172 A c a d e m ic M odule

READING PASSAGE 2

You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 15—27, which are based on

Caffeine
Almost 200 years ago, a young German chemist named Friedrich Ferdinand
Runge isolated a molecule from coffee beans; he named the substance kaffein.
Today, scientists are still studying the properties of this bitter, white powder.
More than sixty plants are known to produce caffeine, whose pungent taste helps
protect them from insect predators.
Caffeine is probably the most widely used drug in the world. Humans have
been consuming caffeine for hundreds of years, primarily in the form of coffee,
tea, and cocoa. Today, it is also added to soft drinks and energy drinks and is a
component of some over-the-counter medications. Many of the world’s people,
including children, ingest it in some form daily.
The body absorbs caffeine in less than an hour, and it remains in the system
for only a few hours, passing from the gastrointestinal tract into the bloodstream
within about ten minutes and circulating to other organs, including the brain.
Caffeine molecules are small and soluble in fat, properties that allow them to pass
through a protective shield known as the blood-brain barrier and directly target
the central nervous system.
Caffeine acts on the body in many ways, some of them probably still
unknown. However, caffeine accomplishes its principal action as a stimulant by
inhibiting adenosine, a chemical that binds to receptors on nerve cells and slows
down their activity. Caffeine binds to the same receptors, robbing adenosine of
the ability to do its job and leaving caffeine free to stimulate nerve cells, which
in turn release epinephrine (also known as adrenaline), a hormone that increases
heart rate and blood pressure, supplies an energy boost, and in general makes
people feel good.
For all its popularity, caffeine retains a somewhat negative image. It is, after
all, a mildly habit-forming stimulant that has been linked to nervousness and
anxiety and that causes insomnia. It affects most of the body’s major organs.
Recent research casts doubt on the magnitude of many of these seemingly unde­
sirable effects and even suggests that a daily dose of caffeine may reduce the risk
of some chronic diseases, while providing short-term benefits as well.
Daily caffeine consumption has been associated with lowered incidence of
type II diabetes, Parkinson’s disease, and Alzheimer’s disease. How caffeine
works to thwart diabetes, a condition characterized1 by high levels of glucose in
the blood, remains unknown, but glucose tolerance or more efficient glucose
metabolism may be involved. Parkinson’s disease, a central nervous system

1British: characterised
 A c a d e m ic M od u le — P ractice Test 5 173

disorder that causes tremor and joint stiffness, is linked to insufficient amounts
of a substance called dopamine in the brain. Caffeine may interact with brain
cells that produce dopamine and help maintain a steady supply. The role of caf­
feine in Alzheimer’s disease, which damages the brain and causes memory loss
and confusion, may be related to a problem in the blood—brain barrier, possibly
a contributor in Alzheimer’s, if not the major cause. Caffeine has been found to
protect the barrier against disruption resulting from high levels of cholesterol.
Habitual coffee and tea drinkers had long been observed to have a lower inci­
dence of non-melanoma skin cancers, although no one knew why. A recent
study found that caffeine affects skin cells damaged by ultraviolet radiation, a
main cause of skin cancer. Caffeine interferes with a protein that cancerous cells
need to survive, leaving the damaged cells to die before they become cancerous.
Drinking caffeinated coffee has also been associated with a decreased incidence
of endometrial cancer— that is, cancer of the cells lining the uterus. The
strongest effect appears to be in overweight women, who are at greatest risk for
the disease. Researchers believe blood sugar, fat cells, and estrogen may play a
role. Although the mechanism remains unknown, people who drink more than

