Blind to Change

How much of the world around you do you really see?

Picture the following and prepare to be amazed. You’re walking across a college campus when a
stranger asks you for directions. While you’re talking to him, two men pass between you carrying
a wooden door. You feel a moment’s irritation, but you carry on describing the route. When
you’ve finished, you’re told you’ve just taken part in a psychology experiment. “Did you notice
anything after the two men passed with the door?” the stranger asks. “No,” you reply uneasily. He
explains that the man who initially approached you walked off behind the door leaving him in his
place. The first man now rejoins you. Comparing them, you notice that they are of different
height and build and are dressed very differently.

Daniel Simons of Harvard University found that 50% of participants missed the substitution
because of what is called change blindness. When considered with a large number of recent
experimental results, this phenomenon suggests we see far less than we think we do. Rather
than logging every detail of the visual scene, says Simons, we are actually highly selective. Our
impression of seeing everything is just that. In fact, we extract a few details and rely on memory,
or even our imagination, for the rest.

Until recently, researchers thought that seeing involved making pictures in the brain. By building
detailed internal representations of the world, and comparing them over time, we could spot any
changes. Then in Consciousness Explained, the philosopher Daniel Dennett claimed that our
brains hold only a few salient details about the world – and that is why we are able to operate
successfully. This phenomenon, known as change blindness, demonstrates that we don’t actually
see as much of the world as we believe. While it might seem that our eyes capture every detail of
a scene, our brains often only register a fraction of it, relying heavily on memory and inference to
fill in the gaps. This selective attention has broader implications than we might expect, extending
into many aspects of our daily lives.

The simple act of driving. How many times have you missed a traffic signal change because your
attention was momentarily diverted? This is not just a matter of distraction but a failure of our
visual system to detect changes that do not seem immediately relevant. Researchers have even
demonstrated that people can miss significant alterations in visual scenes, such as the
appearance or disappearance of large objects, especially when their attention is focused
elsewhere. One famous experiment involved showing participants a video of a basketball game.
They were instructed to count the number of passes made by one team. In the middle of the
game, a man in a gorilla suit walked through the scene, yet many participants failed to notice
him.
This experiment highlights how attention can be so narrowly focused on a specific task that we
become blind to other, seemingly obvious, changes around us.

Simons’ work on change blindness reveals how our brain constructs a coherent reality out of
fragments. The brain’s ability to focus on what’s deemed important at the time can lead to
significant gaps in our perception. We may believe that we are aware of everything happening
around us, but in reality, we only see what we need to see at that moment.

The implications of change blindness extend beyond simple experiments. In real-world

situations, such as witnessing a crime or driving, our selective attention can have serious
consequences. Eyewitness testimonies, for instance, may be unreliable because individuals often
do not register all the details of an event, especially if their attention was focused elsewhere. This
raises important questions about how much we can trust our perceptions and memories.
Psychologist Christopher Chabris, who worked with Simons on the gorilla experiment, argues
that understanding the limitations of our perception can help us better understand how the
brain works. Rather than assuming that we see the world as it is, we must recognize that our
experience of reality is shaped by our expectations, prior knowledge, and the limited capacity of
our visual system.

The phenomenon of change blindness underscores the complexity of human perception. Our
brains, while powerful, are not perfect recording devices. They prioritize information, often
missing or altering details in the process. This selective attention allows us to function in a
complex world but also leaves us vulnerable to mistakes and misinterpretations. As we continue
to explore the intricacies of perception, it becomes increasingly clear that what we see is not
always what is there.

27.​What is the main topic of the passage?​

A) The impact of selective attention on driving​

B) The limitations of human perception and attention​

C) The history of psychological experiments​

D) The effectiveness of memory in recognizing changes

28.​What does Daniel Simons’ experiment demonstrate?​

A) That people notice changes if they are significant​

B) That people are always aware of their surroundings​

C) That change blindness is a common phenomenon​

D) That visual memory is accurate and reliable

29.​What was the result of the basketball game experiment?​

A) Most participants noticed the man in the gorilla suit​

B) Only a few participants counted the passes correctly​

C) Many participants failed to notice the man in the gorilla suit​

D) Participants were distracted by the game and missed all changes

30.​What did participants fail to notice in Simons’ experiment?​

A) The change in the direction they were walking​

B) The substitution of the person asking for directions​

C) The presence of a wooden door between them​

D) The sudden disappearance of the stranger

31.​What does the phenomenon of change blindness suggest?​

A) People can remember every detail they see​

B) People often miss significant changes in their environment​

C) Visual scenes are accurately captured by the brain​

D) Our brains create detailed images of the world

32.​What did the basketball game experiment reveal about attention?​

A) Participants were more focused on the gorilla than the game​

B) People are always aware of their surroundings​

C) Attention to one task can lead to missing obvious changes​

D) Visual distractions do not affect attention

33.​Why might eyewitness testimonies be unreliable, according to the passage?​

A) People tend to exaggerate what they see​

B) Visual memories are often incomplete and selective​

C) Witnesses are easily distracted during important events​

D) Everyone perceives reality in the same way

Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 3?

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

34. Researchers have always believed that our brains capture every detail of a visual

scene.​

35. Daniel Dennett’s theory suggested that our brains store detailed pictures of the

world.​

36. Eyewitness testimonies are completely reliable according to the passage.

Look at the following statements (Questions 37-40) and the list of researchers below.

