#15 - A person's dietary consumption of cholesterol and fat is one of the most important factors

[Administrator]

Complete Question Explanation

Must Be True—Numbers and Percentages. The correct answer choice is (C).

Answer choice (A):

Answer choice (B):

Answer choice (C): This is the correct answer choice.

Answer choice (D):

Answer choice (E):

This explanation is still in progress. Please post any questions below!

[hbaezh]

At first read this stimulus got me overwhelmed, but as I read it through I broke it down

1. Dietary consump. of chol. and fat determine the level of serum chol. in one's blood.
2. As chol. and fat rise in the blood so does the serum chol., BUT once serum chol. reaches its threshold - 1/4 of the consump. level of chol. and fat in the average NA diet- serum chol. rise only gradually even IF the consump. rises dramatically.

I eliminated E because the stimulus does not mention anything about HOW to lower the serum chol. levels, only how to INCREASE it.

I eliminated D because I found it to be out of scope, like where did the behavioral aspect come from?

With B, it was sorta tricky to understand but I think this choice is sorta mistaken reversal? lol. It states people CANNOT increase their consump. of chol. and fat WITHOUT dramatically INCREASING their serum chol levels. After the threshold the serum chol. rises gradually NOT dramatically even when the chol. and fat level increases DRAMATICALLY the serum chol. rises gradually.

A brings in info that is CBT? there was no info on how the threshold can be reduced

C did not JUMP out to me as correct but I thought of it in a mathematical way. If people consume HALF of what NA average is they probably will not have HALF the avg. level of serum chol due to the fact that level of serum chol. of an average NA die it 1/4 that of the level of fat and chol it is impossible to have HALF of an average because they consume HALF of the initial average.....it is mathematically impossible?,,,, I am not good at math anyways but that is how I thought of working out the logic of the answer choice....

Is my analysis correct?

[Jeremy Press]

Hi hbaezh,

With some minor qualifications (described below), I'm on board with your analysis here. Nice job!

Here are the two minor changes I would make. First, answer choice E is an opposite answer. If the level of serum cholesterol rises proportionally up to 1/4 of the current cholesterol/fat consumption level in today's average NA diet, that means that, even below the 1/4 threshold, you could reduce your serum cholesterol by reducing your intake of cholesterol and fat. The proportional relationship moves predictably in both directions. As one rises, the other rises. As one declines, the other declines.

Second, with answer choice C, we know that beyond the 1/4 threshold, the level of serum cholesterol rises "only gradually" (not proportionally). So, for people who are at 1/2 the level of NA intake, they will probably have somewhat higher serum cholesterol than those at the 1/4 threshold, but not proportionally higher serum cholesterol (only a gradually higher serum cholesterol level). I think that's consistent with what you're describing? I just wanted to spell it out a little further to make sure we're on the same page here.

Regardless, really nice work on this question--keep it up!