Academic Module-Practice Test 5

two cups of coffee or tea a day reportedly have about half the risk of develop­
ing chronic liver disease as those who drink less than one cup of coffee daily;
caffeinated coffee has also been associated with lowered risk of cirrhosis and
liver cancer.
While many of caffeine’s undesirable effects, such as elevated heart rate and
blood pressure, are brief, some short-term benefits, including pain relief,
increased alertness, and increased physical endurance, have also been attributed
to caffeine. As a component of numerous over-the-counter diet pills and pain
relievers, caffeine increases their effectiveness and helps the body absorb them
more quickly. By constricting blood vessels in the brain, it can alleviate
headaches— even migraines— and can help counter the drowsiness caused by
antihistamines.
Caffeine does not alter the need for sleep, but it does offer a temporary solu­
tion to fatigue for people who need to stay alert. Research has shown that sleep-
deprived individuals who consumed caffeine had improved memory and
reasoning abilities, at least in the short term. Studies of runners and cyclists have
shown that caffeine can improve their stamina—hence its addition to energy-
boosting sports drinks.
People who consume a lot of caffeine regularly may develop temporary with­
drawal symptoms, headache being the most common, if they quit or cut back
on it abruptly. Fortunately, these symptoms last only a day or two in most
cases. Individuals who are more sensitive to the stimulatory side effects of caf­
feine may want to avoid it, but most doctors agree that the equivalent of three
cups of coffee a day does not harm healthy people. There is no medical basis
to give up daily caffeine and many reasons to include a moderate amount in
one’s diet.
174 A c a d e m ic M odule

Questions 15-23
Do the following statements agree with the information given in the passage?
On lines 15-23 on your answer sheet, write

TRUE if the statement agrees with the information

FALSE if the statement contradicts the information
NOT GIVEN if there is no information on this

15 Before 200 years ago, people did not drink coffee regularly.
16 Children generally do not consume caffeine.
17 The nervous system is affected by caffeine.
18 Caffeine causes the heart to beat faster.
19 Caffeine can be addictive.
20 Alzheimer’s disease may be caused in part by caffeine consumption.
21 Drinking coffee can help protect against some skin cancers.
22 Caffeine may increase the incidence of endometrial cancer.
23 Caffeine can help some medications work faster.

Questions 2 4 -2 7
Write the correct letter, A, B, or C, on lines 24 -2 7 on your answer sheet.

24 Caffeine is used to treat

A high blood pressure.
B liver cancer.
C headaches.
25 Some athletes use caffeine to
A increase their endurance.
B improve their speed.
C maintain their alertness.
26 Symptoms of caffeine withdrawal
A can become an ongoing problem.
B may last as long as a week.
C are usually short-lived.
27 Drinking three cups of coffee a day
A may be recommended by a doctor.
B will probably not cause problems.
C is harmful to the health.
 A c a d e m ic M o d u le — P ractice Test 5 175

READING PASSAGE 3

You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 28—40, which are based on
Reading Passage 3 below.

Animal Camouflage
The theory of natural selection, proposed by Charles Darwin almost 150 years
ago, hypothesizes that organisms with traits that give them a survival advantage
tend to live longer and produce more offspring. Over many thousands of years
of evolution, those beneficial characteristics dominate the gene pool. Animals
that use camouflage to conceal themselves from their enemies, predator and prey
alike, provide a classic example of natural selection at work. Creatures with some
type of protective coloring pass along the genes responsible, with each generation
fine-tuning them along the way, eventually providing the most effective coloring
for their environment and lifestyle. Scientists have described four types of cam­
ouflage that animals use: background matching, disruptive coloration, counter­
shading, and mimicry.
From dirt-colored chipmunks and gophers to leaf-green praying mantises and
tree frogs to ocean-gray mackerel and sharks, all sorts of wildlife use background
matching, also known as crypsis, to blend in with their surroundings. Some ani­
mals have the ability to alter their coloring as their environment changes season­
ally or as they change locations. The arctic fox and the snowshoe hare both have
white winter fur that matches the snow and ice around them, but a brown pelt
in warmer weather blends in with their woodland environs. Some reptiles and
fish can alter their surface appearance instantly as they move from place to place.
The green anole lizard changes from green to brown as it travels among leaves
and branches, whereas the flounder and other types of flatfish are able to match
not just the color but also the silty or mottled sandy texture of the ocean floor
beneath them.
Most animals, though, cannot change their appearance so easily. Because
background matching works only for a specific setting and often requires animals
to remain motionless for long periods, a somewhat more effective strategy
involves having a camouflage that works on many backgrounds, blending in with
all, but not perfectly matching any of them.
Disruptive coloration uses a pattern such as stripes or spots to disrupt the
body’s outline. The pattern breaks up the contour of the animal’s body, confus­
ing observers and making it difficult to distinguish an individual shape. Colors
with more contrast, like a tiger’s stripes, tend to increase the disruptive effect.
This type of camouflage works well for animals that travel in herds. It helps
zebras blend in not so much with their background as with each other. Their
major predator, the lion, sees a mass of moving stripes and has trouble targeting