37. Daniel Simons​

38. Daniel Dennett​

39. Christopher Chabris​

40. John Grimes

A) Suggested that the brain holds only a few details at a time​

B) Conducted the basketball game and gorilla suit experiment​

C) Demonstrated change blindness during eye movements​

D) Found that 50% of participants did not notice a change in a person​

E) Showed that people notice all changes if they are significant​

F) Studied the effects of long-term memory on perception

IELTS Reading – Practice Test 12

Reading Passage 1
Synaesthesia
A Imagine a page with a square box in the middle. The box is lined with rows of the number 5, repeated over and
over. All of the 5s are identical in size, font and colour, and equally distributed across the box. There is, however, a
trick: among those 5s, hiding in plain sight is a single, capital letter S. Almost the same in shape, it is impossible to
spot without straining your eyes for a good few minutes. Unless, that is, you are a grapheme-colour synaesthete - a
person who sees each letter and number in different colours. With all the 5s painted in one colour and the rogue S
painted in another, a grapheme-colour synaesthete will usually only need a split second to identify the latter.
B Synaesthesia, loosely translated as "senses coming together" from the Greek words syn ("with") and aesthesis
("sensation"), is an interesting neurological phenomenon that causes different senses to be combined. This might
mean that words have a particular taste (for example, the word "door" might taste like bacon), or that certain smells
produce a particular colour. It might also mean that each letter and number has its own personality - the letter A
might be perky, the letter B might be shy and self-conscious, etc. Some synaesthetes might even experience other
people's sensations, for example feeling pain in their chest when they witness a film character get shot. The
possibilities are endless: even though synaesthesia is believed to affect less than 5% of the general population, at
least 60 different combinations of senses have been reported so far. What all these sensory associations have in
common is that they are all involuntary and impossible to repress, and that they usually remain quite stable over
time.
C Synaesthesia was first documented in the early 19th century by German physician Georg Sachs, who dedicated
two pages of his dissertation on his own experience with the condition. It wasn't, however, until the mid-1990s that
empirical research proved its existence, when Professor Simon Baron-Cohen and his colleagues used fMRls on six
synaesthetes and discovered that the parts of the brain associated with vision were active during auditory
stimulation, even though the subjects were blindfolded.
D What makes synaesthesia a particularly interesting condition is that it isn't an illness at all. If anything,
synaesthetes often report feeling sorry for the rest of the population, as they don't have the opportunity to
experience the world in a multisensory fashion like they do. Very few drawbacks have been described, usually
minimal: for instance, some words might have an unpleasant taste (imagine the word "hello" tasting like spoilt
milk), while some synaesthetes find it distressing when they encounter people with names which don't reflect their
personality (imagine meeting a very interesting person named "Lee", when the letter E has a dull or hideous colour
for you - or vice versa). Overall, however, synaesthesia is widely considered more of a blessing than a curse and it
is often linked to intelligence and creativity, with celebrities such as Lady Gaga and Pharrell Williams claiming to
have it.
E Another fascinating side of synaesthesia is the way it could potentially benefit future generations. In a 2013
study, Dr Witthoft and Dr Winawer discovered that grapheme-colour synaesthetes who had never met each other
before experienced strikingly similar pairings between graphemes and colours-pairings which were later traced
back to a popular set of Fischer-Price magnets that ten out of eleven participants distinctly remembered possessing
as children. This was particularly peculiar as synaesthesia is predominantly considered to be a hereditary condition,
and the findings suggested that a synaesthete's environment might play a determining role in establishing
synaesthetic associations. If that was true, researchers asked, then might it not be possible that synaesthesia can
actually be taught?

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IELTS Reading – Practice Test 12

F As it turns out, the benefits of teaching synaesthesia would be tremendous. According to research conducted by
Dr Clare Jonas at the University of East London, teaching people to create grapheme-colour associations the same
way as a synaesthete may have the possibility to improve cognitive function and memory. As she put it, 'one
possibility is guarding against cognitive decline in older people - using synaesthesia in the creation of mnemonics
to remember things such as shopping lists.' To that end, researchers in the Netherlands have already begun
developing a web browser plug-in that will change the colours of certain letters. Rothen and his colleagues
corroborate the theory: in a paper published in 2011, they suggest that synaesthesia might be more than a hereditary
condition, as the non-synaesthetic subjects of their study were able to mimic synaesthetic associations long after
leaving the lab.
G There is obviously still a long way to go before we can fully understand synaesthesia and what causes it. Once
we do, however, it might not be too long before we find out how to teach non-synaesthetes how to imitate its
symptoms in a way that induces the same benefits 4.4% of the world's population currently enjoy.
Questions 1-7
The reading passage has 7 paragraphs, A-G. Which paragraph contains the following information?
1 some of the disadvantages related to synaesthesia __
2 what scientists think about synaesthesia's real-life usefulness __
3 a prediction for the future of synaesthesia __
4 an example of how grapheme-colour synaesthesia works __
5 a brief history of synaesthesia __
6 some of the various different types of synaesthesia __
7 information about a study that suggests synaesthetic symptoms aren't arbitrary __
Questions 8-11
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 1?
Write
TRUE if the statement is true according to the passage
FALSE if the statement is false according to the passage
NOT GIVEN if the information is not given in the passage
8 There are 60 different types of synaesthesia.
9 Before Professor Simon Baron-Cohen's research, synaesthesia was thought to be
a myth.
10 A lot of celebrities are affected by synaesthesia.
11 Most scientists believe that synaesthesia runs in families.
Questions 12-14
Complete the summary.
Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage for each answer.
Synaesthesia is a unique neurological condition that causes different senses to get mixed. Recent research has
suggested that teaching synaesthesia to non-synaesthetes can enhance 12 _____ and guard against the deterioration
of cognitive 13 _____ ; unfortunately, it might be a while before we come up with a beneficial way to 14 _____ it
to the general population.

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IELTS Reading – Practice Test 12

