#16 - Stress is a common cause of blood pressure

[Administrator]

Complete Question Explanation

Must Be True—CE. The correct answer choice is (E)

In this stimulus, the author discusses the causal relationship between exercise and blood pressure. Linked together, the facts in the stimulus give us the following causal chain that is true for some people:

• Cause Cause/Effect Cause/Effect Effect
  
  exercise calm the mind reduce stress lower blood pressure

This is a Must Be True question. Our prephrase is that the correct answer choice will likely test the primary inference of the causal chain that we constructed from the facts presented in the stimulus, that, for some people, exercise can lower the person’s blood pressure.

Answer choice (A): This answer choice states the reverse of the causal relationship from the stimulus, and so is incorrect.

Answer choice (B): Although the stimulus told us that most people can calm their minds by exercising, only some people can reduce stress by calming their minds. So, the stimulus does not support this statement that most people can reduce their blood pressure by reducing their stress levels.

Answer choice (C): Here, the answer choice is the opposite of what the stimulus stated. Just because increased exercise can reduce stress levels, that relationship does not also mean that lack of exercise causes increased stress levels.

Answer choice (D): In this case, it is the word “directly” that makes the answer choice incorrect. Exercise does not directly reduce stress. Rather, exercise can calm the mind, which in turn can lead to a reduction in stress.

Answer choice (E): This is the correct answer choice because it properly describes one of the causal inferences diagrammed above, that, for some people, exercise can lead to a reduction in stress.

[JSLSAT]

Hi PowerScore,

I initially chose D for this, since it's brought out both ends of my relationship chain ("Engaging in exercise can directly lower one's blood pressure." The chain being: Engage in Exercise --MOST--> Calm Minds --SOME -- Reduce Stress --SOME-- Lower Blood Pressure). However, E is also correct in this chain.

Is the reason D is wrong due to the presence of the word "Directly"? Does this long chain make it INdirect? I took direct to mean "Engage in Exercise --SOME-- Lower Blood Pressure".

Please advise - thank you!

[Jonathan Evans]

Hi JSLSAT,

Good job with the relationship chain, although there is an issue there that we need to address. When you are down to two in a situation like this, focus on the differences between the two answer choices. Notice that D includes the word "directly" whereas E does not. At best, such an effect would be indirect.

Second, notice in your relationship chain that it becomes more tenuous between the two "some" terms. There is actually a small degree of ambiguity in this stimulus (thus the question stem, which asks "which of the following is most strongly supported" rather than "which of the following can be properly inferred," for example).

What I am referring to is that we are not completely clear that everyone who calms her mind can reduce stress. Is this a capability of the some people who can lower their blood pressure? In other words, is it only a subset of the people who can calm their minds who can reduce stress, or is it that everyone who calms his mind thereby reduces stress, but only some people can calm their minds?

Further, it could be true that all the people who are able to calm their minds by exercising do not overlap with the some people who can calm their mind with the ultimate effect of lowering their blood pressures.

At the very least, though, it is clear that there is a direct, strong link between calming the mind and reducing stress. Thus, answer choice E is the most strongly supported while D is not.

[JSLSAT]

Got it - thanks very much. Just when you think you're starting to get it, they throw more curveball language.

[mokkyukkyu]

Hi,

let me double check...
so E might no be the case if there is no overlapping (since in the stimulus it only says "most"), but among the 5 choices, it is the best answer, thus correct, right?

[Adam Tyson]

Correct! We cannot be certain that the group of people who can calm their minds by exercising overlaps with the group that can reduce blood pressure by calming their minds, but it is the one answer that is most strongly supported.

[michael1345]

hi, I really dont understand how E could be strongly supported. Because there could be no overlap, you cannot be certain that "AT LEAST SOME people" can reduce their stress this way. Its asking for MSS and i really dont see how the stimulus can support that because you have no way of knowing. Thats why I ended up picking D. really didnt like this question.

[James Finch]

Hi Michael,

For Most Strongly Supported questions, there is inherent uncertainty. Here, that is compounded by the "most/some people can" constructions used in the stimulus. Don't let that uncertainty confuse you or scare you away from correct answer choices; instead, keep the logical flow and scope in mind and make sure the terms line up. Here, there's a big red flag when trying to connect the first premise (stress as a cause of HBP) to the causal chain we have, because we only know that stress can cause high blood pressure, but we don't know how it works. Is it 1-1, as stress increases, BP increases? Is it binary, where at a certain threshold, stress causes high blood pressure, but below that threshold doesn't? And most importantly, what happens when stress levels are lowered?

Instead, we have to look to the chain that actually links up: Exercise can, for most people, calm the mind; calmer minds can, for some people, lead to lower stress. Thus we can diagram it as:

E CM LS

with the caveat that this is a possible, can relationship, not a definite will one. So we can infer that for some of most people, exercise can lead to lower stress (via calming the mind), exactly what (E) says. (D), on the other hand, takes it too far and assumes a relationship between lowering stress and lowering blood pressure that we aren't actually given in the stimulus.

Hope this clears things up!

[michael1345]

I appreciate it thank you!

[SGD2021]

Hello,

Why is the diagram drawn as E --> CM instead of as CM--> E? Isn’t the group that comes after “most” always supposed to go on the left? Or is it because the “most” applies to those who exercise and that’s why the diagram is drawn with E on the left? So it doesn’t always have to be the thing right after the “most” in the sentence that goes on the left in the diagram. What goes on the left is always the thing that the “most” applies to, meaning the thing the “most” modifies? Are there any key words in this sentence of the stimulus ("And most people can calm their minds, in turn, by engaging in exercise") that can help us determine that the "most" applies to most of those who engage in exercise as opposed to most of those who calm their minds?)