Most Strongly Supported (MSS) LSAT questions are similar to Must Be True (MBT) questions covered in the last lesson. They often use Formal Logic (some of them are based on other concepts we’ll discuss later in the chapter). The answer could be the Main Idea, a secondary conclusion, or a premise.
CHALLENGE: Find Supported Answer Choices
Most Strongly Supported (MSS) questions are focused on finding a strongly supported statement and are easily identifiable. These questions are often not arguments but a series of premises. Common phrasings:
- Which one of the following is most strongly supported by the information above?
- The speaker’s statements, if true, most strongly support which one of the following?
- Which one of the following conclusions is most strongly supported by the information above?
- Which one of the following is most reasonably supported by the information above?
How to solve
- The questions often use Formal Logic. Try diagramming them.
- Because the answer could be three things: a Main Idea, a secondary conclusion, or a premise, this is a particularly challenging question. You’re going to need to go through the answer choices to get to the bottom of it.
- The correct answer sometimes restates two sentences in the stimulus (the answer might just be a premise).
- Read and understand the passage: Be very precise in what each sentence means and what it doesn’t mean. Also, try to see how the sentences are inter-related. You can’t predict the correct answer choice before you get there.
- The wrong choices will have no support and the correct answer choice will have some support (not most). The support isn’t necessarily that strong in many cases. So, these questions lend themselves to Process of Elimination perhaps more than any other question type.
- Avoid trap choices: MSS questions are devious because the answer could be the unstated Main Idea of the passage or a combination of two lines.