Reading Passage 2
The Tamam Shud Case
It has been more than 65 years since the Taman Shud case was first opened, but this notoriously bizarre murder
mystery from Australia continues to baffle scientific investigators and crime aficionados from around the world
today.
On the morning of 1st December 1948, the body of an unidentified man was discovered propped against a rock
wall on Somerton beach in Adelaide, opposite the Crippled Children's home. The man was around 40-45 years old,
had an athletic figure and was dressed in a smart suit and tie. He had no form of ID on him and all the labels on his
clothes had been removed. The only things found on his body were an unused 10:50 a.m. ticket from Adelaide
Railway Station to Henley Beach for the 30th November, a packet of chewing gums, an aluminium comb, a packet
of cigarettes, a box of Bryan & May matches, sixpence and a small piece of paper with the words "Tam am shud"
printed on it - which means "ended" or "finished" in Persian. To make matters more interesting, the autopsy
revealed that his death had been unnatural, but determined no cause of death: although he had clearly died of heart
failure, his heart had been healthy and no signs of violence or poisoning were discovered in his system.
The case garnered media attention almost immediately, with dozens of people with missing friends and relatives
travelling to Adelaide to have a look at the Somerton man's body - but none of them being able to positively
identify him. The next piece of evidence came when a journalist named Frank Kennedy discovered that the piece of
paper with the printed words had been ripped from the last page of The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, a book of
collected poems by Omar Khayyam, an 11th century Persian poet. Following pleas by the police for the public to
check their copies of The Rubaiyat for any missing pages, a local man brought in the correct copy, which he
reported having found in the back seat of his car six months earlier, around the time the corpse had been
discovered.
This is where things get even more complicated: in the back of the book, police discovered five lines of letters that
appeared to be some sort of secret code. In the back cover, they also found a phone number which led them to a 27-
year-old woman known as "Jestyn" who lived on Moseley Street, a stone's throw from the crime scene. Jestyn
denied any knowledge of the man and was generally guarded and non-committal throughout the police interview.
Nevertheless, the police decided not to pursue the lead. As for the code? Despite years of research by cryptology
experts and students, no one has managed to crack it to this day.
It's not just the mysterious code, however, that makes this case so popular with crime fans. It's been more than half
a century since the man's death, but his identity is still a mystery. Although copies of the victim's fingerprints and
photograph, as well as the name "T. Keane" (which was written on some labels found in his suitcase) were sent
around the world to all Commonwealth countries, the search turned up no results. Some theories regarding the
man's origins have arisen over the years, with many believing that he was American due to the predominantly US
way the stripes slanted on his tie, his aluminium comb (rare in Australia at the time) and the belief that Americans
were far more likely to chew gum than Australians in the 1940s. Others also theorise that he was Jestyn's lover, and
perhaps even a Soviet spy agent - although this all still remains just speculation for now.
Interest in the case was rekindled in 2013, following an interview on the show 60 Minutes with Kate Thompson,
the daughter of "Jestyn" - whose actual name was revealed to be Jo Thompson. Kate Thompson claimed that her
mother had lied to the police about not knowing the Somerton Man. She also said her mother was a Soviet spy with
a "dark side" and that she might've been responsible for the man's murder. Also participating in the show were

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IELTS Reading – Practice Test 12

Roma and Rachel Egan, wife and daughter respectively of Kate Thompson's late brother Robin, whom many
believe to have been the Somerton man's son. The two women have backed a request to get the man's body
exhumed in the interest of proving this claim, which they also believe to be correct. A similar bid had been rejected
previously in 2011 by Attorney-General John Rau, citing insufficient "public interest reasons". There is currently a
petition on Change.org, as well as an lndiegogo campaign to raise funds in support of solving the case.
Questions 15-20
Complete the timeline below.
Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from Reading Passage 2 for each answer.
1948, November 30th - The Somerton Man misses a train to 15 ________.
1948, December 1st - The Somerton Man's body is discovered on Somerton beach
1948, December 2nd - Post mortem reveals no 16 ________.
1949, January 14th - Adelaide Railway Station discover deceased man's suitcase
1949, July 22nd - A businessman from Somerton hands in copy of poem book that contains the 17 ________ and
Jestyn's 18 ________ .
1949, July 25th - Police visit Jestyn at her house on 19 ________ to speak with her - she remains 20 ________
during questioning.
Questions 21-24
Complete each sentence with the correct ending A-G below.
21 The code written on the back of The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam
22 Journalist Frank Kennedy
23 The identity of the woman to whom the phone number belonged
24 Kate Thompson's sister-in-law
A believes her daughter is related to the Somerton man.
B has tried to solve it for decades with no results.
C was revealed by her daughter in 2013.
D inadvertently assisted the police in their investigation.
E was only named as "Jestyn".
F remains a mystery.
G revealed that Jo Thompson was a cruel Soviet spy.
Questions 25-28
Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D.
25 According to the autopsy on the Somerton man
A his heart failed for no reason.
B there were traces of poison in his system.
C he was physically fit.
D there was nothing wrong with his heart.

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IELTS Reading – Practice Test 12

26 The copy of The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam with the missing page
A was discovered in a local man's garage.
B was in a local man's possession for six months after the murder.
C was discovered by a local man six months after the murder.
D was found by journalist Frank Kennedy.
27 One of the reasons many believe that the Somerton Man was American is that
A he wasn't found in any database in Commonwealth countries.
B he had been chewing a gum before his death.
C his tie had an American pattern of stripes.
D the name "T. Keane" was found in his suitcase.
28 Roma and Rachel Egan
A are critical of attempts to exhume the Somerton man's body.
B disagree that Robin Thompson was the Somerton man's son.
C backed the request that was rejected in 2011 by Rau.
D voiced their beliefs on the same programme as Kate Thompson.

Reading Passage 3
Coinage in Ancient Greece
A There are more than 170 official national currencies currently in circulation around the world - and while they
may differ greatly in value, most show a high degree of commonality when it comes to their design. Typically, a
coin or banknote will feature the effigy of a notable politician, monarch or other personality from the country of
origin on one side and a recognisable state symbol (e.g. a building or an animal) on the reverse. This pattern, which
has been around for more than 21 centuries, originated in ancient Greece.
B Prior to the invention of legal tender, most transactions in the ancient world took the form of trading a product or
service for another. As sea trade grew in the Mediterranean, however, the once popular barter system became hard
to maintain for two reasons: firstly, because it was tricky to calculate the value of each item or service in relation to
another, and secondly, because carrying large goods (such as animals) on boats to do trade with neighbouring cities
was difficult and inconvenient. Therefore, the need soon arose for a commonly recognised unit that would
represent a set value - what is known today as a currency. As Aristotle explains in Politics, metal coins naturally
became the most popular option due to the fact that they were easy to carry, and didn't run the risk of expiring.
According to ancient Greek historian Herodotus, the first coins were invented in 620 BC in the town of Lydia,
although some theorise that they actually originated in the city of Ionia. (Coins had already existed for nearly 400
years in China, unbeknownst to Europeans.)
C Much like with every other form of ancient Greek art, the history of ancient Greek coins can be divided into
three distinct chronological periods: the Archaic (600- 480 BC), the Classic (480-330 BC) and the Hellenistic
Period (330-lst century BC). As ancient Greece was not a united country like today, but rather comprised of many
independent city-states known as poleis, each state produced its own coins. The island of Aegina was the first to
mint silver coins, perhaps adopting the new system upon witnessing how successfully it had facilitated trade for the
Ionians. Aegina being the head of a confederation of seven states, it quickly influenced other city-states in the
Mediterranean and the new method of trade soon became widespread. Up until approximately 510 BC, when

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IELTS Reading – Practice Test 12

