Researcher:  The rate of psychological problems is higher among children of divorced parents than among other childre...

shunhe July 22, 2020

Hi @andreaskormusis,

Thanks for the question! Yes, you’re right in that the argument isn’t saying that the children of divorced parents aren’t damaged, it’s saying that the divorce isn’t the direct cause of the damage. That’s not the complete explanation for why (E) is the answer, but it’s going in the right direction. We know that the argument starts off by telling us that children with divorced parents have a higher rate of psychological problems than other children. And the argument then says that you can’t say that that’s because of the divorce itself. You might actually think that certain behaviors that lead to divorce (like hostility) are learned by children, which is what gives them the psychological problems.

So now we’re asked for the role of the first sentence about children of divorced parents having a higher rate of psychological problems than other children. And (E) tells us that this is an established finding for which the argument proposes an explanation. Well, it’s an established finding, because the argument doesn’t dispute it. The argument’s not saying that actually, they don’t have a higher rate of psychological problems. The argument’s saying instead that well, you thought it was because of X, but actually, consider: it might be because of Y. So the argument is proposing an explanation for this finding. So that’s the role that the sentence plays, and (E) is correct.

Hope this helps! Feel free to ask any other questions that you might have.

andreaskormusis July 22, 2020

Makes perfect sense, Thanks!

shunhe July 28, 2020

Glad it made sense!

parikhnj September 11, 2020

Just to be clear, the first sentence obviously isn't the conclusion, but, the explanation for the said phenomenon would be considered the conclusion right?