#16 - A recent study found that small rats were approximately twice as likely,

[Administrator]

Complete Question Explanation

Resolve the Paradox, Except. The correct answer choice is (A).

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

Answer choice (B):

Answer choice (C):

Answer choice (D):

Answer choice (E):

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

[frozenpea]

Answer A is the correct answer because it does not clarify or contribute to an explanation as to why smaller rats are more likely, or larger rats are less likely, than average-sized rats to suffer from heart problems.

If small rats are more likely to suffer from a fatal disease that is not a heart problem, then we would not expect smaller rats to be 2x as likely to suffer from heart problems as the stimulus indicates. If they are more likely to suffer from disease X than heart diseases, we would expect the overall rate of heart disease/problems among small rats to be lower, and not 2x higher. (Because they would be succumbing to the problems from disease X, which strikes earlier than heart disease.)

[masonmattu]

Hi, I'm a bit confused as to why E isn't the answer here. It only partially explains the discrepancy?

[Luke Haqq]

Hi masonmattu!

We're asked for one answer choice that doesn't "contribute to an explanation of the correlation" seen in the stimulus. So four incorrect answer choices will contribute to or affirm that correlation. The correlation is between rat size and heart disease risk--the larger the size, the lower the risk.

Answer choice (E) does something to that correlation. It reinforces it. It at least suggests why large rats have lower disease risk than small rats. That's still the case even if the answer choice doesn't explain the difference between large and average-size rats.