1British: hypothesises
 176 A c a d e m ic M odule

a specific animal. A single zebra, on the other hand, may use background match­
ing when hiding in tall grass, where its black and white stripes merge with the
green and yellow stalks. The different colors of the grasses and zebra are no help
to a lion, which is color-blind.1
Animals with countershading typically have a dark backside and a light belly,
which affect an onlooker’s perception of their three-dimensional appearance
and help decrease their visibility in sunlight. Countershading also can create a
more uniformly dark appearance, presenting an apparent lack of depth.
Caterpillars make good use of this effect, which gives them a flat look that
blends in with tree bark.
Countershading is useful to birds and marine animals that are typically seen
against a light environment from below and against dark surroundings from above.
Predatory birds like hawks take advantage of it to conceal themselves from the
small birds and rodents they hunt. While in flight, a dark back absorbs the sun­
I,
light above them and a light underside reflects the light below, diminishing telltale
shadows that might give them away. On the ground or in a tree, their mottled
brown feathers blend in with branches and leaves. Penguins also use countershad­
Academic Module-Practice Test 5

ing. Their white chests and black backs stand out on land but disappear in water
where penguins spend most of their time. They are almost invisible to an observer
looking down into dark water, while a creature in deeper water looking up sees a
splash of white that looks like a beam of sunlight.
Mimicry, or masquerading, works not by hiding a creature but by making it
appear to be something else. Walking stick insects are virtually indistinguishable
from twigs, and katydids look so much like green leaves that leaf-eating insects
have been observed trying to chew on them.
A type of mimicry known as aposematism involves masquerading as an animal
that is undesirable or even dangerous. Predators bypass the foul-tasting monarch
butterfly, but they also avoid the tasty look-alike viceroy butterfly. Coral snake
impersonators, like the harmless scarlet snake, have the same red, black, and yel­
low bands but in a different order: black, yellow, red, yellow on the coral snake
and red, black, yellow, black on the scarlet snake. Different types of moths use
aposematism to scare off predators; some species have a big spot on each wing to
mimic the eyes of a large animal, while the hawk moth caterpillar has a pattern
on its rear that looks like a snake head.
Some predators use what is known as aggressive mimicry to disguise them­
selves as something harmless so they can catch prey off guard. Small animals are
not afraid of turkey vultures, which are scavengers, not predators. So when the
similar zone-tailed hawk flies with a group of turkey vultures, it has an easy time
locating and zeroing in on its living prey.
No single type of camouflage works best in all situations, and many animals use
more than one technique to enhance their ability to avoid detection by predator
and prey alike.

1British: colour-blind.
 A c a d e m ic M o d u le — P ractice Test 5 177

Questions 2 8 -3 6
Complete the summary below. Choose N O M O R E TH A N TH REE W ORDS
from the passagefor each answer.
Write your answers on lines 28—3 6 on your answer sheet.

Camouflage helps animals hide from both 2 8 _____________________ _

Animals pass on their 2 9 _____________________ through their genes.
There are four different types of camouflage. In background matching, an
animal’s appearance helps it 3 0 _____________________ with its environment.
The arctic fox and snowshoe hare are examples of animals that
3 1 _____________________ with the seasons. However, not all animals can
easily change their appearance. Many use a different strategy, having camouflage
that helps them disguise themselves 3 2 _____________________ Animals with
disruptive coloration have marking such as 3 3 _____________________ that
make it difficult for a predator to discern the shape of the body. Therefore, the
predator has a hard time targeting one animal out of a group. Although zebras
are black and white, they can hide in tall grass because their major predator is
34 . 3 5 _____________ _______ is a type of
camouflage that helps hide animals that are seen from above or below. Penguins,
for example, have 3 6 _____________________ , which help them blend in
with the dark water from the point of view of an observer standing above.

