Cause and Effect

Although cause and effect, and misunderstandings about cause and effect, are most prevelant on the LSAT, they are a major part of the SAT, GRE, and GMAT as well. Each of these tests is concerned with the candidate's ability to critically analyze information in order to form valid conclusions. That skill, as I have often said in class, is one of the cornerstones of intellectually challenging professions like law, medicine, and business management.


There are at least two other reasons, though, besides it's importance to critical thinking, that cause and effect (let's call it C&E henceforth for convenience's sake) is so frequently tested on higher-level academic stardardized tests: For one thing, C&E is frequently misunderstood, even by otherwise intelligent and well-educated people who have not been trained in critical thinking. For another, the English language is fluid and flexible enough to allow testmakers to create dozens and dozens of different--and intentionally confusing--ways of saying the same things. That last fact, especially, makes C&E a tempting subject ground for testmakers, who have to construct not only challenging questions, but also vague, confusing answer choices to deceive test-takers.


As to the first reason, why and how is C&E frequently misunderstood? The most common error, probably, that is easy to make is to confuse CORRESPONDENCE (the fact that two different things happen, either at the same time or one after the other) with CAUSATION (one thing actually bringing the other about). Correspondence is evidence that C&E might exist, but it's not enough to establish that relationship. What you think is the effect might be the cause, or some other, unknown quantity may be creating your effect.


For instance, if I observe that "Employees who have worked at a company the longest are the ones who report being the happiest with their jobs." Then from that, I conclude "Therefore, staying at a job for a long time will cause you, over time, to grow to love that job and be happy at the company." It seems more likely that, in fact, the fact that I like my job might be the CAUSE, and staying for a long time at my company would be the EFFECT. One would have to do more research to determine whether happiness was causing the long stays, or vice-versa, or whether some other, unrelated factor was causing both.


On the other hand, let's say I observe that twenty people who ate dinner at this restaurant last night got sick. "Therefore," I conclude, "the food at the restaurant must have caused the illnesses." Certainly, it's not likely that, as in the example about job satisfaction, the cause and effect were reversed. That would mean that the fact that the people were ill caused them to go eat at the same restaurant, which doesn't make sense either chronologically or in terms of common sense. However, I might be overlooking important intervening causes. For instance, were more people than usual in this particular city ill last night? Maybe there is a flu or other virus running through the general population, and people are getting sick all over the place. Absent that, maybe there was something about the restaurant other than the food that made those who ate there sick. Perhaps a gas leak or chemicals stored in the basement caused the patrons to fall ill.


Even tougher, though, than learning to screen C&E arguments for flaws like those above, is learning to decipher the vague, intentionally-confusing language used by testmakers to complicate questions and answer choices. For instance, all of these phrases mean the same thing:


"My car will only run if it has gas."
"My car won't run unless it has gas."
"Without gas, my car won't run."
"Unless it has gas, my car will not run."
"When it doesn't have gas, my car can't run."
"I can't run my car unless I put gas in it."
"Absent gas, my car can not run."


Those are just a few examples; given time I could probably come up with 20 or so more. It's difficult enough to use and understand English when the people with whom you're communicating are trying to make themselves understood, but it's really tough when they're trying to trick you. That's what the LSAT and tests like it do.


One trick that I use often to help myself figure out complicated logical statements is to ask myself, "Which thing will cause the other thing NOT to happen?" For some reason, it often helps me get the correct phrase, which I can then translate into the contrapositive. For instance, in my examples above, I would think "Well, if my car doesn't have gas, it won't run. Therefore NO GAS then NO RUN, so if my car RUNs it must have GAS." This is especially helpful, because once you have a phrase that works, and that you intuitively understand, you can apply it to other phrases. We've all been in cars that have gas, but which for some reason or other will not run. Therefore, not all cars that have gas will run, but all cars that run must have gas.

The ability to understand C&E is among the most important of all the skills you need to master for the LSAT, GRE, GMAT, and even the SAT. I'll talk more about it in future blogs, and discuss more ways to make complicated phrases easier to understand.



▼▽▼▼【講師】Douglas先生のバックナンバー━━━━━━━━
・【Smoke and Makuuchi】2008.10.01(Wed)
･【It's Always Something】2008.10.22 (Wed)
・【Working the Corners】2008.11.12 (Wed)
・【Logic Games】2008.12.03 (Wed)
・【A Truth about Application Essays】2008.12.24 (Wed)
・【The Real Score】2009.01.21 (Wed)
・【Think Honestly】2009.02.11 (Wed)
・【Fall Seven, Stand Eight】2009.03.04 (Wed)

ブログランキングに参加しています。
下記の3つをクリックして、応援していただけると嬉しいです。
▼Please help us increase our blog ranking by clicking below!▼

We thank you for your continued support!