Athens began producing its own coin, the Aegina coin - which featured a turtle on its surface - was the most
predominant in the region.
D The tetradrachm, Athens's new coin bearing the picture of an owl on its obverse as a tribute to the city's
protector, the goddess Athena, brought with it a shift in the world of coinage. Prior to the tetradrachm, Athenians
had been using simple iron rods known as 'obols' for currency. As the average human hand could grasp about six
obols, that number soon came to represent a 'drachma' (from the Greek verb 'dratto', which means 'to grasp') - so
the new tetradrachm had the same value as 24 obols. With Athens continually growing in power, the tetradrachm
soon replaced the Aegina 'turtle' as the most preponderant coin in the region. It was around that time that an
agreement akin to way the EU's euro currency functions also appeared, with different coins from all over the
Mediterranean being made to the same standards as the Athenian coin (albeit with each city's own symbols on
them) and being used interchangeably among the trading city-states.
E Coinage soon spread beyond those city-states. Romans abandoned the bronze bars they'd been using in favour of
coins around the year 300 BC, and Alexander the Great and his father King Philip of Macedonia began to produce
massive quantities of coins to fund their military escapades around the same time. It was with the death of the
latter, in 336 BC, that the Hellenistic Period began. Two things characterise the Hellenistic Period: the introduction
of a "type" (the design that coins were stamped with) on the reverse of the coins, and mass production, which
mostly took place in kingdoms beyond the Greek city-states, such as Egypt, Syria and the far east. Another new
feature, which was heavily criticised by the Greeks, was the introduction of profiles of kings and other important
living figures as stamps in lieu of the traditional symbols of animals and buildings. Athens, still a powerful city at
the time, eschewed these designs and continued to produce its own tetradrachm coins, even introducing - a new
style coin characterised by broad, thin flans - a design which became popular across the Agean and lasted until the
spread of Roman rule over Greece.
F It's not difficult to see why ancient Greek coins continue to fascinate coin collectors and historians today. They
marked the beginning of a new era in business and introduced a model of trade in Europe that is still present
nowadays; they greatly influenced the design of modern coinage, with symbols such as the owl (which can be seen
on the Greek version of the euro today) and portraits of important personalities; and, since they were hand-made to
high technical standards representative of ancient Greek perfectionism, many are even remarkable in their own
right, as tiny metal works of art.
Questions 29-34
The reading passage has six paragraphs, A-F. Choose the correct heading for paragraphs A-F from the list of
headings below.
List of Headings
I The beginning of the Archaic period
II The Athenian obol replaces the turtle
III How product exchange became insufficient
IV Roman and Macedonian coins
V The relevance of ancient Greek coins today
VI New cities introduce new design rules
VII A precursor of the modern euro
VIII The difference between Ionian and Lydian coins
IX Modern coin designs and their origin

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IELTS Reading – Practice Test 12

29 Paragraph A __
30 Paragraph B __
31 Paragraph C __
32 Paragraph D __
33 Paragraph E __
34 Paragraph F __
Questions 35-38
Answer the questions below with words taken from Reading Passage 3.
Use NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS for each answer.
35 What were the ancient Greek city-states commonly known as? ______
36 Which type did the Aegina coin use? ______
37 What was the value of a drachma in ancient Athens? ______
38 What did the Romans use prior to the introduction of coins? ______
Questions 39-40
Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D.
39 The Athenian Hellenistic-period tetradrachm coin
A replaced the owl type with the profile of a king.
B was a thin, wide metal disk.
C remained popular under Roman rule.
D was massively produced in Syria and Egypt.
40 Ancient Greek coins
A are still a method of trade in Europe nowadays.
B are remarkably different from modern coins.
C are a fine example of ancient Greek art.
D were a tribute to the goddess Athena, protector of Athens.

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IELTS Reading – Practice Test 12

Answer Keys
IELTS Reading Section 1
1. D. 'Disadvantages' from the questions are paraphrased as 'drawbacks' in the text of Paragraph D.
2. F. Second and third sentences of Paragraph F mention the potential usefulness of the condition. Even
though Paragraph E mentions a study on how it could be of benefit to future generations, no real-life
examples of its application are listed.
3. G. The prediction in paragraph G is to find out ways of using the benefits of this condition by general
population. Paragraph E has the phrase 'future generations' in the first sentence
4. A. 'Grapheme-colour synaesthesia' is the keyword here and it can be found in the middle of Paragraph A.
Paragraph B describes more general cases that are not limited to grapheme-colour case.
5. C. From the very first sentence of Paragraph C the answer is evident.
6. B. From second sentence onwards we are given various kinds of synaesthesia.
7. E. 'Arbitrary' means 'based on chance, not planned'. The studies state the opposite - in other words,
according to these studies the symptoms of synaesthesia are predetermined or based on certain factors.
Paragraph E suggests that synaesthesia 'can be taught' - in other words it is a factor that can be controlled.
8. FALSE. Paragraph B, last but one sentence states: 'at least 60 different combinations of senses have been
reported so far'. So saying there are 60 types is false - the bit 'at least' suggests that there can be more,
whereas saying that there are only 60 limits it to this number.
9. NOT GIVEN. Nothing is mentioned about synaesthesia believed to be a myth. Second sentence of
Paragraph C states that 'empirical research proved its existence', but there was no doubt expressed about its
actual existence. Remember how in TRUE/FALSE/NOT GIVEN tasks you shouldn't infer and speculate,
but instead operate with the solid facts taken from the text.
10.NOT GIVEN. Last sentence of Paragraph D names two celebrities affected by synaesthesia. We can
neither confirm nor deny that 'a lot of celebrities' are affected by it based on two people. In any case, no
such information is given in the text.
11.TRUE. In the middle of Paragraph E: 'synaesthesia is predominantly considered to be a hereditary
condition'. The word 'hereditary' means 'passed from parents to children, from one generation to another'.
12.Memory. 'Enhance' in the questions has similar meaning to 'improve' from the text. The answer to this and
the next question are found in the middle of Paragraph F.
13.Function. See question 12. Note that you should always use words from the text. Even though using the
word 'ability' would be grammatically and lexically correct, it is not used in the relevant sentence from the
text and therefore shouldn't be picked for the answer.
14.Teach. Paragraph G mentions how it could take some time before scientists come up with ways to teach
people synaesthesia.

