Logical Reasoning

PT112 · S4 · Q17 Researchers have found that people

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Researchers have found that people who drink five or more cups of coffee a day have a risk of heart disease 2.5 times the average after corrections are made for age and smoking habits.

Background

People who drink 5 or more cups of coffee a day have a risk of heart disease that 2.5 times that of other people their age / with their smoking habits.

Plan

Limit coffee intake to two cups a day.

Goal

Decrease risk of heart disease

Evaluate

We need a way to argue that these researchers could limit their coffee intake to 2 cups max per day, but not decrease their risk of heart disease.

It seems like we'd have two different ways of doing so:

1. Lowering to 2 cups a day isn't enough. Someone drinking 2 cups per day has just as much risk as someone drinking 5+ cups a day.

2. The coffee wasn't the cause for the increased risk of heart disease in the first place.

That 2nd one seems more likely to me as an LSAT type objection, because these researchers are looking at a Curious Comparison (ppl who are X are more likely to be Y) and assuming a Causal Explanation.

Curious Fact ... why do people who drink 5+ cups of coffee / day have a 2-3x the risk of heart disease?

Author's Explanation .... the 5+ cups of coffee causes the increased risk of heart disease.

Goal

Since we are trying to weaken, we would be looking for an answer that

suggests an Alternate Explanation for why those heavy coffee drinkers have elevated heart disease risk, or an answer that

undermines the plausibility of the Author's causal assumption that the coffee drinking is elevating the heart disease risk, or an answer that

undermines the notion that cutting back from 5 cups to 2 cups would be enough to reduce risk of heart disease.

17.

Which one of the following, if true, indicates that the researchers' precaution might NOT have the result of decreasing their risk of heart disease?

The study found that for
Strengthens
This makes it seem like 5 cups is worse than 4 cups, which is worse than 3 cups. So this answer makes us think that 2 cups would carry lower risk of heart disease than would 5 cups.
4% picked this
Per capita coffee consumption has
No Impact
It doesn't make any difference how popular or unpopular coffee consumption is in the world. We're only analyzing whether those who do drink coffee are raising their risk of heart disease by doing so.
4% picked this
Correct
The study did not collect
Why this is right
This obliquely suggests an Alternate Explanation for why the heavy coffee drinkers have higher risk of heart disease. Whenever LSAT presents a correlation, (ppl who are X are more likely to be Y), and the author assumes some causal explanation (X causes Y), then the author fails to consider ... Reverse Causality -- maybe Y causes X Third Factor -- maybe Z causes X and Y This answer is suggesting that maybe people who have lots of stress are the heavy coffee drinkers (e.g., air traffic controllers, police detectives, wall street workers, ER physicians). The stress is the third factor that both causes heavy coffee drinking and causes increased risk in heart disease (it's identified as a major causal factor). That would lead to there being a correlation between heavy coffee drinking and higher risk of heart disease, even though it's the stress, not the coffee, that is causing the higher risk of heart disease. And if coffee was never the cause in the first place, then these researchers' cutting back on coffee isn't going to have any effect on their heart disease risk.
Skill tested: Weaken · how this choice captures the argument's function is the move to repeat next time.
81% picked this
Subsequent studies have consistently shown
No Impact
The distinction between smokers and nonsmokers is irrelevant, because the statistic we're going off of has already assured us that other risk factors such as age and smoking habits have been controlled for. The statistic is saying, "Whatever the risk is for a 40 year old nonsmoker who doesn't drink 5+ cups of coffee per day, the risk for a 40 year old nonsmoker who does drink 5+ cups is 2.5 times as much". And the same thing would go for smokers. Whatever the default risk level is for smokers, the risk level for smokers who also drink 5+ cups of coffee is 2.5 times as high.
7% picked this
Subsequent studies have shown that
Strengthens
This increases the plausibility that the coffee drinking was the cause of the elevated risk of heart disease by describing the causal mechanism by which those two things are connected. Since this helps to confirm that heavy coffee drinking is a cause of increased risk of heart disease, it strengthens the notion that the researchers will be lowering their risk of heart disease by lowering their coffee consumption.
4% picked this

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