In a recent study, one group

Answer choices

1. A

   Irrelevant Comparison: lifting vs. running2% picked this

   In another study, people who watched recordings of themselves lifting weights exercised for more time each day than did people who

   We care about the distinction between watching yourself exercise and not-watching yourself, but this answer would help us evaluate the difference between watching yourself lift vs. watching yourself run. We're not interested in that distinction.

   2%
2. B

   Weakly Strengthens4% picked this

   Another study's members exhibited an increased willingness to give to charity after hearing stories in which people with

   This is too distant a situation to have much impact, but it actually seems to strengthen the plausibility that seeing / hearing about yourself (or someone you identity with) doing X leads to an increased motivation to do X yourself.

   4%
3. C

   No Impact41% picked this

   Participants who were already highly motivated to exercise did not report exercising for any longer each day than

   Since we don't know how highly motivated participants were initially divided up into the experimental groups, learning about what highly motivated participants are / aren't doing doesn't help us clarify anything about the possible differences between the two groups we care about: those who watched themselves and those who watched others.

   41%
4. D

   Correct48% picked this

   In studies of identical twins, participants who observed their twin read overreported by a significant amount how much time they themselves spent

   Why this is right

   Oh, hello, Nightmare! You're going into the vault of correct answers I detest. This definitely cracks the Top 20 for me. Since the causal-difference maker in the Author's Hypothesis was whether you watched yourself vs. someone else, LSAT feels like if we're talking about studies of identical twins, watching an identical twin is essentially a fair proxy for watching yourself. (I definitely think any identical twin you ask would say, "Sure it's similar in some ways, but it's VERY different from watching myself". But LSAT just needs it to be relevantly similar) If you swap out "observed their identical twin" with "watched themselves", you get an answer saying, "in other studies, participants who watched themselves read tended to significantly overreport how much time they read in the near future." This suggests an alternate explanation for the data in the exercise study: the reason that the group that watched themselves run a treadmill is now reporting, on average, 1 hr more of exercise per day than the group that watched others isn't because watching yourself motivates you to actually exercise more; it's because watching yourself inclines you to overreport how much you do something in the days or week that follows. This answer does do the expected: it provides an alternate explanation for the Curious Fact. It just does so in such a stupid, overwrought LSAT way that it's like they knew they needed to create a Level 5 question.

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

   48%
5. E

   Strengthens4% picked this

   A third group of participants who watched recordings of themselves sitting on couches afterwards reported being sedentary for more time each day

   This reinforces the author's causal story, since it offers more data points in which watching yourself do X inclined you do to more X.

   4%