IELTS Reading Section 2

15.Henley Beach. Paragraph Two, fourth sentence. Two things to note here: first is that preposition 'to'
indicates destination, second is that both words should be capitalised, otherwise the answer won't be
counted as correct.

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IELTS Reading – Practice Test 12

16.Cause of death. 'Post mortem' is paraphrased as 'autopsy', both mean post-death examination of body, often
to determinate the reason for death. Answering 'sings of violence/poisoning' is incorrect as one answer does
not include the other, and 'cause of death' in this case is more general and preferred.
17.(Secret) code. Paragraph Four, first sentence states that a secret code was found in the book.
18.(Phone) number. Second sentence of Paragraph four - Jestyn's phone number was found along with the
secret code.
19.Moseley Street. Preposition 'on' helps to understand that it is the street name that should go in the gap.
Don't forget to capitalise both words, otherwise it won't be scored.
20.Guarded and non-committal. Note that non-committal is a compound adjective and therefore is counted
as one word. If you omit either word you won't get a point. There are no half-points in IELTS.
21.F. Last two sentences of Paragraph Four ('As for the code?')
22.D. Paragraph Three, second sentence. The word 'inadvertently' means 'unintentionally'. This is a rare case of
having to go back in text to find the answer. This will happen several times in this text.
23.C. Last Paragraph, third sentence. Jestyn's daughter reveals that her mother was a Soviet spy.
24.A. The answer is in the middle of last paragraph: '... whom many believe to have been the Somerton man’s
son'.
25.D. Last sentence of Paragraph Two. The choice here is between A and D: 'although he had clearly died of
heart failure, his heart had been healthy'. A doesn't fit as nothing is mentioned of the reason - whether there
was or wasn't one. However, it is clearly states that his heart was in good state - there was nothing wrong
with it.
26.B. Paragraph Three, last sentence. Here we struggle to choose between B and C. Answer C implies that the
the book had been found six months after the murder, which is true. However, Answer B is more complete
as it states that the man had had that book in his car all that time, although he had not been aware of it.
27.C. Paragraph Five, last but one sentence. The slant of the tie pattern is clearly mentioned here. Chewing
gum shouldn't be picked for two reasons - first, it is a supporting argument at the end of the sentence and
second, it is unknown whether he had in fact chewed gum before his death, the chewing gum was just in his
possession.
28.D. Last paragraph: 'Also participating in the show were Roma and Rachel Egan.

IELTS Reading Section 3

29.IX. This is a very straightforward answer. V - relevance of Greek coins can't be used here as it is only a
minor point.
30.III. The paragraph focuses on flaws of barter system and how with the growth of Mediterranean trade a
new form of exchange appeared.
31.I. A good reference point can be found at the end of the paragraph: 'Up until approximately 510 BC'. At the
beginning of the paragraph three distinct periods are mentioned, and then the paragraph refers to the first -
Archaic one.
32.VII. 'Precursor' is something that existed before the thing that influenced it. For example, a cart is a
precursor of the modern automobile. Thus, the system adopted in Athens was an earlier design of what is
now used in the European Union.
33.VI. A number of states and cities are mentioned such as Egypt, Syria and Athens, all coming up with their
own rules and patterns of coin design.

Page 9
IELTS Reading – Practice Test 12

34.V. Ancient Greek coins remain desirable both as items of a great historical period and as things of beautiful
design.
35.Poleis. Paragraph Two, second sentence. Make sure to get the spelling right.
36.Turtle. There were several 'types' of coins, including a 'turtle' type. Another type mentioned in the text is
the tetradrachm.
37.Six obols/6 obols. The answer is in the third sentence of Paragraph C. Do not confuse it with tetradrachm,
which is 24 obols.
38.Bronze bars. Second sentence of Paragraph E mentions the Romans giving up using bronze bars in favour
of coins around 300 BC.
39.B. Answers A, C and D generally refer to coins of Hellenistic period, whereas only answer B is true for
coins made in Athens during that period (last sentence of Paragraph E).
40.C. Last paragraph of the text focuses on the aesthetic value of the coins of Ancient Greece and how they are
a worthy example of art of that time and place.

Vocabulary
The vocabulary below is meant to help you with the more difficult words. If the word isn’t on the list then you are
either supposed to know it or it is too specific to be worth learning and you don’t have to know it to answer the
question. Symbols in brackets mean part of speech (see bottom of the list). Sentences in italics give examples of
usage for some more complex words and phrases.
And remember — you are not given a vocabulary list (or a dictionary) at your real exam.

Reading Section 1
Strain (v) - to stretch or apply pressure to something. Can also be used figuratively. Her witty remark really
strained our relationship.
Rogue (adj) - behaving in an unusual or unexpected way that is usually harmful. This cellphone operator is known
for its rogue practice of overcharging its clients.
Perky (adj) - happy and energetic. The new employee was a perky girl in her late twenties.
Self-conscious (adj) - shy, lacking confidence and uncomfortable because you're too worried about other people's
opinions of you. I couldn't help being self-conscious in my school years, I worried about things too much.
Witness (v) - to see something in person, be present when something happens. I witnessed a huge row between our
employees in the company cafeteria today.
Blindfolded (adj) - with one's eyes covered by something like a piece of fabric. You don't expect me to walk across
this busy street blindfolded, do you?
Drawback (n) - a negative aspect of something, a disadvantage. One of the major drawbacks of having a full-time
job is that you have almost no time for yourself.
Peculiar (adj) - unusual or strange, sometimes unpleasantly so. There was a peculiar smell in our kitchen I
couldn't find the source of.
Hereditary (adj) - being passed from parents to children, from one generation to the next. This disease is not
hereditary, so you shouldn't be worried about it at all!
Tremendous (adj) - impressively big in amount, size, or exceptionally good. Unexpectedly, the school play turned
out to be a tremendous success.

Page 10
IELTS Reading – Practice Test 12

Corroborate (v) - to add proof or additional information to some statement. The scientists corroborated the
research in quantum physics.
Cognitive decline - a process when one's intelligence, memory and other brain functions become worse or slower.
It is believed that learning foreign languages can offset cognitive decline among the elderly.

