Q22 - In a survey of consumers

[alonzo83]

This is the question about surveying consumers in Easter Europe. I cannot figure out why the correct answer is correct, can someone please explain? I don't see how the survey is violated by the principle in answer choice A.

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

Wow! I'm impressed with whoever wrote this question. He/She developed a fairly complex scenario.

Here's the survey...

They ask everyone two questions.

1. Do you recognize the brand?
2. Do you have a high or low regard for it's products?

My initial thought was, "well that's just silly!" Why would they ask people who don't recognize the brand name, whether they like the products? How could they possibly answer that question if they don't even recognize the brand name?

We're looking for a principle that would violate the survey described and answer choice (A) actually gets at the heart of the strange questioning pattern.

According to answer choice (A) since the respondents cannot reasonably answer the second question if they did not recognize the brand name, the survey should not have asked anyone whether they had hi or low regard for the brand's products. But in the survey they did, so the principle in answer choice (A) is violated.

(A) states a principle that is violated by the stimulus for the reasons above.
(B) is out of scope. A "manageable number of categories" is never discussed.
(C) is out of scope. "Anonymity" is never discussed.
(D) is irrelevant. In the stimulus exactly two questions were asked about a product, not ten.
(E) is out of scope. "Fear of getting a wrong answer" does not relate to the stimulus. Maybe the respondents feared getting a wrong answer, but we don't know, because that information is not related to us.

The answer choices were not bad, but the question itself is really challenging. For this question, on the test, I probably wouldn't have spent long enough to really understand it. Rather, I would have seen that answer choices (B) through (E) were all irrelevant, eliminated them, selected answer choice (A), and then moved on!

But during prep, it's always good to ask "why?"

[geverett]

Thinking through this one some more.

So here is what we have:

2 questions

1. Do you or do you not recognize brand name?

2. Do you think it's a high quality product?

We are then told that each is ranked in order for recognition and then ranked in order for quality.

The brands ranked in top 27 were the only ones available in the country. Then we are told that these brands in the top 27 had a sharply different quality ranking. It then tells us that most brands ranked outside the top 27 that were not available in the country had a very similar corresponding quality ranking.

The trouble I am having with A is that the question of the survey just asks if the respondent thinks the products are high quality. What someone thinks about the quality of something is highly subjective and does not necessarily preclude conjecture and hearsay even if the product is not available in their country. Also, just because it's not available in their country does not mean that they have not sampled the product by some other means. After all this is Eastern Europe and it's quite plausible one could go across the border rather easily and sample said product.

I realize B with "manageable number of categories" is pretty sucky as well. After all what # constitutes a manageable or unmanageable category? However, A seemed pretty rough to me as well. Would love to hear more on this.

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

According to answer choice (A) if you make a particular response (you did not recognize the brand name), it would not be possible for you to reasonably answer the question of where it ranks in terms of quality. So they should never have asked the question.

But the answer choice sounds so vague when it says, "a particular response." What response are they talking about? "I recognize the brand." Or the other response, "I don't recognize the brand." From those who respond in the affirmative, a reasonable answer can be expected for the question of how the rank. But from those who respond negatively, no reasonable answer as to where the brands rank should be expected. So, the question shouldn't have been asked.

Thanks for hacking this out with me!

[wguwguwgu]

I still have a hard time trying to understand the stimulus.

so why should the non-27 products all get the same ranking between recognition and approval?

Are they saying that people are so lazy that they ALWAYS answer either yes to BOTH questions or no to BOTH if they have not used it?

Many thanks in advance!

[gplaya123]

As Matt has pointed out, the latter half of stimulus is sort of gibberish. We just primarily need to focus on the first half.
First half says
In a survey, people were asked 2 questions about 400 brands, whether they recognize them and whether they like them.
The half of stimulus hints that not all 400 brands are available in their country.

A says if people can't answer it reasonably, don't let them.
Well, but the stimulus directly contradicts it: people were asked whether they like a brand or not even though they don't recognize it.
Therefore A is clearly violated.

[WaltGrace1983]

I agree with the correct answer but I disagree with a lot of the reasoning that is going on here. I'll offer my own take on this.

Already this is a tough question because it doesn't ask us for 1 "correct" answer but rather 4 "correct answers!" It is asking what principle is VIOLATED - we are so used to figuring out what principle is SUPPORTED. Already I am apprehensive.

