Polls have shown that a higher

Answer choices

1. A

   Strengthens1% picked this

   The polls of graduating university students were designed to avoid overrepresenting any

   This makes the data seem stronger, if they did a good job of representing the overall variety of college grads.

   1%
2. B

   Strengthens6% picked this

   The political views of people with a university education are to a large degree influenced by their professors, and university professors are

   This increases the plausibility that attending college is a causal difference-maker that could make someone be more into government social spending than is the average person.

   6%
3. C

   Strengthens13% picked this

   Polls of retired persons who have not graduated from a university show a higher percentage of persons in favor of reducing government social services

   Although the author hasn't said anything explicitly causal, we can think of his conclusion as thinking that "going to college makes you more likely to oppose reductions in social spending". This answer feels like a No Cause, No Effect strengthener. The people who didn't graduate college are more likely to favor reductions than the people who did graduate. It sounds like going to college really does skew you towards favoring social spending more than the rest of the population.

   13%
4. D

   Correct74% picked this

   Polls of those who graduated from a university more than five years before being polled show a higher percentage of people in favor of

   Why this is right

   This is saying that people who are 27 or older (i.e. they graduated at 22, at least 5 years ago) are more in favor of reducing social services than is the overall population. This sounds like the opposite of what we heard in the argument, where the college grads were more opposed to reducing social services. Do they contradict? No, the premise was comparing graduating students to first year students. This answer choice is talking about people who are at least five years removed from graduation. The conclusion blends these two groups together, because it talks about "people with a university education". The conclusion is looking pretty shaky. If college grads age 27 and up are actually soured on social services more than the overall population, then college grads overall might be more negative about social services than is the overall population.

   Skill tested: Weaken · how this choice captures the argument's function is the move to repeat next time.

   74%
5. E

   Strengthens6% picked this

   In the polls cited, graduating university students were more likely to express strong opinions about the question of reducing government social services

   This seems to only underscore the difference between graduating students and first year students that we were told about in the Premise. That would probably help the author to think that college grads are thus different from the rest of the population.

   6%