prep08 CR1 80 请教评价题的回答

u4462952

prep08 CR1 80
In many scientific disciplines, scientists generally do not do highly creative work beyond the age of forty, a tendency that has normally been taken to show that aging carries with it a loss of creative capacity.  However, by the age of forty most scientists have been working in their chosen field for at least fifteen years, so an alternative explanation is that spending too long in a single field reduces the opportunity for creative thought.

Investigating which of the following would be most useful in choosing between the competing explanations described above?

A. Whether among those scientists who do highly creative work beyond age forty a large proportion entered their field at a considerably later age than is common

B. Whether scientists' choice of research projects tends to be influenced by their own belief that their most creative work will be done relatively early in their career

C. Whether scientists who are older than forty tend to find more satisfaction in other activities, such as teaching and mentoring, than they do in pursuing their own research

D. Whether funding agencies are more inclined to award research grants to scientists who are veterans in their field than to scientists who are relative newcomers

E. Whether there is significant variation among scientific fields in the average age at which scientists working in those fields are at their most productive



对于答案A：如果回答YES， 说明大部分到了40岁仍有创造力的人工作年数还不够长， 所以是工作时间制约创造力。
如果回答NO， 说明大部分到了40岁仍有创造力的人并没有晚进入工作岗位， 所以不是工作时间影响创造力，但也不是年龄制约了创造力。

请问对于问题：”choosing between the competing explanations“， A的YES/NO可以回答该问题吗？尤其是如果回答NO， 根本没有做出任何选择阿， 只是说两者都不是， 但问题不是问“choosing between”嘛。
请教！

wyw1018

这到题我也觉得有问题，答案A只能判断是否是工作时间长短原因，没法判断年龄原因。而且问题是要求在这两个原因之间选择，在别的论坛看到很多其他人的解释，都觉得没有说服力。或许这道题的本意是这样，如果工作时间这个原因能够成立，则推翻年龄原因；如果工作时间原因不能成立，则肯定年龄原因。只能这样解释了。