#24 - People who have experienced a traumatic event but who

[Administrator]

Please post your questions below! Thank you!

[Mollythecatttt]

Hi, I picked (A) (although I do not like it), and could not figure out why (B) is correct.
Here is how I thought about the question during the test:

Conclusion:
experiencing a traumatic event ("TE") can effect how much cortisol ("C") one produces in response to stress.

Premise:
(A comparison) the thing being compared here is "how much C people produce when exposed to stress. The result between two groups of people are "TE & /PTSD > /TE"

Thoughts/Anticipation: This is a classic correlation/causation flaw. We are looking for: a 3rd factor causing both factors; reversal causation; coincidence.

Answer Choices:
(A) It is very weak - "sometimes." I both like & dislike it. I like it because if it is true, then we can say the "TE & /PTSD > /TE" result may comes from the medical condition, instead of whether or not having experienced a PE. However, it also looks suspicious. The conclusion in the argument is "TE CAN effect." So simply showing me another factor "medical conditions" can ALSO effect does not seem to be a good weakening answer. Anyway, I will keep it for now.
(B) This is about how people experiencing TE did not develop PTSD. Irrelevant.
(C) This is about TE people only. I don't care about whether the C they produces can vary under different situations. I care about the cause.
(D) This is about how to treat PTSD. Our two groups are people who do not have PTSD. Don't care. Irrelevant.
(E) This is an explanation about how TE can lead to more C. It is not about the cause.

Second thoughts:
None of the answer choices fit my anticipation. Since I dislike (B) ~(E) more than (A), I picked (A).

Thanks!

[James Finch]

Hi Molly,

This is one of the rare instances of reverse causation, where the stimulus is positing that traumatic events lead to more cortisol production, but leaves open the possibility that actually people who already produce more cortisol would be less affected by traumatic events and less likely to suffer PTSD as a result. It's a bit tricky to think through, as the correct answer choice (B) takes an extra step involving PTSD rather than directly reversing the stated causal relationship in the conclusion. Nonetheless, it does reverse that relationship, by making the stated effect (increased cortisol production) a cause instead, making it the correct answer choice.

(A) on the other hand is too vague ("sometimes affects", without telling us how it affects cortisol production), and doesn't actually impact the stimulus one way or the other.

Hope this clears things up!

[ydejesus5]

Hi - I'm sorry, but will someone please break this down further?

I see that traumatic event 'causing' cortisol production is the conclusion.
I see that cortisol production 'causing' effect of traumatic event is the reversal.

How does preventing PTSD become a weakener?

Thank you in advance for your help!!

[James Finch]

Hi ydejesus,

The PTSD element is quite important as it suggests reverse causation off the bat, right from the given premise. We're given a correlation between higher cortisol levels and lower likelihood to develop PTSD after experiencing a traumatic event. So the premise would suggest that higher cortisol levels would act as a sort of buffer against developing PTSD, meaning cortisol would be an inverse cause for PTSD: higher cortisol, lower chance of PTSD, and vice versa, when experiencing a traumatic event.

When read this way, the stated conclusion of trauma causing cortisol levels makes no sense, as it has no real evidence to support it.

Here we actually have two correlations given by our premise: the first is that higher cortisol levels correlates with less PTSD, and the second is that higher cortisol correlates with having experienced a traumatic event. The conclusion assumes a causal relationship that has traumatic events causing higher cortisol levels:

Experience Traumatic Event Higher Cortisol Levels

This ignores the correlation between higher cortisol and PTSD, which would actually suggest that higher cortisol levels would be the cause for a lack of PTSD. This also would undermine the conclusion that experiencing a traumatic event causes the higher cortisol levels, because we're only dealing with a single traumatic event; reversing this causation would mean that higher cortisol levels could be cause for how one experiences a traumatic event and thus how likely one is to develop PTSD.

Higher Cortisol Levels Lesser Trauma from Event PTSD

The key idea here being the subjective experiencing of the traumatic event and the effect that would have on a person. (B) lays out that chain, making it correct.

