The Graph Above Depicts the Relative Increase in Autism in Children

question 44

Multiple Choice

The graph above depicts the relative increase in autism in children from 1997 to 2007 living in California. In 2001, the additive thimerosal was removed from most childhood vaccines. Based on the information presented in the graph, what can be concluded about the hypothesis that thimerosal causes autism?

• A) Thimerosal, at the very least, contributes to the occurrence of autism as evidenced by the almost logarithmic increase in children with autism from 2001 to 2007.
• B) Prior to 2001, thimerosal clearly influenced the cases of autism in California.
• C) A sharp decrease in the cases of autism would be expected after 2001 if thimerosal was the causative agent of autism.
• D) The results of the study are inclusive.
• E) Thimerosal requires some other agent to help induce autism.

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Definitions:

Superclass

The class from which another class (subclass) inherits fields and methods in object-oriented programming.

Method Area

A memory area in the Java Virtual Machine (JVM) that stores the class structures, such as runtime constant pool, field, and method data.

Box

An object or graphical user interface component that contains other items but can also refer to boxing conversion in programming, where a primitive type is converted into a corresponding wrapper class object.

Rectangle

A geometric shape or object with four sides at 90-degree angles, often represented in computer graphics.