looking for factors that affect coverage, not factors that coverage affects.

If this were true, it would, if anything, support the author’s argument: it suggests that reporters would be biased against challengers.

PrepTest 120 - Section 3 - Question 16

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