#3 - A recent study of perfect pitch—the ability to

[Administrator]

Complete Question Explanation

Strengthen, CE. The correct answer choice is (A)

The conclusion of the argument suggests that having a perfect pitch is a consequence of genetic
factors:

• Premise: A person who has perfect pitch has a higher chance of being related to someone else who has it than a person without perfect pitch
  
  Conclusion: Having a perfect pitch is a consequence of genetic factors

The relationship between premise and conclusion is a causal one, which can be diagrammed as:

• GF = genetic factors
  PF = perfect pitch
  
  C E
  GF PF

As with all causal arguments, you must critically evaluate the causality described in the conclusion. The conclusion, which is easy to spot due to the conclusion indicator “this shows that,” is based on a study that observed a correlation between having perfect pitch and having a relative who also has perfect pitch. Correlations between two variables do not automatically imply that one causes the other, as they may be coincidental effects of another cause, among other reasons. For instance, what if people who have relatives with perfect pitch are more likely to attend concerts, study the piano, or receive musical training? To strengthen the cause and effect relationship, look for answers that eliminate such alternate causes and show that nothing else but genetics can explain why those who have perfect pitch tend to be related to someone else who has it.

Answer choice (A): This is the correct answer choice, as it strengthens the argument by eliminating an alternate cause for the stated effect. If people who have relatives with perfect pitch are no more likely to receive superior musical training, their perfect pitch cannot be the result of such training. Note that this answer choice does not prove the cause and effect relationship—it is still possible that other causes could account for the stated effect. In Strengthen questions, your choice should be based upon a comparative analysis between the five answer choices, and the correct answer choice does not have to prove the conclusion 100% to be correct.

Answer choice (B): Whether the researchers conducting the study had perfect pitch is irrelevant to our evaluation of the study’s conclusion. This answer choice is incorrect.

Answer choice (C): Discussing the implications of the stated effect (perfect pitch) is a digression that neither strengthens nor weakens the causal argument.

Answer choice (D): This Opposite answer hurts the argument by suggesting that children whose parents have perfect pitch receive more musical training, and may develop perfect pitch as a result of such training. Because alternate causes weaken the argument, this type of wrong answer choice appears frequently in Strengthen questions.

Answer choice (E): If anything, this answer may hurt the argument by showing that having perfect pitch is also correlated with (and may thus be the result of) musical training. However, because we do not know if such training is the result of having relatives who have perfect pitch, this answer does not contribute to the causal explanation of the correlation cited by the study.

[lsatstudent99966]

I have a question about (D), and (E):

The official LSAT Superprep II says that (E) "does not affect the strength of the argument" because it could be true that 1. people born with perfect pitch are more likely to get musical training, but it could also be true that 2. musical training helps people acquire perfect pitch.

But the same explanation also says that (D) weakens the argument.

This is a bit confusing to me, because the problem identified in (E) (not knowing whether it's musical training that causes perfect pitch or the other way around) seems to apply to (D) as well. Why then, can we conclude that (D) weakens the argument?

Thanks in advance!

[Robert Carroll]

lsatstudent,

I think the explanation at the top of this thread does a good job of showing the difference. Answer choice (D) claims that those with perfect pitch are more likely to make sure their children receive musical training. So you can be sure that a child of someone with perfect pitch has an increased likelihood of training, which would be an alternative cause of perfect pitch. Answer choice (E) is more ambiguous in its effects on the argument, because it's possible that those with perfect pitch already get more musical training (which isn't really bad for the argument), or that those with more musical training develop perfect pitch because of that (which definitely does weaken the argument).

Since both answers are incorrect, I also wouldn't worry too much about LSAC's explanations of them, since there's less motivation for them to get the explanations precise for wrong answers. It's enough to know that they don't strengthen the argument.

Robert Carroll

[lsatstudent99966]

lsatstudent,

I think the explanation at the top of this thread does a good job of showing the difference. Answer choice (D) claims that those with perfect pitch are more likely to make sure their children receive musical training. So you can be sure that a child of someone with perfect pitch has an increased likelihood of training, which would be an alternative cause of perfect pitch. Answer choice (E) is more ambiguous in its effects on the argument, because it's possible that those with perfect pitch already get more musical training (which isn't really bad for the argument), or that those with more musical training develop perfect pitch because of that (which definitely does weaken the argument).

Since both answers are incorrect, I also wouldn't worry too much about LSAC's explanations of them, since there's less motivation for them to get the explanations precise for wrong answers. It's enough to know that they don't strengthen the argument.

Robert Carroll

Thank you Robert, that is pretty clear!

But I'm still a bit confused about (D), couldn't it also be that because the children already have perfect pitch, their parents decided to give them more musical training? (Using the similar logic in (E)).