PrepTest 112, Section 1, Question 6
It is widely believed that eating chocolate can(81 more words not shown)
Of the following, which one(9 more words not shown)
- APeople are mistaken(18 more words not shown)
- BThe more chocolate(17 more words not shown)
- CEating large amounts(16 more words not shown)
- DIt is less(22 more words not shown)
- EThe more stress(12 more words not shown)
Reading the argument
Chocolate came first. That doesn't settle what caused the acne.
The reports might be accurate: someone eats a lot of chocolate and then has an outbreak. But what else was happening? Suppose the person was going through a stressful breakup and changed their eating habits. Something about that period might explain both the extra chocolate and the acne. That is a possibility to investigate, not a diagnosis of anyone in the passage.
The author develops that kind of explanation. Studies connect stress-related hormonal changes with acne, and other evidence connects stress with increased chocolate eating among people who like chocolate. In this account, the chocolate eating is itself an effect of stress, rather than the cause responsible for the outbreak.
What we’re looking for
I might still want evidence about whether chocolate independently contributes to acne. But the main-point question asks what explanation the author favors. The author thinks common wisdom has probably misidentified the cause: stress is the more likely explanation of both the eating and the acne. We need the answer that captures that comparison without declaring either account conclusively proved.
Working the answers
- A
The reports could be correct even if the people's explanation is wrong. Eating chocolate really might be followed by acne while stress accounts for both. The author challenges the causal interpretation, not the reported sequence of events. A wrongly treats those as the same claim.
- B
This makes chocolate eating a cause of stress-related hormonal changes. The passage instead uses stress and its hormonal effects to explain the observed pattern. B points the explanation in the wrong direction and adds a claim that increasing chocolate consumption makes those changes more likely.
- C
The author doesn't compare chocolate's ability to cause stress with its ability to cause acne. Stress is the proposed common source of the chocolate eating and the outbreak, not an outcome attributed to eating the chocolate. C changes the causal story.
- DCorrect
This compares the two explanations the argument is about. The author regards chocolate causing acne as less likely than stress causing both increased chocolate eating and acne.
That explains the phrase about mistaking an effect for a cause. In the favored account, eating more chocolate results from stress. People then treat that eating as the cause of another result of stress, the acne. D captures the overall point, including its tentative strength.
- E
The passage does connect stress with greater chocolate eating among people who already like chocolate. But that is only one part of the explanation, and E leaves out acne altogether. It also turns the limited tendency into a broader claim about increasing stress and cravings. The main point requires the link between the two observed outcomes, which D includes.
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