The Blackridge Company, a software retailer, recently implemented a service offering free telephone support for its customers. After 3 months of service, the average length of a technical support call was 15 minutes, 3 minutes higher than the company's target length of 12 minutes. After studying the operations of the new telephone support division, the company discovered that customer support agents were putting customers on hold for an average of 4 minutes per call while these agents researched possible solutions to the technical issues at hand.

From the passage above, it can be inferred that the Blackridge Company could reduce the average length of its customer support calls by doing which of the following, assuming that each is a realistic possibility?

A study of kindergarten students has shown that children from households that own many books, an average of 54 books, show average or high reading achievement levels, while the households of children with lower reading achievement levels tend to own fewer books, 5 books on average.

What additional information would strengthen the assertion that parents who don`t buy children's books to keep in the home cause their children to fall behind their peers in reading skills?

Studies have shown that an automobile that runs on a blend of 85% ethanol/15% gasoline gets better mileage than an otherwise similar car equipped with a gasoline engine. Many American legislators have concluded that an increase in tax incentives for ethanol production would lessen our dependence on foreign oil.

Which of the following, if true, casts the most doubt upon the validity of the legislators` conclusion?

Spokesperson: The major school lunch vendors recently agreed to stop selling high-calorie beverages in elementary and middle schools because studies show that children of ages 7 to 8 who substitute one low-calorie beverage for one high-calorie soft drink in their daily diets will, on average, weigh 20 pounds less than they would have by the time they reach high school. Since only low-calorie beverages will be sold in schools, within six to eight years, we can expect to see a reduction in the percentage of overweight high-school children.

The spokesperson assumes which of the following to be true?

Scientist: All other things being equal, the intensity of heat increases as the distance from the heat source decreases. Knowing this, most people conclude that the Earth's seasons are caused by the Earth's changing distance from the sun. In other words, winter occurs when the Earth is far from the sun, and summer occurs when the earth is close to the sun. However, we know that as North America experiences summer, South America experiences winter, even though the difference in the continents' distance to the sun is negligible. Therefore, the earth's changing distance from the sun does not cause the seasons.

In the argument, the two portions in boldface play which of the following roles?

The mayor of Coast Town has determined that the best way to pay for the construction of a new library is to charge all residents and non-residents a fee for visiting Coast Town's well-regarded beach. The mayor reasons that at current levels of visitation, the revenue generated from the beach visitation fee will pay for the new library within three years.

Which of the following pieces of information would be most useful in evaluating the mayor's conclusion?

A recent survey conducted in the New Homes magazine indicated that more than 70% of its readers are planning to purchase or build a new home over the next two years. Based on the results of the survey, the editor of the magazine concluded that over the next two years, the real estate industry is likely to experience rapid growth driven by the high market demand for new homes.

Which of the following statements, if true, would be the most damaging to the conclusion of the magazine's editor?

Antoine: The alarming fact is that among children aged 19 years and younger, the number taking antipsychotic medicines soared 73 percent in the last four years. That is greater than the increase in the number of adults taking antipsychotic medicines during the same period.

Lucy: But the use of antipsychotic drugs by adults is considered normal at the current rate of 11 adults per 1,000 taking the drugs. In contrast, the number of children on antipsychotic medication last year was 6.6 per 1,000 children.

Lucy's argument is structured to lead to which of the following as a conclusion?

Fact: Asthma, a bronchial condition, is much less common ailment than hay fever, an allergic inflammation of the nasal passages.Fact: Over 95 percent of people who have asthma also suffer from hay fever.

If the information given as facts above is true, which of the following must also be true?

During the past year, Pro-Tect Insurance Company's total payouts on car-theft claims were larger than the company can afford to sustain. Pro-Tect cannot reduce the number of car-theft policies it carries, so cannot protect itself against continued large payouts that way. Therefore, Pro-Tect has decided to offer a discount to holders of car-theft policies whose cars have antitheft devices. Many policyholders will respond to the discount by installing antitheft devices, since the amount of the discount will within two years typically more than cover the cost of installation. Thus, because cars with antitheft devices are rarely stolen, Pro-Tect's plan is likely to reduce its annual payouts.

In the argument above, the two portions in boldface play which of the following roles?

City Official: At City Hospital, uninsured patients tend to have shorter stays and fewer procedures performed than do insured patients, even though insured patients, on average, have slightly less serious medical problems at the time of admission to the hospital than uninsured patients have. Critics of the hospital have concluded that the uninsured patients are not receiving proper medical care. However, this conclusion is almost certainly false. Careful investigation has recently shown two things: insured patients have much longer stays in the hospital than necessary, and they tend to have more procedures performed than are medically necessary.

In the city official's argument, the two boldface portions play which of the following roles?

Fish currently costs about the same at seafood stores throughout Eastville and its surrounding suburbs. Seafood stores buy fish from the same wholesalers and at the same prices, and other business expenses have also been about the same. But new tax breaks will substantially lower the cost of doing business within the city. Therefore, in the future, profit margins will be higher at seafood stores within the city than at suburban seafood stores.

For the purposes of evaluating the argument, it would be most useful to know whether

In order to combat Carville's rampant homeless problem, Mayor Bloomfield recently proposed a ban on sleeping outdoors in the city's many parks. He claims that such a measure will force the homeless to either leave Carville or to find means other than sleeping in public parks. Which of the following, if true, suggests that Mayor Bloomfield's plan will be successful?

The Yorgorian people, many of whom still live in the jungle in traditional conditions, eat many meats of jungle mammals, resulting in a cuisine that is high in the protein RX7G, much higher than the cuisine of the industrial nation of Transpraxia. Medical research has shown a high correlation between the protein RX7G and coronary heart disease, and yet, the Yorgorian people have a much lower incidence of such disease than found in Transpraxia. Medical researchers have dubbed this the Yorgorian Paradox. Which of the following, if true, helps to explain the Yorgorian Paradox?

Charcoal from a hearth site in Colorado, 2,000 miles south of Alaska, is known to be 11,200 years old. Researchers reasoned that, since glaciers prevented human migration south from the Alaska-Siberia land bridge between 18,000 and 11,000 years ago, humans must have come to the Americas more than 18,000 years ago.

Which of the following pieces of new evidence would cast doubt on the conclusion drawn above?