Reading Section 2
Baffle (v) - to puzzle, to make or be difficult to understand. No matter how hard I try to understand it, physics
simply baffles me.
Aficionado (n) - someone who is knowledgeable and passionate about something. This wine shop is very popular
with local aficionados.
Noncommittal (adj) - not participating, not having any opinion on something. Despite my expectations, the
majority of our class remained noncommittal when it came to choosing the school president.
Rekindle (v) - to bring back to life, to bring old feelings back. I don't think that old love can be rekindled.
Exhume (v) - to extract a body from the ground after it has been buried. I don't think it is a good idea to exhume
the corpse - it is extremely disrespectful.

Reading Section 3
Coinage (n) - the process of making coins. Coinage in some countries costs more than the actual coins produced.
Currency (n) - money used in a particular country. Tugrik is the national currency of Mongolia.
Commonality (n) - sharing something with someone, e.g. interests or experience. There is no commonality
between you two, you are completely different.
Effigy (n) - an object that represents something or someone. Sometimes used negatively. The car's front part was
adorned with a tiny effigy of a woman.
Legal tender - just another word for officially recognised money. A one hundred dollar bill is a well-known form
of a legal tender.
Transaction (n) - the act or process of exchanging things, usually financial. We have set up the meeting at ten
o'clock to conduct the transaction.
Expire (v) - if something expires, it becomes too old to be useful or edible. This milk has expired, you'd better
throw it away.
Mint (v) - to produce coins. Similar to coinage. The government has announced that it will not mint coins starting
in 2021.
Preponderant (adj) - large, significant or important. A series of preponderant events.
Escapade (n) - an out-of-ordinary act or event, usually involving danger or excitement. Julian offered to join him
in his usual weekend escapades. It was too grand an opportunity to miss.
In lieu (of) - instead of. The company offered me money in lieu of the days off I couldn't take.
Eschew (v) - to avoid something or to give something up. The policy of not hiring people from other cities should
be eschewed.

Page 11
READING PASSAGE 3​

You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 27-40, which are based on

Reading Passage 3 on pages 9 and 10.

A closer examination of a study on verbal and non-verbal messages

A study of non-verbal communication carried out in 1967 continues to be widely

quoted today. David Lapakko looks at limitations in the original study.

Description of the Study

The findings of a study on verbal and non-verbal messages in communication by

Albert Mehrabian and his colleagues at UCLA in 1967 have been quoted so

frequently that they are now often regarded as a self-evident truth.

In the first experiment, subjects were asked to listen to a recording of a female

saying the word 'maybe' in three tones of voice to convey liking, neutrality, and

disliking. The subjects were then shown photos of female faces expressing the

same three emotions and were asked to guess the emotions in the recorded voice

and the photos. It was found that the photos got more accurate responses than

the voices.

In the second experiment, subjects listened to nine recorded words spoken in

different tones of voice. Three words had positive meanings (e.g., honey), three

were neutral (e.g., oh), and three were negative (e.g., terrible). Again, the subjects

had to guess the speaker's emotions. It was found that tone of voice carried more

meaning than the individual words.

From these experiments, the researchers concluded that 7% of our feeling

towards a speaker is based on the actual words they use, 38% on their tone of

voice, and 55% on their body language (e.g., facial expression).

Methodological Issues
However, a closer look at the study reveals several limitations. The first is that the

entire study involved only 62 subjects. Of these, 25 were used to select the word

for the first experiment, while the key issue—comparing verbal and non-verbal

communication—was determined by only the 37 remaining subjects. All were

female undergraduates who participated as part of their introductory psychology

course, and their ages and academic qualifications seem remarkably uniform.

Thus, the findings may simply be a product of the nature of the sample.

Critics have also pointed out that the 7-38-55 formula is flawed since it was pieced

together from two different experiments, neither of which involved all three

channels (verbal, vocal, and facial). In addition, in the first experiment, the single

word maybe was used throughout, so it was impossible for the effects of changes

in verbal input to be assessed. The researchers intentionally used a "neutral" word

so naturally, the subjects found little meaning there. Clearly, such a methodology

lacks validity. In the real world, people communicate in a particular context and

speak in phrases and full-blown sentences, making extensive use of the

multi-faceted vehicle of language.

My concern is that interpretations of this study have gained such prominence in

our pedagogical literature. This 7-38-55 formula appears in many basic texts used

for training in public speaking, interpersonal communication, and organizational

communication.

Lessons to Consider
Clearly, one appealing aspect of the Mehrabian study is its numerical precision.

Communication is a complex phenomenon, but it seems less so when we can rely

on these three magical numbers. In contrast to the ambiguities of language,

numbers seem to possess exactness. And the popular appeal of the study has

given the 7-38-55 formula enormous credibility. There is a certain mystique about

non-verbal communication, and the continued references to this research sustain

it, encouraging people to believe in the overwhelming importance of the

non-verbal message compared with the verbal one.>> Form đăng kí giải đề thi

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Yet we know that even one well-chosen word to a colleague or friend can make or

break a communicative effort. Words do matter. Bradley (1991), one of the few

textbook writers to criticize the Mehrabian study, makes the same point when he

observes, "If we could communicate 93% of information and attitudes with vocal

and facial cues, it would be wasteful to spend time learning a language."

Mehrabian himself believes his research should not be interpreted to devalue the

role of language in communication, saying:​

"Please remember that all my findings dealt with communications of feelings

and attitudes. It is absurd to imply or suggest that the verbal portion of all

communication constitutes only 7% of the message... anytime we communicate

abstract relationships (e.g., x = y²) clearly 100% of the entire communication is

verbal" (Mehrabian, 1996).

To be fair, many textbook writers attempt to be faithful to the context of

Mehrabian's research. For example, Stewart and D'Angele (1988) write:

"Mehrabian argues that when we're uncertain about what someone's feeling, or

about how much we like him or her, we rely... only 7% on the words that are

spoken." Others try to play down the specific percentages, saying that an

understanding of the general importance of non-verbal cues is more important.

Nonetheless, other textbook authors simply use the numbers without placing any

limits on their meaning.

Conclusion
Since this relatively small study was first published, it has achieved an influence

far beyond its intended scope. We need to put it into its proper perspective and

learn some important lessons from it regarding social science research,

communication pedagogy, and the forces which have created widespread

misunderstanding about communication.

Questions 27-30
Complete the summary using the list of words and phrases, A-H, below.​

Write the correct letter, A-H, in boxes 27-30 on your answer sheet.

