Companies Worldwide have Started Adopting MAT (Management Aptitude Test)

Question: Companies worldwide have started adopting MAT (Management Aptitude Test), a decade-old standardized online-based aptitude entrance test administered centrally by CGI (Confederation of Global Industries) all round the year to screen in the most eligible candidates for their respective interviews. Latest statistics released by CGI show that the average error rate, a statistical figure to assess the difficulty level of a question and determined only after the number of respondents reaches at least thousand, of ten toughest questions in a sample group of MAT tests conducted within any pre-defined time interval not earlier than three years ago has never exceeded 70%. A particular question recently introduced by CGI in MAT was, however, found to have an error rate of more than 80%, attempted by approximately 5000 candidates worldwide. Hence, this question could be considered among the toughest of the questions to have appeared on the MAT. But, some respondents contend that the new question was indeed so tough need not be true as it is also quite likely that the official answer to the question itself is wrong.

Which of the following, if true, would most help to arbitrate the contention presented in the argument?

1. 95% of the respondents who got the question right scored at least 99 percentile on the MAT.
2. Statistics released by CGI have revealed that for any time interval put under consideration since the last ten years, the difference between the number of respondents per thousand answering the ten toughest questions correctly and a number of those answering them wrong has varied between 200 and 650.
3. The average error rate of the ten toughest questions in any time interval, not later than three years ago, was approximately 74%.
4. As per the latest records available by the CGI, most of the all-time toughest questions on MAT put to test, the error rate of which exceeded 80% but not 85%, have been certified as perfectly valid questions with correct official answers by more than one independent auditor.
5. Studies by certified psychometricians indicate that a question in any online-based aptitude entrance test cannot achieve a maximum error rate not lower than 80%, even after allowing for a maximum grace variation in error rate up to 5%.

Companies Worldwide have Started Adopting MAT Management Aptitude Test is a GMAT critical reasoning topic. This GMAT Critical Reasoning topic has been taken from the book ‘501 GMAT Questions’. In this question, the candidates need to provide an option that supports the argument provided in the passage. GMAT critical reasoning tests the logical and analytical skills of the candidates. Critical reasoning in GMAT requires candidates to find the strengths and weaknesses of the argument, or find the logical flaw in the argument.  The GMAT CR section contains 10 -13 GMAT critical reasoning questions out of 36 GMAT verbal questions.

Answer: E
Explanation:

Question Stem: Which of the following, if true, would most help to arbitrate the contention presented in the argument?

We need to find an option that produces additional evidence to either support the contention or destroy it.
 

1. 95% of the respondents who got the question right scored at least 99 percentile on the MAT. – Wrong. Even if 4750 respondents who answered the question right scored 99 percentile on MAT overall, this does not really resolve the contention whether the answer is right or not
2. Statistics released by CGI have revealed that for any time interval put under consideration since the last ten years, the difference between the number of respondents per thousand answering the ten toughest questions correctly and a number of those answering them wrong has varied between 200 and 650. – Wrong. the option says that the maximum error rate of the ten toughest questions within any time band recorded until date is 82.5% and the minimum error rate for these is 60%. Quite likely that the question which achieved an error rate of 82.5% actually had the correct answer marked. Hence, this in no way proves that a question with an error rate of 80% or above is necessarily wrong. 
3. The average error rate of the ten toughest questions in any time interval, not later than three years ago, was approximately 74%. – This option also does not resolve the contention of whether the answer is right or not. In fact, the fact that the avg. the error rate was 74% need not mean that none of them were above 80%
4. As per the latest records available by the CGI, most of the all-time toughest questions on MAT put to test, the error rate of which exceeded 80% but not 85%, have been certified as perfectly valid questions with correct official answers by more than one independent auditor. – Wrong. Same as B and states the reasoning explicitly to eliminate D
5. Studies by certified psychometricians indicate that a question in any online-based aptitude entrance test cannot achieve a maximum error rate not lower than 80%, even after allowing for a maximum grace variation in error rate up to 5%. – Correct. It states that studies by certified psychometricians state that any question can never achieve a max. error rate not lower than 80% (i.e. 80% or more), even after allowing for a max grace variation of up to 5%.

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