Open-office floor plans—workspace designs that eliminate private offices and cubicles—were adopted by many companies to encourage collaboration. These...

Let's begin by understanding the meaning of this sentence. We'll use our understanding of pause points and segment the sentence as shown - understanding and assimilating the meaning of each segment bit by bit!

Sentence Structure

• Open-office floor plans
  • workspace designs
    • that eliminate private offices and cubicles—
  were adopted by many companies
  • to encourage collaboration.

• These layouts
  • can reduce productivity significantly [?] furthermore [?] employees report higher stress levels
    • and more difficulty concentrating on complex tasks.

Understanding the Meaning

Let's start with the first sentence:

• 'Open-office floor plans—workspace designs that eliminate private offices and cubicles—were adopted by many companies to encourage collaboration.'

This tells us:

• Open-office floor plans (spaces without private offices or cubicles)
  • were adopted by companies
  • with the goal of encouraging collaboration

Now the second sentence:

• 'These layouts can reduce productivity significantly...'

This is where we have the blank. Let's look at the choices:

• Choice A: significantly, furthermore;
• Choice B: significantly furthermore,
• Choice C: significantly, furthermore,
• Choice D: significantly; furthermore,

We're deciding on the punctuation before and after "furthermore."

To see what works here, let's read the rest of the sentence and understand what it's saying:

• '...employees report higher stress levels and more difficulty concentrating on complex tasks.'

Now let's understand what this complete sentence is telling us:

• 'These layouts can reduce productivity significantly'
  • This is saying that open offices reduce how productive people are
  • This is a complete thought - it has a subject (these layouts) and a verb (can reduce) and expresses a full idea

• 'furthermore'
  • This word means "in addition to what I just said"
  • It's adding another point about the problems with these layouts

• 'employees report higher stress levels and more difficulty concentrating on complex tasks'
  • This is telling us another problem: workers experience more stress and can't concentrate as well
  • This is also a complete thought - it has a subject (employees) and a verb (report) and expresses a full idea

So the complete picture is:

• The sentence is presenting TWO separate problems with open offices:
  • Problem 1: They reduce productivity
  • Problem 2: They cause stress and concentration difficulties
• These are connected with the word "furthermore"

What do we notice about the structure here?

• We have two complete thoughts that could each stand alone as sentences
  • "These layouts can reduce productivity significantly." ✓ Complete
  • "Employees report higher stress levels..." ✓ Complete

• When you have two complete thoughts, you can't just use a comma to connect them - that would be incorrect

• The word "furthermore" is a transitional word (adding information), but it's NOT the same as words like "and" or "but" that can connect with just a comma

• For transitional words like "furthermore," we need:
  • A SEMICOLON before the word
  • A COMMA after the word

So we need: significantly; furthermore,

The correct answer is Choice D.

GRAMMAR CONCEPT APPLIED

Connecting Two Complete Thoughts with Transitional Words

When you want to connect two complete thoughts (sentences that could stand alone) using a transitional word like "furthermore," "however," "therefore," "moreover," or "nevertheless," you need specific punctuation (these transitional words are called conjunctive adverbs in grammar terms):

Pattern: [Complete thought]; transitional word, [complete thought]

Example 1:

• Complete thought 1: The study took three years
• Complete thought 2: The results were inconclusive
• Connected: The study took three years; however, the results were inconclusive.

Example 2:

• Complete thought 1: Sales increased by 15%
• Complete thought 2: The company hired fifty new employees
• Connected: Sales increased by 15%; therefore, the company hired fifty new employees.

In our question:

• Complete thought 1: These layouts can reduce productivity significantly
• Complete thought 2: Employees report higher stress levels and more difficulty concentrating on complex tasks
• Connected: These layouts can reduce productivity significantly; furthermore, employees report higher stress levels and more difficulty concentrating on complex tasks.

Key point: Transitional words like "furthermore" are NOT the same as coordinating conjunctions like "and," "but," or "so." Coordinating conjunctions can connect with just a comma, but transitional words require a semicolon before them and a comma after them.