PrepTest 158, Section 2, Question 20
A research psychologist used a personality test to(57 more words not shown)
Each of the following, if(13 more words not shown)
- ARepressors are better(12 more words not shown)
- BRepressors are less(10 more words not shown)
- CParents and other(18 more words not shown)
- DSome psychologists have(21 more words not shown)
- ESensitizers tend to(24 more words not shown)
Reading the argument
The repressors are doing better on several measures. Does repressing upsetting thoughts make that happen, or might students who already do well be more inclined to repress those thoughts?
The passage doesn't answer that. It reports a pattern, without concluding that repression causes success or recommending that everyone repress feelings. We shouldn't accuse the researcher of making a causal claim the passage never makes.
Now the question asks for the exception: four answers help explain the repressors' characteristics, and one doesn't. Accept each answer as true, then ask what it actually establishes. A fact about concentration or social behavior could help explain a piece of the pattern. We don't need every answer to explain every characteristic.
What we’re looking for
One possible route is that focusing less on upsetting thoughts leaves more attention for useful action. Another might run the other way, with existing success affecting how people handle feelings. Let's see which choices supply something that could actually explain the findings.
Working the answers
- A
Better focus and fewer distractions could help explain higher grades. Students who can stay with their work have an advantage in completing it and learning from it. Since the question tells us to accept this difference as true, A contributes a reason for part of the observed pattern. Eliminate it.
- B
Being less likely to put people off through emotional expression could help explain better social outcomes. For example, sharing something very personal at an unsuitable moment might make an interaction awkward. B supplies a difference that could affect how others respond to the students, so it helps explain the social findings.
- C
More rewards can reinforce the behavior being rewarded. If caregivers respond especially positively to these students' desirable schoolwork and social behavior, the students may keep doing those things. That feedback can help sustain the academic and social success described. C therefore contributes to an explanation.
- DCorrect
We're told that some psychologists have proposed a hypothesis. Accepting that fact means accepting that they proposed it; it doesn't mean accepting the hypothesis itself as established.
The proposed connection between wanting to maintain success and repressing upsetting thoughts might be worth investigating. But D supplies no fact showing that this connection actually operates. The other choices describe differences or influences we are told to treat as real. D only reports an idea about them, so it is the exception.
- E
Focusing on obstacles rather than helpful factors could make useful action harder. Imagine approaching LSAT study by thinking only about how difficult it will be and how failure would feel. Now compare that with thinking about the opportunities preparation could create and the steps that help you improve. Those different focuses could affect how readily someone works toward a goal.
E gives sensitizers more of the obstacle-focused tendency. That can help explain why repressors, who have less of it, do better on measures of success. It doesn't prove a universal rule about positive thinking; it contributes a possible mechanism to this particular pattern.
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