Hope this helps!

[ydejesus5]

Wait, does this scenario require the assumption that not developing PTSD equates to not experiencing traumatization from a traumatic event? So if it is the case that higher cortisol means no PTSD, that means no trauma experienced from a traumatic event? That would weaken the conclusion? Or am I still off the mark?

Update

The contrapositive of the answer is: if PTSD, then not high cortisol. Is this the answer?!

[Zach Foreman]

ydejesus5,
You do not want to confuse your approach with correlation/causation and you approach with sufficient/necessary. We first look for indicator words to figure out what category a question is. This has "develop", "tend to produce", "can affect". These are not SN indicator words (if, then, unless, only if, when, must, etc). These are correlation/causation words. Therefore we should NOT try to use the contrapositive or think of MN or MR.
Instead, since we can see that the question stem is weaken, we should think of the five ways to weaken a causal: alternate, reverse, CnoE, noCbutE and data attack. So first we should diagram:

Trauma + No PTSD = higher cortisol
no Trauma= lower cortisol
therefore
Trauma -->cortisol level

So, as a first pass, that diagram is very strange. If we think about the first sentence, what actually is the process? It seems likely that the cortisol response happened all along, not as a result (or at least we have no evidence that it is an effect). So, we can rewrite it as:
Trauma + high cortisol response --> no PTSD
This makes more sense. We would expect Trauma --> PTSD since that is implied by the name, so the fact that PTSD doesn't occur should lead us to the idea that cortisol helps prevent PTSD. And that is our prephrase which leads us quickly to B.
Hope that helps.

[Naminyar]

Hello PS

As E says, “ experiencing a traumatic event can damage the gland that produces cortisol, resulting in that gland producing more cortisol”

If that is the case, the individuals who have experience a traumatic event are likely to produces more cortisol whether or not in response to stress.

Would you please explain why E does not weaken the argument?

[Jeremy Press]

Hi Naminyar,

Although it's true that the fact answer choice E states might mean one would produce more cortisol generally (both when the gland is producing cortisol under stress and when the gland is producing cortisol in non-stress situations), that's not inconsistent with the conclusion in the stimulus. Let's say, as answer choice E says, that the experience of a traumatic event makes the gland produce more cortisol than normal. Then let's say that a stressful situation triggers the gland's cortisol production mechanism. Answer choice E would dictate that the gland would then produce more cortisol than if the person had not experienced a traumatic event. That validates the conclusion's claim that experiencing a traumatic event does have some impact on the amount of cortisol produced in a stressful situation.

So, answer choice E is best read as a Strengthen answer.

I hope this helps!

Jeremy

[LSAT2HARD]

There are three elements of this stimulus. Traumatic events, PTSD, and the hormone cortisol.
The premises established a correlation between PTSD, Traumatic events, and the hormone cortisol, but in the most extreme case, we cannot deduce anything from the mere correlation.
The author then concludes that Traumatic events can affect the hormone cortisol level, which is an implausible inference.

I can understand up to this point, but I don't know why B can weaken the argument as reverse causality.
B says high cortisol can help prevent PTSD.
First, I think there is still the possibility that Traumatic events cause a higher level of cortisol to prevent PTSD which strengthens the argument. TE HC no PTSD
Second, a reverse causality should be the one between cortisol level and Traumatic events rather than PTSD, like higher cortisol helps one avoid facing traumatic events.
I know that a weakened question does not need to overturn the argument, but I don't feel answer B weakens the argument in anyways.

I also like to use similar but simple cases to understand the difficult questions. I come up with a stimulus of my own. Suppose that a person who has got COVID but who didn't die has a higher level of antibody than those who didn't suffer from COVID. I conclude that COVID can affect antibody levels. (To be honest, I don't feel anything wrong with this stimulus, as I do with the original stimulus.)

Now, if I provide an answer saying that producing more antibodies helps prevent death, would you feel it is a weakening answer by reverse the causality?