The soaring prices of scholarly

Answer choices

1. A

   Irrelevant Causality3% picked this

   The nonacademic readership of a scholarly or scientific journal can be accurately gauged by the number of times articles appearing in it are cited

   The nonacademic readership is unrelated to our Goal, which is just measuring a journal's usefulness for academics.

   3%
2. B

   Irrelevant Comparison3% picked this

   The average length of a journal article in some sciences, such as physics, is less than half the average length of a journal article

   The difference in article length between disciplines doesn't have anything to do with our goal of arguing that "using citation frequency isn't a great way to determine usefulness within a discipline."

   3%
3. C

   Irrelevant Comparison4% picked this

   The increasingly expensive scholarly journals are less and less likely to be available to the general public

   The fact that availability of journals to the general public in nonacademic libraries is decreasing is irrelevant. The Plan we're analyzing is just about academics and academic libraries.

   4%
4. D

   Correct82% picked this

   Researchers often will not cite a journal article that has influenced their work if they think that the journal in which it appears is

   Why this is right

   If researchers avoid citing articles from journals they think are not highly regarded, then citation frequency could inaccurately reflect a journal's influence or usefulness. It highlights a flaw in using citation frequency as a sole measure of usefulness for subscription decisions. This answer is saying that some useful articles (i.e. they influenced a researcher's work) are not cited, weakening the connection between the Plan and the Goal.

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

   82%
5. E

   No Impact9% picked this

   In some academic disciplines, controversies which begin in the pages of one journal spill over into articles in other journals that are widely

   This statement deals with how controversies can spread across journals but doesn’t demonstrate an intrinsic problem with measuring a journal's usefulness by citation frequency.

   9%