Do the following statements agree with the information in the passage? On lines
on your answer sheet, write:

TRUE if the statement agrees with the information

FALSE if the statement contradicts the information
NOT GIVEN if there is no information on this

37 The walking stick insect looks like a small stick.

38 The viceroy butterfly is similar in appearance to the monarch butterfly.
39 The scarlet snake is extremely poisonous.
40 The hawk moth caterpillar is brightly colored.
Practice Test 2

READING PASSAGE 3

You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 28-41 which are based on Reading Passage
3 below.

practices new socialised forms of provision

TOURISM have developed in order to cope with the
mass character of the gazes of tourists as
opposed to the individual character of
A Tourism, holidaymaking and travel are these travel Places are chosen to be visited and
days more significant social phenomena be gazed upon because there is an
than most commentators have considered anticipation especially through
On the face of it there could not be a more daydreaming and fantasy of intense
trivial subject for a book And indeed since pleasures, either on a different scale or
social scientists have had considerable involving different senses from those
difficulty explaining weightier topics such as customarily encountered Such anticipation
work or politics it might be thought that they is constructed and sustained through a
would have great difficulties in accounting variety of non-tourist practices such as
for more trivial phenomena such as films TV literature, magazines records and
holidaymakmg However there are videos which construct and reinforce this
interesting parallels with the study of daydreaming
deviance This involves the investigation of D Tourists tend to visit features of landscape
bizarre and idiosyncratic social practices and townscape which separate them off
which happen to be defined as deviant in from everyday experience Such aspects
some societies but not necessarily in others are viewed because they are taken to be in
The assumption is that the investigation of some sense out of the ordinary The
deviance can reveal interesting and viewing of these tourist sights often
significant aspects of normal societies It involves different forms of social patterning
could be said that a similar analysis can be with a much greater sensitivity to visual
applied to tourism elements of landscape or townscape than
B Tourism is a leisure activity which is normally found in everyday life People
presupposes its opposite namely regulated linger over these sights in a way that they
and organised work It is one manifestation would not normally do in their home
of how work and leisure are organised as environment and the vision is objectified or
separate and regulated spheres of social captured through photographs postcards
practice in modern societies Indeed acting films and so on which enable the memory
as a tourist is one of the defining to be endlessly reproduced and recaptured
characteristics of being modern’ and the
popular concept of tourism is that it is E One of the earliest dissertations on the
organised within particular places and subject of tourism is Boorstins analysis of
occurs for regularised periods of time Tourist the pseudo event (1964) where he argues
relationships arise from a movement of that contemporary Americans cannot
people to and their stay in various experience reality’ directly but thrive on
destinations This necessarily involves some “pseudo events Isolated from the host
movement that is the journey and a period environment and the local people the
of stay in a new place or places The journey mass tourist travels in guided groups and
and the stay are by definition outside the finds pleasure in inauthentic contrived
normal places of residence and work and attractions gullibly enjoying the pseudo
are of a short term and temporary nature events and disregarding the real world
and there is a clear intention to return outside Over time the images generated
“home within a relatively short period of time of different tourist sights come to
constitute a closed selfperpetuating
C A substantial proportion of the population of system of illusions which provide the
modern societies engages in such tourist tourist with the basis for selecting and

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 Reading

evaluating potential places to visit Such the provision of such objects and, on the
visits are made says Boorstin, within the other hand changing class, gender, and
“environmental bubble of the familiar generational distinctions of taste within the
American style hotel which insulates the potential population of visitors It has been
tourist from the strangeness of the host said that to be a tourist is one of the
environment characteristics of the “modern experience
Not to go away is like not possessing a car
F To service the burgeoning tourist industry, or a nice house Travel is a marker of status
an array of professionals has developed in modern societies and is also thought to
who attempt to reproduce evernew objects be necessary for good health The role of
for the tourist to look at These objects or the professional, therefore, is to cater for
places are located in a complex and the needs and tastes of the tourists in
changing hierarchy This depends upon the accordance with their class and overall
interplay between, on the one hand, expectations
competition between interests involved in

Questions 28-32

Raiding Passage 3 has 6 paragraphs (A-F) Choose the most suitable heading for each
paragraph from the list of headings below Write the appropriate numbers (i-ix) in boxes 28
32 on your answer sheet Paragraph D has been done for you as an example.
NB There are more headings than paragraphs so you will not use all of them You may use any
heading more than once.

List of Headings
i The politics of tourism
ii The cost of tourism
iii Justifying the study of tourism
iv Tourism contrasted with travel
v The essence of modern tourism
vi Tourism versus leisure
vii The artificiality of modern tourism
viii The role of modern tour guides
ix Creating an alternative to the everyday experience

28 Paragraph A
29 Paragraph B
30 Paragraph C
Example Answer
Paragraph D ix

31 Paragraph E
32 Paragraph F

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