Electric bug zappers, which work by attracting insects to light, are a very effective means of ridding an area of fly...

Annie on December 24, 2019

Hi @M-Howard,

This question asks you to find the answer choice which "most helps account for" the pest control experts' recommendation. This essentially means you're looking for the answer choice which provides an extra premise in the argument and thus helps explain the conclusion. Here's a breakdown of the argument:

Premise: Electric bug zappers are very effective at getting rid of flying insects.
Premise: ???
Conclusion: Most pest control experts advise against using electric bug zappers and instead recommend insect-eating birds or sprays.

Answer Choices:
(A) is incorrect. This answer choice explains how using insect-eating birds would work but doesn't help explain why birds are a better option than zappers. You're looking for an answer which helps bridge the gap between the premise and the conclusion.

(B) is incorrect. The fact that zappers are less effective against mosquitos than other bugs does not explain why they are not recommended. For instance, they could be 100% effective against other bugs and 99% effective against mosquitoes. This wouldn't help explain why they aren't being recommended.

(C) is incorrect. There's no indication that the amount of light provided by the bug zapper is a problem.

(D) is correct. This provides an explanation for why the experts would not recommend bug zappers and would recommend birds and sprays, namely that zappers kill more good insects than the others do.

(E) is incorrect. This does not explain why experts no longer recommend zappers. All it does is provide a bit of support for why sprays may be good (but again, doesn't do so in comparison to zappers).

M-Howard on December 28, 2019

Thanks for the breakdown! This was helpful.

Ravi on January 16, 2020

@M-Howard, let us know if you have any other questions!