Ensuring that children consume less sugar is among the most effective ways to curb childhood obesity. Recently, with this goal in mind, school officials have begun to replace high calorie sugary drinks in school vending machines with bottled water, unsweetened fruit juices, and sugar free sodas. Since students spend so much time in school, officials reason that removing access to sugary drinks during school hours will cause a dramatic reduction in the intake of sugar.

Which of the following, if true, most undermines the school officials’ plan?
a) Unsweetened fruit juices contain more sugar than does bottled water.
b) Many students have access to sugary drinks both before and after school.
c) Sugar free sodas contain artificial sweeteners that some medical officials link to headaches and other health concerns.
d) Sugary snack foods comprise the majority of sales in school vending machines.
e) The average school-aged child consumes two twenty-ounce sugary drinks every day.

The correct answer is (d).

I was able to get to the correct answer, but took around 3 minutes. I was confused b/w choices (b) & (d).

My thought process was as follows:

Conclusion - Removing access to sugary drinks will cause a large reduction in sugar intake.

(b) - Alternate path to sugar drinks - acts as a counter premise.
(d) - Alternate path to sugar drinks - acts as a counter premise.

I thought (d) was more within scope, since it is an alternate path to sugar within the sugar. I am not quite sure if
this logic indeed is correct. Also any other techniques for handling such types of questions.

thanks a lot.

Sorry for the typo:

(d) more within scope, since it is an alternate path to sugar within the school.

The conclusion states that the school expects to reduce *dramatically* the amount of sugar children consume specifically because the students will no longer be able to get such sugary drinks at school. You have to make sure that you directly address that conclusion.

If, as a result of no longer having access to sugary drinks at school, sugar intake will go down dramatically, the author must be assuming that the students currently do consume a lot of those sugary drinks at school. If they are not actually consuming many sugary drinks at school, then the plan won't work very well.

D establishes the idea that students get most of their in-school sugar from snack food. If that's the case, then they are NOT getting the majority of their in-school sugar from sugary drinks, so swapping out sugary drinks for more healthy drinks is not likely to have a dramatic effect.

B, on the other hand, addresses a situation outside of the conclusion's scope: what students might drink at home or at other places besides school. The school officials' plan does not address other places where students might consume sugary drinks (or sugar in any form) - it only addresses in-school consumption.

_________________
Stacey Koprince
Instructor
Director of Online Community
ManhattanGMAT

Hi Stacey,

I am a little confused here. Both the options seem as enticing.

The explanation given against B is this -
The intention of the school officials’ plan is to limit the intake of sugar by students. Access to sugary drinks outside of school is certainly a factor in students' total sugar intake. However, the possibility that students might consume sugar elsewhere fails to undermine the school officials’ plan to restrict access to sugary drinks at school. As a result of the restricted access during school hours, those students who have access to sugary drinks outside of school may still consume less sugar than they otherwise would.

Cant I apply similar reasoning against D?

Even if the school restricts access to just the sugary drinks, the students would still consume a lot less sugar than they actually do (thanks to no access to sugary drinks).

Please help!

Not necessarily. We have to know that students are buying sugary drinks in the first place in order for our plan to have any effect on their sugar intake. D opens up the possibility that students weren’t buying many (or even any) sugary drinks to begin with. If sugary drink sales are already a small percentage of sales, cutting them out entirely won’t have much effect, especially if students are getting a lot of sugar from foods..

You say “Even if the school restricts access to just the sugary drinks, the students would still consume a lot less sugar than they actually do (thanks to no access to sugary drinks).” What if the school restricts access to nuclear waste sandwiches? Does that mean students will consume a lot less nuclear waste? No, because they weren’t consuming it to begin with so the restriction won’t have any effect. That’s what D is all about..

_________________
Tim Sanders
Manhattan GMAT Instructor