Question

Directions for questions 37 to 41: Analyze the statements given and provide an appropriate answer for the questions that follow.

Most antidepressant drugs cause weight gain. While dieting can help reduce the amount of weight gained as one takes such antidepressants, some weight gain is unlikely to be preventable.

The information above most strongly supports which one of the following?

• A. A physician should not prescribe any antidepressant drug for an overweight patient.
• B. People who are trying to lose weight should not ask their doctors for an antidepressant drug.
• C. At least some patients gain weight as a result of taking antidepressant drugs.
• D. The weight gain experienced by patients taking antidepressant drugs should be attributed to lack of dieting.

Hint:

Pick the smallest, safest claim that follows directly from the facts, avoid any option that adds a policy recommendation or a rule the passage does not state.

Answer 1

The Correct Option is C

The passage gives two facts: most antidepressants cause weight gain, and even with dieting some of that gain cannot be avoided. The correct answer should follow from just these facts, without adding a new claim.

1. A physician should not prescribe any antidepressant drug for an overweight patient: this is a policy recommendation the passage never makes, it only describes a side effect.
2. People who are trying to lose weight should not ask their doctors for an antidepressant drug: again an instruction to patients that goes beyond what the passage states.
3. At least some patients gain weight as a result of taking antidepressant drugs: this is exactly what "most antidepressant drugs cause weight gain" implies for the patients who take them, a direct and modest restatement of the given fact.
4. The weight gain experienced by patients taking antidepressant drugs should be attributed to lack of dieting: the passage says the opposite, some weight gain is unlikely to be preventable even with dieting.

Since the passage is describing a drug side effect and not recommending any course of action, the option that simply restates the side effect in a weaker form is the one that is best supported.

Let's summarize:

• "Most drugs cause X" directly supports "at least some patients experience X".
• Policy advice, such as not prescribing, not asking, or dieting always, is never stated in the passage.
• Blaming the gain on lack of dieting contradicts the passage directly.

So the best-supported statement is that at least some patients gain weight as a result of taking antidepressant drugs, option 3.