The passage as a whole is important, it is the details that aren't necessarily. Here is what is important:
(1) Participants were asked if they a) recognized a Western brand name; and b) thought that the products were high quality.
(2) Brands ranked in Top 27 were all available in that particular nation
(3) Other brands had rankings/ratings that were essentially the same in approval and recognition.

Now why is (3) important? It is important because it is implying that all of these people said "no, I don't recognize that brand" and "no, I don't think that the brand is of high quality." That is just how I take it but I think it is true. This leads us to an important question, "are such rankings even telling of anything?" I don't think so. After all, most of the Western brands probably don't have anything to do with this Eastern European country.

Now when approaching the correct answers, we must remember that we are looking for what is violated!

(B)'s principle is supported. The variety of responses are probably large but they are not necessarily difficult to group! In fact, there are only two groups!
(C)'s principle is supported. There is nothing telling us that saying "yes" or "no" to these questions would compromise anonymity. It's not like saying you like Dove soap necessarily implies you are John Johnson or something.
(D)'s principle is supported. They are asking the same question about a large number of products rather than a large number of questions about a small number of products
(E)'s principle is supported. There is no wrong answer! It is a survey!

(A) is the only one that is not supported. So what is (A) saying?

(A) says "IF the question cannot be reasonably answered...dont ask it!" What does the survey do? It takes questions that cannot be reasonably answered - aka, "do you think that [insert product they have never heard of] makes high quality stuff?" - and does what? It asks it!

To put it in a different way, (A) says:

Unanswerable → ~Ask

While the argument says:

Unanswerable → Ask

[blairped]

I agree with the correct answer but I disagree with a lot of the reasoning that is going on here. I'll offer my own take on this.

Already this is a tough question because it doesn't ask us for 1 "correct" answer but rather 4 "correct answers!" It is asking what principle is VIOLATED - we are so used to figuring out what principle is SUPPORTED. Already I am apprehensive.

The passage as a whole is important, it is the details that aren't necessarily. Here is what is important:
(1) Participants were asked if they a) recognized a Western brand name; and b) thought that the products were high quality.
(2) Brands ranked in Top 27 were all available in that particular nation
(3) Other brands had rankings/ratings that were essentially the same in approval and recognition.

Now why is (3) important? It is important because it is implying that all of these people said "no, I don't recognize that brand" and "no, I don't think that the brand is of high quality." That is just how I take it but I think it is true. This leads us to an important question, "are such rankings even telling of anything?" I don't think so. After all, most of the Western brands probably don't have anything to do with this Eastern European country.

Now when approaching the correct answers, we must remember that we are looking for what is violated!

(B)'s principle is supported. The variety of responses are probably large but they are not necessarily difficult to group! In fact, there are only two groups!
(C)'s principle is supported. There is nothing telling us that saying "yes" or "no" to these questions would compromise anonymity. It's not like saying you like Dove soap necessarily implies you are John Johnson or something.
(D)'s principle is supported. They are asking the same question about a large number of products rather than a large number of questions about a small number of products
(E)'s principle is supported. There is no wrong answer! It is a survey!

(A) is the only one that is not supported. So what is (A) saying?

(A) says "IF the question cannot be reasonably answered...dont ask it!" What does the survey do? It takes questions that cannot be reasonably answered - aka, "do you think that [insert product they have never heard of] makes high quality stuff?" - and does what? It asks it!

To put it in a different way, (A) says:

Unanswerable → ~Ask

While the argument says:

Unanswerable → Ask

I really liked your analysis! Crystal clear now! Gracias!!

[NathanW987]

Hello,

I get why answer (A) is correct here, but I am not so clear as to why answer (D) is incorrect. Answer (D) states, "It is better to ask the same question about...". Doesn't same question imply one singular question? Thus, by asking 1) whether or not they recognized the brand name and 2) whether or not they thought the products bearing that name were high quality, the survey is violating the principle of asking one question?

Thanks for the clarification!

[RosamondeS150]

There are two surveys involved:
1) a rating and corresponding rank order based on recognition;
2) a rating and corresponding rank order based on approval.


As the brands ranked in the top 27 for recognition were those available in that nation, respondents might have known, thus have recognized, those brands. However, their approval rankings differed sharply from their recognition rankings, which means there exists a discrepancy between the results of recognition and approval. For example, some brand might be well recognized just because it is notorious. For the other brands, as they are not available in that nation, the respondents might have no idea about their fame, which leads to a relative consistency in the results of recognition and approval.


As we can see from above, the familiarity of the brands could have influence on the accuracy of the results. That factor of familiarity might make the respondents unable to reasonably answer the question. So the correct answer is A.