It's common for jazz musicians and fans to refer to certain songs as having 'swing,' indicating that the songs provoke...
GMAT Information and Ideas : (Ideas) Questions
It's common for jazz musicians and fans to refer to certain songs as having 'swing,' indicating that the songs provoke a strong feeling, like the impulse to tap one's foot or dance. The exact acoustic properties that give a song swing, however, have long been thought to be undefinable. To investigate swing, a team led by physicist Corentin Nelias delayed the downbeats and synchronized the offbeats in jazz piano solos and asked jazz musicians to compare the intensity of swing in each modified piece with the intensity of swing in the original piece. They found that participants were more than seven times likelier to characterize the modified songs as having swing than to characterize the original versions as having swing, suggesting that ______
Which choice most logically completes the text?
synchronized offbeats tend to give a song swing regardless of whether downbeats are delayed.
the acoustic properties that give a song swing are not easy for jazz musicians to manipulate.
jazz songs that feature the piano are more likely to have swing than are jazz songs that do not feature the piano.
the timing of downbeats and offbeats may play a crucial role in giving a song swing.
Step 1: Decode and Map the Passage
Create Passage Analysis Table
| Text from Passage | Analysis |
|---|---|
| "It's common for jazz musicians and fans to refer to certain songs as having 'swing,' indicating that the songs provoke a strong feeling, like the impulse to tap one's foot or dance." |
|
| "The exact acoustic properties that give a song swing, however, have long been thought to be undefinable." |
|
| "To investigate swing, a team led by physicist Corentin Nelias delayed the downbeats and synchronized the offbeats in jazz piano solos and asked jazz musicians to compare the intensity of swing in each modified piece with the intensity of swing in the original piece." |
|
| "They found that participants were more than seven times likelier to characterize the modified songs as having swing than to characterize the original versions as having swing, suggesting that ______" |
|
Provide Passage Architecture & Core Elements
Visual Structure Map:
[CONTEXT: Definition of "swing"]
↓
[PROBLEM: Swing properties thought undefinable]
↓
[EXPERIMENT: Nelias team manipulates timing]
├── Method: Delay downbeats + sync offbeats
└── Comparison: Modified vs original versions
↓
[RESULTS: 7x more likely to call modified "swing"]
↓
[BLANK: What this suggests...]
Main Point: An experiment manipulating the timing of downbeats and offbeats dramatically increased how often jazz musicians perceived songs as having swing.
Argument Flow: The passage moves from defining swing as a mysterious quality to showing that specific timing manipulations can reliably create it.
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 finding is dramatic: modified songs were 7+ times more likely to be perceived as having swing
- Since the only changes made were to the timing of downbeats and offbeats, this strongly suggests these timing elements are crucial to creating swing
- The right answer should connect the experimental manipulation (timing changes) to the dramatic results (much more swing perception)
synchronized offbeats tend to give a song swing regardless of whether downbeats are delayed.
✗ Incorrect
- Claims synchronized offbeats create swing "regardless of whether downbeats are delayed" but the experiment manipulated BOTH elements together
the acoustic properties that give a song swing are not easy for jazz musicians to manipulate.
✗ Incorrect
- Claims acoustic properties of swing are "not easy for jazz musicians to manipulate" but contradicts the passage where researchers successfully manipulated timing
jazz songs that feature the piano are more likely to have swing than are jazz songs that do not feature the piano.
✗ Incorrect
- Claims piano-featuring jazz songs are more likely to have swing but this isn't supported by the passage
the timing of downbeats and offbeats may play a crucial role in giving a song swing.
✓ Correct
- States that "timing of downbeats and offbeats may play a crucial role in giving a song swing" which directly connects to what was manipulated in the experiment