Q5 - Peter: Unlike in the past,

[ohthatpatrick]

Question Type:
ID the Disagreement

Stimulus Breakdown:

P: In the past, most kids stories had clearly immoral characters. Nowadays, most don't, but most should. Kids need to learn what happens if you're bad.
Y: Most kids stories still have clearly immoral characters in them. They're just not as frightening as they used to be, which is a good thing.

Answer Anticipation:
I tend to re-read the 1st person's claims one at a time, to see where the 2nd person diverged. In this case, it stuck out on the first read -- Peter said that "most kid stories nowadays DON'T have clearly immoral characters" and Yoko said that "most DO" (tend to = most). So we can prephrase that they disagree over whether "most children's stories nowadays have clearly immoral characters".

Correct Answer:
D

Answer Choice Analysis:
(A) Only Yoko deals with whether they should be more/less frightening.

(B) Only Yoko deals with whether they are/aren't less frightening.

(C) Neither person addresses whether the OVERALL quality has gone up or down.

(D) Yes! Peter says they don't. Yoko says they do.

(E) Only Peter talks about learning consequences of bad actions.

Takeaway/Pattern: If the disconnecting claims didn't stick out on the first read, then simply take each of Peter's 4 claims and ask yourself if Yoko seemed to say/argue the opposite. Yoko didn't talk about the past, didn't talk about whether children's stories SHOULD have immoral characters, and didn't talk about whether children need to learn the consequences of bad actions.

#officialexplanation

[tara_amber1]

This one was fairly easy for me, but as I'm gearing up for the upcoming LSAT, I wanted to get a thorough explanation for each logical reasoning question I come across.

Correct answer: (D)
Question type: Disagree

For these types of questions, I like to make mental notes about what the 2nd person says about the 1st person's argument. Almost like comparative passages where there will be one main subject discussed but the two authors have differing views on it.

Peter believes that clearly immoral characters were more used in children's stories in the past, than in the present. He supports the use of clearly immoral characters because through this, children can learn the consequences of being bad.

Yoko believes that children's stories are still using clearly immoral characters, but in the past these characters used to frighten children. She thinks this is an improvement.

Anticipation: Immoral characters is something that's brought up by both parties. They both have an opinion on it, and Peter thinks those characters aren't used much today, and Yoko begs to differ.

(D) is the correct answer because it spots exactly that.

(A) Yoko has an opinion on this, Peter does not. So we can't be sure that Peter disagrees or not.

(B) Commits the same error as A, but just with a temporal factor.

(C) Neither of them have an opinion about the "overall quality" of children's stories in the past and present.

(E) Peter has an opinion on this, but Yoko doesn't. We can't be sure that Yoko disagrees or not.

Hope this helps!