The Metropolitan Museum of Arts has built a reputation as one of the city's premier cultural institutions over its 150-year...
GMAT Information and Ideas : (Ideas) Questions
The Metropolitan Museum of Arts has built a reputation as one of the city's premier cultural institutions over its 150-year history, attracting millions of visitors annually through its diverse collections and special exhibitions. However, museum curators have expressed concern that visitor engagement has been diminishing, with fewer people spending extended time exploring the galleries. The curators believe that interactive digital guides could help reverse this trend and restore the museum's ability to captivate audiences.
According to the text, why are museum curators concerned?
The museum isn't attracting as many total visitors as before.
Visitor engagement has been diminishing over time.
The museum can't expand its collections due to space limitations.
The digital guide system isn't working properly.
Step 1: Decode and Map the Passage
Part A: Create Passage Analysis Table
| Text from Passage | Analysis |
|---|---|
| "The Metropolitan Museum of Arts has built a reputation as one of the city's premier cultural institutions over its 150-year history, attracting millions of visitors annually through its diverse collections and special exhibitions." |
|
| "However, museum curators have expressed concern that visitor engagement has been diminishing, with fewer people spending extended time exploring the galleries." |
|
| "The curators believe that interactive digital guides could help reverse this trend and restore the museum's ability to captivate audiences." |
|
Part B: Provide Passage Architecture & Core Elements
Visual Structure Map: Museum Success History → Problem (Visitor engagement diminishing) → Proposed Solution (Interactive digital guides)
Main Point: Museum curators are concerned about declining visitor engagement and believe digital guides could help solve this problem.
Argument Flow: The passage establishes the Metropolitan Museum's successful track record, then presents the curators' concern about diminishing visitor engagement, and concludes with their proposed solution of interactive digital guides to address this issue.
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 passage explicitly states what the curators are concerned about
- We found in our analysis that curators are worried about visitor engagement has been diminishing
- The right answer should directly reflect this stated concern about declining engagement
- It should not confuse this with other potential museum issues
- The right answer should identify that curators are concerned specifically about diminishing visitor engagement
The museum isn't attracting as many total visitors as before.
- Claims the issue is fewer total visitors
- The passage says they attract millions of visitors annually with no indication total numbers have dropped
- Confuses total visitor numbers with engagement levels
Visitor engagement has been diminishing over time.
- Directly matches the passage statement about visitor engagement has been diminishing
- This is exactly what the text says the curators are concerned about
- Perfectly aligns with our prethinking
The museum can't expand its collections due to space limitations.
- Introduces space limitations for collections, which isn't mentioned anywhere
- Completely unrelated to the stated concern about visitor engagement
- This trap represents students assuming museums generally face space issues, but this isn't supported by the text
The digital guide system isn't working properly.
- Suggests digital guides aren't working, but digital guides are proposed as a future solution
- The passage presents digital guides as something curators believe could help, not something that's failing
- This trap represents students misreading the chronology - the digital guides are a proposed solution, not a current failing system