Mehrabian's 1967 study​

Albert Mehrabian and his colleagues carried out an influential study comparing

the 27......... of verbal and non-verbal communication. This involved two

experiments. In both experiments, subjects had to identify the 28........ being

communicated by other people. The two main areas focused on in the first

experiment were voice tones and 29........., while the second focused mainly on

voice tones and 30..........

A facial expressions​

B purposes​

C printed words​

D effects​

E word meanings​

F gender differences​

G feelings​

H characteristics

Questions 31-35
Do the following statements agree with the views of the writer in Reading

Passage 3?​

In boxes 31-35 on your answer sheet, write:

YES - if the statement agrees with the views of the writer​

NO - if the statement contradicts the views of the writer​

NOT GIVEN - if it is impossible to say what the writer thinks about this

1.​ One limitation of the study was that there were too few subjects

involved.

2.​ The fact that the subjects in the study came from a similar

background was an advantage.

3.​ The two experiments should have been carried out in a different order.

4.​ The researchers' choice of a neutral word was helpful in the context of

the study.

5.​ The study would have been more valid if it had included a range of

languages.

Questions 36-40
Choose the correct letter, A, B, C, or D.​

Write the correct letter in boxes 36-40 on your answer sheet.

1.​ What does the writer say about the numerical precision of

Mehrabian's study?​
 A. It makes the claims more attractive.​

B. It is the strongest point of the study.​

C. It will appeal to superstitious people.​

D. It allows comparison between languages.

2.​ What does the writer say about the popularity of the 7-38-55 formula?​

A. It is unlikely to maintain its present status.​

B. It is leading to an undervaluing of language.​

C. It should be applied in a more practical way.​

D. It may help understanding of non-verbal messages.

3.​ What point is Bradley making about language learning?​

A. Language could be learned more efficiently than it is.​

B. More research is needed into attitudes to communication.​

C. More should be spent looking at tone and body language.​

D. Language must be important since we make an effort to acquire it.

4.​ What does Mehrabian himself say about his findings?​

A. They are relevant to only one area of communication.​

B. It is only in maths that 100% of communication is verbal.​

C. Feelings are more difficult to communicate than numerical facts.​

D. Non-verbal communication is the main part of the message.

5.​ What is the writer's purpose in the paragraph beginning To be fair...?​

A. to justify the strong points of Mehrabian's study​

B. to outline other research on non-verbal behaviour​

C. to present varying interpretations of Mehrabian's study​

D. to show that textbooks tend to ignore non-verbal behaviour

Reading Practice

Communication in Science
A

Science plays an increasingly significant role in people’s lives, making the faithful
communication of scientific developments more important than ever. Yet such
communication is fraught with challenges that can easily distort discussions, leading to
unnecessary confusion and misunderstandings.

Some problems stem from the esoteric nature of current research and the associated
difficulty of finding sufficiently faithful terminology. Abstraction and complexity are not signs
that a given scientific direction is wrong, as some commentators have suggested, but are
instead a tribute to the success of human ingenuity in meeting the increasingly complex
challenges that nature presents. They can, however, make communication more difficult.
But many of the biggest challenges for science reporting arise because in areas of evolving
research, scientists themselves often only partly understand the full implications of any
particular advance or development. Since that dynamic applies to most of the scientific
developments that directly affect people’s lives global warming, cancer research, diet
studies – learning how to overcome it is critical to spurring a more informed scientific
debate among the broader public.

Ambiguous word choices are the source of some misunderstandings. Scientists often
employ colloquial terminology, which they then assign a specific meaning that is impossible
to fathom without proper training. The term “relativity,” for example, is intrinsically
misleading. Many interpret the theory to mean that everything is relative and there are no
absolutes. Yet although the measurements any observer makes depend on his coordinates
and reference frame, the physical phenomena he measures have an invariant description
that transcends that observer’s particular coordinates. Einstein’s theory of relativity is really
about finding an invariant description of physical phenomena. True, Einstein agreed with
the idea that his theory would have been better named “Invarianten theorie.” But the term
“relativity” was already entrenched at the time for him to change.

“The uncertainty principle” is another frequently abused term. It is sometimes interpreted as

a limitation on observers and their ability to make measurements.

But it is not about intrinsic limitations on any one particular measurement; it is about the
inability to precisely measure particular pairs of quantities simultaneously? The first
interpretation is perhaps more engaging from a philosophical or political perspective. It’s
just not what the science is about.

Even the word “theory” can be a problem. Unlike most people, who use the word to

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describe a passing conjecture that they often regard as suspect, physicists have very
specific ideas in mind when they talk about theories. For physicists, theories entail a
definite physical framework embodied in a set of fundamental assumptions about the world
that lead to a specific set of equations and predictions – ones that are borne out by
successful predictions. Theories aren’t necessarily shown to be correct or complete
immediately. Even Einstein took the better part of a decade to develop the correct version
of his theory of general relativity. But eventually both the ideas and the measurements
settle down and theories are either proven correct, abandoned or absorbed into other,
more encompassing theories.

“Global warming” is another example of problematic terminology. Climatologists predict

more drastic fluctuations in temperature and rainfall – not necessarily that every place will
be warmer. The name sometimes subverts the debate, since it lets people argue that their
winter was worse, so how could there be global warming? Clearly “global climate change”
would have been a better name. But not all problems stem solely from poor word choices.
Some stem from the intrinsically complex nature of much of modern science. Science
sometimes transcends this limitation: remarkably, chemists were able to detail the precise
chemical processes involved in the destruction of the ozone layer, making the evidence
that chlorofluorocarbon gases (Freon, for example) were destroying the ozone layer
indisputable.

A better understanding of the mathematical significance of results and less insistence on a

simple story would help to clarify many scientific discussions. For several months, Harvard
was tortured months, Harvard was tortured by empty debates over the relative intrinsic
scientific abilities of men and women. One of the more amusing aspects of the discussion
was that those who believed in the differences and those who didn’t use the same
evidence about gender-specific special ability? How could that be? The answer is that the
data shows no substantial effects. Social factors might account for these tiny differences,
which in any case have an unclear connection to scientific ability. Not much of a headline
when phrased that way, is it? Each type of science has its own source of complexity and
potential for miscommunication. Yet there are steps we can take to improve public
understanding in all cases. The first would be to inculcate greater understanding and
acceptance of indirect scientific evidence. The information from an unmanned space
mission is no less legitimate than the information from one in which people are on board.

