Dr. Martinez's interdisciplinary research faces significant challenges in reconciling her _____ methodological approaches: quantitative analysis from ...
GMAT Craft and Structure : (Structure) Questions
Dr. Martinez's interdisciplinary research faces significant challenges in reconciling her _____ methodological approaches: quantitative analysis from her psychology background, which emphasizes statistical rigor and controlled variables; ethnographic fieldwork from anthropology, which prioritizes deep cultural immersion and qualitative insights; and computational modeling from data science, which relies on algorithmic pattern detection and large-scale datasets.
Which choice completes the text with the most logical and precise word or phrase?
incompatible
established
innovative
secondary
Step 1: Decode and Map the Passage
Passage Analysis Table
| Text from Passage | Analysis |
|---|---|
| 'Dr. Martinez's interdisciplinary research faces significant challenges in reconciling her _______ methodological approaches:' |
|
| 'quantitative analysis from her psychology background, which emphasizes statistical rigor and controlled variables;' |
|
| 'ethnographic fieldwork from anthropology, which prioritizes deep cultural immersion and qualitative insights;' |
|
| 'and computational modeling from data science, which relies on algorithmic pattern detection and large-scale datasets.' |
|
Passage Architecture & Core Elements
Main Point: Dr. Martinez struggles to combine methodological approaches from different disciplines that have fundamentally different philosophies and techniques.
Argument Flow: The passage presents a research challenge, identifies the missing descriptor for the approaches, then lists three very different methodological approaches from different fields that emphasize different types of data and analysis methods.
Step 2: Interpret the Question Precisely
This is a fill-in-the-blank question asking us to choose the best logical connector. The answer must create the right relationship between what comes before and after the blank.
Step 3: Prethink the Answer
- The key context clues are 'significant challenges in reconciling' - this tells us the approaches are difficult to combine
- Looking at the three approaches described, they are fundamentally different: Psychology uses statistics and controlled variables, Anthropology uses cultural immersion and qualitative insights, Data science uses algorithms and large datasets
- These represent very different philosophies and methods that would naturally conflict or be hard to integrate
- The right answer should describe approaches that are difficult to reconcile or combine
incompatible
- 'Incompatible' means unable to work together harmoniously
- This directly explains why there are 'significant challenges in reconciling' the approaches
- The three methods described use completely different philosophies (statistical vs. qualitative vs. algorithmic)
- Matches our prethinking that the approaches are difficult to combine
established
- 'Established' means well-known or accepted
- Does not explain why there would be challenges in reconciling them
- Being established would not create reconciliation problems
innovative
- 'Innovative' means new and original
- Does not explain the reconciliation challenges
- New methods could actually be easier to combine since they are not set in traditional ways
secondary
- 'Secondary' means less important
- Does not make logical sense - why would secondary approaches be hard to reconcile?
- Contradicts the detailed description of each approach, which suggests they are all important to her work