LSAT Out of Scope Answers

Perhaps the most common type of wrong answer on the LSAT test is an answer that is beyond the scope of the evidence being considered. By being able to recognize out of scope answer choices, you will most likely be able to eliminate at least one if not two or three wrong answers per question. 

This is the second in a series of articles on LSAT Logical Reasoning Wrong Answer Choices. The series includes the following articles:

LSAT Out of Scope Answers

Scope is the specific targeted topic of the author. Two authors can write about the same topic, yet their scope can be different. As a result, the actual information included by each writer can be vastly different.
 
As an analogy, pretend you’re an author writing for a zoo newsletter. You have a big file cabinet filled with research for your writing. Each drawer in that cabinet has a label on it: primates, marsupials, aquatic animals, etc. You can think of those drawer labels as topics. You might want to write an article about primates, so you open the primate drawer.
 
Inside the primate drawer are several sections: gorillas, chimpanzees, orangutans, and other primates at your zoo. Each section narrows the scope of your research and writing. You’re no longer simply writing about the topic of primates, now you’re writing about chimpanzees.

You can go a step further. Each section has a group of file folders in it: chimps and language, chimpanzee social order, chimpanzee nutrition, etc. Each folder has separate reports and news clippings inside about specific ideas. In the language folder, you find two articles from a local university. One article is about chimpanzees learning sign language, and another is about chimpanzees recognizing symbols on cue cards. Even those these articles are in the same folder in the same section of the same file drawer, they contain vastly different ideas. Sure, in a large view, both articles are about primates. But you can narrow the scope down to a specific and targeted idea: some chimps are learning sign language at a local university.
 
Scope is as narrow as you can make a topic and still get all of the pieces in. The LSAT loves to test you on scope, so much so that scope errors are the most common wrong answer type on the LSAT. On some questions, you can eliminate three answers right off the bat just by understanding the scope of the argument.

What is In Scope?
 
Read the following argument stimulus and think about its central assumption.

Researchers at State University are teaching chimpanzees to communicate using sign language. For years the research continued largely without success. The researchers would reward the chimpanzees with food when they used the right gestures. The chimpanzees simply mimicked the researchers’ gestures in a sort of Pavlovian response. The researchers recently had a breakthrough. By adding emotional words and cues along with simple nouns, the chimpanzees seem able to grasp larger concepts and some even form simple sentences. This research proves that children raised in emotionally distant families have difficulty expressing themselves with language.

First, do any red flags pop up for you? It seems like a pretty big jump to go from chimps in a lab to children raised in emotionally distant families. The assumption must somehow bridge that gap. A possible prephrase you might come up for the assumption is that children raised in emotionally distant families learn to express language in a manner similar to chimpanzees taught without emotional cues.

But if you didn’t get that prephrase and you have to eliminate, understanding scope can help you avoid some tempting traps. 

How the LSAT Tempts You Out of Scope

Consider the following answer choices for the above argument. All but one are wrong and out of scope.

(A)    Dolphins and gorillas also acquire language skills more readily when given emotional cues.

Did the author ever mention dolphins or gorillas? No. This is out of scope. More importantly, it doesn’t address our red flag: what is the connection between chimps and children in emotionally distant families?

(B)    The researchers at State University are interested in helping children in emotionally distant families express themselves.

This is tempting. After all, the conclusion is that children raised in emotionally distant families have trouble expressing themselves. But, that’s the author’s conclusion, not the researchers. We have no idea what the intent of the researchers is, other than to try to teach sign language to chimps. This is out of scope.

(C)    Children do not learn to read through a Pavlovian response.

Isn’t this one in scope? Doesn’t the argument mention both Pavlovian response and children? Wrong. Just because the same nouns appear in the argument doesn’t mean you have the right scope. Think back to your file cabinet. These ideas might be in the same folder, but do not share the same scope.

(D)   Chimpanzee social structure is the same as human social structure.

This is tempting because it at least comes close to addressing our red flag: what’s the connection between chimps and children in emotionally distant families? But it doesn’t actually address it. The argument has nothing to do with social structure. It has to do with emotions in the acquisition of language skills. This is out of scope too.

(E)    Children in emotionally distant families learn to express language in much the same way that chimpanzees do.

First, if this were the actual LSAT, you should just mark this answer as correct and move on-without ever reading it. You’ve already eliminated four answer choices. One of them has to be right, so it must be this one. You have to have the confidence in your decision to mark this correct and move on, saving the time you would have used to read and consider it. OK, having said that, let’s look at it now just for practice. This is close to our prephrased answer and it directly addresses our red flag. What is the connection between chimps and kids in emotionally distant families? They learn to express language in similar ways.

Next we’ll look at an LSAT Logical Reasoning answer choice we call Right Answer, Wrong Question.