Self-paced
A recent poll revealed that most students at our university prefer that the university, which is searching for a new president, hire someone who has extensive experience as a university president. ████████ ██ ███ ████ ████ █████ ███ ██████ ████ ████████ █████ ████ █████ █ ████ ██ ███████ ██████████ ██ ███ ███ ████ █████ ████ ████ ██ ███ █████ ███ ███████ ███ ███ █████ ██████ ██ █ ██████████ ██████████
"Surprising" Phenomenon
Why did surveyed students, when given a list of candidates, choose a university president candidate with no experience, even though they also said that they would prefer a university president with extensive experience?
Objective
The correct answer will be a hypothesis that explains the students' contradictory responses, either by showing that none of the candidates had extensive experience, that the students didn’t know the candidates’ experience levels, or that the students had another preference that was more important than their preference for a candidate with extensive experience.
25.
Which one of the following, ██ █████ ████ █████ ██ ███████ ███ ███ ████████ ███████████ ██ ███ █████████ ████████████
a
Because several of ███ ██████████ ██████ ██ ███ ████ ███ █████████ ██████████ ██ ██████████ ███████████ ███ ███ ██ ███ ██████████ █████ ██ ██████████████ ██ ████ █████ ██████
This furthers the discrepancy. We know that the students preferred a candidate with extensive experience. So, if several of the candidates had extensive experience, why did the students choose a candidate with no experience?
b
Most of the ██████████ ██████ ██ ███ ████ ███ █████████ ██████████ ██ ██████████ ███████████
Like (A), this furthers the discrepancy. We know that the students preferred a candidate with extensive experience. So, if most of the candidates had extensive experience, why did the students still choose a candidate with no experience?
c
Students taking the ████ ███ █████ ██████████ ██ ██████ ████ ████ ████ █████████ █████ ██████████ ███ ███ █████████
We don’t know if this subset of candidates was composed of all inexperienced candidates or if it included many experienced candidates. If it included many experienced candidates, the question remains: why did the students choose a candidate with no experience?
d
Most of the ████████ ██████ ███ ████ ███ ███ ████ ███████ ███ ██ ███ ███████ ██████████ ██████ ██ ███ ████ ███ ████ ██████ ██ █ ██████████ ██████████
This helps explain the discrepancy in the students’ answers. Students indicated that they preferred a candidate with extensive experience. However, if most students didn’t know whether the candidates had experience, they were unable to choose a candidate based on this preference.
e
Often a person ███ ██ ████ ██████ ██ █ ████████ ████ ██████ ████ ████ ██████████ ██████ ██████████ ██ ████ █ █████████
Even if the students’ preferred candidate seemed well-suited despite lacking experience, this doesn't explain the contradiction in their answers. The students said they preferred a candidate with extensive experience, so why did they choose someone without any experience?