Action noun parallel to complex gerund form

[harika.apu]

I read Manhattan Sentence Correction guide and came across the section Action Nouns , simple gerunds and complex gerunds.
Under that topic , i saw "only complex gerunds can be parallel to action nouns"
But i have a sentence ,
Doctors generally agree that such factors as cigarette smoking, eating rich foods high in fats, and alcohol consumption not only do damage by themselves but also aggravate genetic predispositions toward certain diseases.
In above sentence ,
elements cigarette smoking , eating rich food ..in fats,alcohol consumption are parallel
However , should "cigarette smoking" be understood as "smoking of cigaratte" in which case it turns complex gerund perfectly in parallel with action noun "alcohol consumption"

Could you please clarify whether my understanding is correct

Thanks
harika.

[RonPurewal]

i don't have any idea what "complex gerund" means... and, in fact, i can't even find it on the internet (in searching, the only references i find are GMAT pages).
honestly, i think that one of the authors of one of the older editions of our SC strategy guide may have just made that term up.

so, feel free to ignore this point.

[RonPurewal]

also, more importantly--remember that parallelism is a "beauty contest" among answer choices.

you should NOT judge the parallelism in individual sentences. rather, you should make relative judgments among the given answer choices.

if you approach parallelism in this way, not only will it be MUCH easier, but these kinds of things won't be issues anymore. (if you see "__ing" || "the __ing" in one choice, but you see "the __ing" || "the __ing" in another choice, then the second choice wins.)

[harika.apu]

also, more importantly--remember that parallelism is a "beauty contest" among answer choices.

you should NOT judge the parallelism in individual sentences. rather, you should make relative judgments among the given answer choices.

if you approach parallelism in this way, not only will it be MUCH easier, but these kinds of things won't be issues anymore. (if you see "__ing" || "the __ing" in one choice, but you see "the __ing" || "the __ing" in another choice, then the second choice wins.)

Thanks Ron

[RonPurewal]

sure.