Over the last 10 years, there has been a dramatic increase in the number of people over the age of 65 living in this ...

Titan on September 10, 2014

Help Please

Hi guys, I am not getting this logic for some reason. Your help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

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Naz on September 17, 2014

Here we have a Cause & Effect argument. The author is explaining why something is happening by positing his proposed cause for the observed effect.

Since this is a Strengthen question, we must bolster the argument. So we need to either eliminate any alternate possibilities, further strengthen the relationship between the premise and conclusion, or add further evidence that helps support the conclusion.

Our conclusion is: "Over the last 10 years, there has been a dramatic increase in the number of people over the age of 65 living in this region."

Why? "During this time the average age of people living in this region has increased from approximately 52 to 57 years."

Let's think about this. There are two reasons why the average age of people living in "this region" would increase from 52 to 57. Either the number of older people has increased, i.e. "over the last 10 years, there has been a dramatic increase in the number of people over the age of 65 living in this region," or the number of younger people has decreased.

Answer choice (A): "The number of people in the region under the age of 18 has increased over the last 10 years."

Answer choice (A) is eliminating the alternate possibility that the number of younger people has decreased. This answer choice states that the number of younger people has, in fact, increased. Thus, one of the two reasons that would lead to the average age of people living in "this region" to increase from 52 to 57 has been eliminated--strengthening our conclusion that there has been a dramatic increase in the number of people over the age of 65 living in this region.

Hope that helps! Please let us know if you have any other questions.

Titan on September 18, 2014

Makes sense now. For some reason I did see that way. Anyways, thanks.

Titan on September 18, 2014

*did not see it that way

Shiyi-Zhang on May 18, 2019

Why is D incorrect?

wills on May 24, 2019

Why is D incorrect? Repeat