PrepTest 111, Section 3, Question 5
Parent: I had tried without success to get(75 more words not shown)
The parent's experience with the(11 more words not shown)
- AChildren are most(10 more words not shown)
- BChildren more readily(11 more words not shown)
- CChildren are too(9 more words not shown)
- DChildren often imitate(9 more words not shown)
- EChildren ordinarily act(11 more words not shown)
Reading the argument
The storybook became a cue to brush her teeth.
At first, the parent hoped the child would imitate the parent's brushing or be persuaded by an explanation. Neither approach worked. Then the parent repeatedly paired brushing the child's teeth with something that followed it: a story before a nap or bedtime. After several weeks, picking up the book was enough to prompt the child to get the toothbrush and brush on her own.
That repeated connection is the interesting part. Think of a favorite drink that you regularly have when starting work, or a song that immediately brings a particular memory to mind. One familiar thing can call another to mind. Here, the storybook becomes associated with a practiced sequence of behavior.
What we’re looking for
The question asks which generalization this experience most closely fits. I'd look for the role of repetition and association: the routine accomplished what imitation and an appeal to reason hadn't. We aren't being asked to prove a universal rule about every child from this one family's experience.
Working the answers
- A
Setting an example was one of the unsuccessful approaches. The parent hoped the child would imitate the behavior, but she didn't. A highlights the method that failed instead of the repeated routine that ultimately worked.
- BCorrect
Habit and repetition are what distinguish the successful approach. Brushing consistently came before the story, and eventually the child began doing it herself when the book appeared. That experience fits the generalization that children more readily acquire behavior through repeated practice than through the other methods described.
B is a broader statement than we could prove from this child alone. But the task is to identify the generalization the experience most closely conforms to, and this is the one that captures the contrast the parent reports.
- C
Not being persuaded doesn't mean the child was unable to understand the reasoning. She might understand a reason and still not act on it. More importantly, the experience doesn't establish that children generally are too young for rational explanations. C makes a claim about their capacity that goes beyond the reported failure of one approach.
- D
Imitation didn't succeed here either. The child eventually adopted a repeated routine, and the passage doesn't say she did so by copying someone else's behavior instead of listening to reason. This answer misses what changed between the unsuccessful and successful approaches.
- E
We don't know that the child wanted more attention. She could have resisted brushing for many reasons. The story focuses on how repetition changed her behavior, not on a motive to frustrate a parent's expectations. It certainly doesn't establish that children ordinarily act from that motive.
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