Q11 - Lecturer: If I say, "I tried to get my work done

[ohthatpatrick]

Question Type:
Inference (most strongly supported)

Stimulus Breakdown:
Saying "I tried to get my work on time" insinsuates that I didn't succeed, even though it technically doesn't tell you whether I succeeded. But if I say "I tried to get my work done on time", then I typically DO mean "I didn't succeed". That’s how conversation works.

Answer Anticipation:
The author is essentially saying that if a speaker chooses to say "I TRIED to do X", then she does usually mean to imply "I did not succeed in doing X", even though the strict meaning of the words doesn't mean that.

Combining those two thoughts, we could say something like "Sometimes the intended meaning isn't the actual meaning". Or we could say something like, "Sometimes the listener correctly interprets the intended meaning, even though it is different from the actual meaning".

Correct Answer:
A

Answer Choice Analysis:
(A) Maybe (and ultimately YES)! Since we know that it's TYPICAL for the meaning of someone's sentence to be different from the meanings of their words, we could probably sign off on this.

(B) If anything, we have anti-support for this, since the author said that her example about "tried" is TYPICAL.

(C) "requires" is strong … in the example was nonverbal communication required? We don't have any support for that.

(D) In our example, the speakers words meant LESS than what he was trying to convey. His words just conveyed "he tried", but he intended to convey "I tried, but did not succeed".

(E) This goes against our example. In our example, "you would USUALLY correctly understand me".

Takeaway/Pattern: "often" is the strongest word in our correct answer, but we can justify it by leaning on the last sentence that tells us that our example is "typical" of conversation. In our example, understanding what the lecturer was saying involved more than just understanding the meaning of the words used.

#officialexplanation

[ca_teran1]

Have no idea how i would break this up in a test, it took me a while to understand the explanation only to just look at tricks to finding answer but I admit this is a blur. Any way to see this stimulus less daunting?

[ohthatpatrick]

I'm not sure if I have anything specific I can recommend. We are going to sometimes find a stimulus that we have a hard time understanding (it may later make sense to us and we just have a mental roadblock to understanding it / it may never really be something we're capable of processing).

There aren't really any "tricks" to reading comprehension, other than to read more slowly ... pause after each idea to make sure you understand it .... try to think of an example that would relate to the subject matter at hand.

When you read the first sentence, did you pause and reflect on what she means by saying "the meaning of my words do not indicate that I didn't get it done on time"?

I'm assuming that most conversational English speakers hear "I tried to get my work done on time" and interpret that as an admission of failure.

It sounds like we're asking for leniency or forgiveness because we did NOT get our work done on time. "But .... I tried to !"

Meanwhile, in that first sentence still, the author is saying that we don't have any literal grounds for that interpretation.

The claim that "I tried to get my work done on time" simply means "I put effort into meeting my deadline".

If we pause long enough there to process what that first sentence is talking about, then the next two sentences seem easier to interpret.

2nd: "don't me wrong ... you're CORRECT to hear that sentence as conveying that I failed to finish on time ... "

3rd: " ... because when we finish on time, we don't emphasize that we TRIED, we specifically indicate that we SUCCEEDED"

The last sentence just says, "This sorta situation happens a lot in conversation".

If I were trying to think of another example, the first thing that came to mind is the phrase "supposed to".

If we say, "My mom was supposed to attend my wedding",
it conveys to a listener "but she didn't attend my wedding", even though the literal meaning my claim doesn't indicate whether she did or didn't attend.

Perhaps she was supposed to attend and DID, in fact, attend.
But as the author was saying, we'd be sending people the wrong signals if she did attend my wedding and we still said "She was supposed to attend my wedding". A normal way to convey that she attended would be "My mom attended my wedding".

Hope this helps.

[Sylvia11]

Question Type:
Inference (most strongly supported)


(D) In our example, the speakers words meant LESS than what he was trying to convey. His words just conveyed "he tried", but he intended to convey "I tried, but did not succeed".

#officialexplanation

I have a question regarding (D). I thought the wording "convey more information in conversation than they intended to convey" matched with "I tried" conveying "I didn't succeed" since you're giving more info than the fact that "I tried." Also, I did not like (A)'s wording choice of "understanding... often requires..." I thought that was too strong.

[ohthatpatrick]

The problem with (D) is "more info than the speaker intended to convey".

When a speaker says
"I tried to get my work done on time"

they intend to convey
- I attempted to get my work done on time
as well as
- I failed, ultimately, to get my work done on time


Is this a case where the speaker conveyed more information than they intended to convey?

No. The speaker is intending to convey both of those ideas. The speaker's actual words convey less information than the speaker intended to convey.

For (A), it's smart that you're nervous about requires. Consider the contrapositive:

"If you just understand the meanings of the words used, then you will often not understand what people have said".

That seems to nicely reinforce what was being talked about. If you only hear the literal meaning, you're missing out on the extra idea the speaker is intending to convey.

Hope this helps.