This doesn’t mean questioning an interpretation, but it also doesn’t mean equating indirect
evidence with blind belief, as people sometimes suggest. Second, we might need different
standards for evaluating science with urgent policy implications than research with the
purely theoretical value. When scientists say they are not certain about their predictions, it
doesn’t necessarily mean they’ve found nothing substantial. It would be better if scientists
were more open about the mathematical significance of their results and if the public didn’t
treat math as quite so scary; statistics and errors, which tell us the uncertainty in a
measurement, give us the tools to evaluate new developments fairly.

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But most important, people have to recognize that science can be complex. If we accept
only simple stories, the description will necessarily be distorted. When advances are subtle
or complicated, scientists should be willing to go the extra distance to give proper
explanations and the public should be more patient about the truth. Even so, some
difficulties are unavoidable. Most developments reflect work in progress, so the story is
complex because no one yet knows the big picture.

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Questions 1-5
Choose the correct letter A, B, C or D.
Write your answers in boxes 1-5 on your answer sheet.

1. Why faithful science communication important?

A Science plays an increasingly significant role in people’s lives.

B Science is fraught with challenges public are interested in.

C The nature of complexity in science communication leads to confusion.

D Scientific inventions are more important than ever before.

2. what is the reason that the author believes for the biggest challenges for science
reporting

A phenomenon such as global warming, cancer research, diet studies is too complex.

B Scientists themselves often only partly understand the Theory of Evolution

C Scientists do not totally comprehend the meaning of certain scientific evolution

D Scientists themselves often partly understand the esoteric communication nature

3. According to the 3rd paragraph, the reference to the term and example of “theory of
relativity” is to demonstrate

A theory of relativity is about an invariant physical phenomenon

B common people may be misled by the inaccurate choice of scientific phrase

C the term “relativity,” is designed to be misleading public

D everything is relative and there is no absolutes existence

4. Which one is a good example of appropriate word choice:

A Scientific theory for the uncertainty principle

B phenomenon of Global warming

C the importance of ozone layer

D Freon’s destructive process on environmental

5. What is a surprising finding of the Harvard debates in the passage?

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A There are equal intrinsic scientific abilities of men and women.

B The proof applied by both sides seemed to be of no big difference.

C The scientific data usually shows no substantial figures to support a debated idea.

D Social factors might have a clear connection to scientific ability.

Questions 6-9
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage?
In boxes 6-9 on your answer sheet, write

TRUE if the statement is true

FALSE if the statement is false

NOT GIVEN if the information is not given in the passage

6..................... “Global warming” scientifically refers to greater fluctuations in temperature

and rainfall rather than a universal temperature rise.

7..................... More media coverage of “global warming” would help the public to
recognize the phenomenon.

8..................... Harvard debates should focus more on female scientist and male scientists

9..................... Public understanding and acceptance of indirect scientific evidence in all

cases would lead to confusion

Questions 10-14
Complete the following summary of the paragraphs of Reading Passage

Using NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the Reading Passage for each answer.

Write your answers in boxes 10-14 on your answer sheet.

Science Communication is fraught with challenges that can easily distort discussions,
leading to unnecessary confusion and misunderstandings. Firstly,
Ambiguous 10..................... are the source of some misunderstandings. Common people
without proper training do not understand clearly or deeply a specific scientific meaning via
the 11..................... scientists often employed. Besides, the measurements
any 12..................... makes can not be confined to describe in a(n)
constant 13..................... yet the phenomenon can be. What’s more, even the word “theory”
can be a problem. Theories aren’t necessarily shown to be correct or complete immediately
since scientists often evolved better versions of specific theories, a good example can be
the theory of 14...................... Thus, most importantly people have to recognize that
science can be complex.

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Solution:
1. A 8. NOT GIVEN
2. C 9. NO
3. B 10. word choices
4. D 11. colloquial terminology
5. B 12. observer
6. YES 13. invariant description
7. NOT GIVEN 14. general relativity

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READING PASSAGE 3
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 27-40, which are based on Reading Passage 3
on pages 10 and 11.

Game theory
Computer software that models human behaviour can make forecasts outsmart rivals and
transform negotiations
According to game theory, our chances of success in negotiations are based on the choices of
others. Computer models have been developed to work out how events will unfold as people and
organizations act in what they perceive to be their own best interests. Numerical values are
placed on the goals, motivations, and influence of players, and likely options are considered.
Game theory software then evaluates the ability of each of those players to influence others, and
hence predicts the course of events.
Although many individuals would feel uncomfortable having a computer make decisions for
them, many organizations run such computer simulations for law firms, companies, and
governments. But feeding software with accurate data on all the players involved is especially
tricky for political matters. Reinier van Oosten of Decide, a Dutch firm that models political
negotiations, notes that predictions may become unreliable when people unexpectedly give in to
'non-rational emotions', such as hatred, rather than pursuing what is apparently in their best
interests. However, sorting out people's motivations is much easier when making money is the
main object. Accordingly, modeling behavior using game theory is proving especially useful
when applied to economics.
Using game theory software to model auctions can be very lucrative. Consulting firms are
entering the market to help clients design profitable auctions, or to win them less expensively. In
2006, in the run-up to an online auction of radio-spectrum licenses by America's Federal
Communications Commission, Dr. Paul Milgrom, a consultant and Stanford University professor
in the United States, customized his game theory software to assist a consortium of bidders. He
was apprehensive at first, but the result was a triumph. When the auction began, Milgrom's
software tracked competitors' bids to estimate their budgets for the 1,132 licenses on offer.
Crucially, the software estimated the secret values bidders placed on specific licenses, and
determined that certain big licenses were being overvalued. Milgrom's clients were then directed
to obtain a collection of smaller, less expensive licenses instead. Two of his clients paid about a
third less than their competitors for an equivalent amount of spectrum, saving almost $1.2
billion. Such a saving makes one wonder why everyone isn't using game theory software. And, if
they were, how would that affect the game?
PA Consulting, a British firm, designs models for software based on game theory to help its
clients solve specific problems in areas from pharmaceuticals to the production of television
shows. British government agencies have asked PA Consulting to build models to test zoning
rules that govern how many of a certain type of business should be allowed to operate in one

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area. To give a simple example; if two competing ice-cream sellers share a long beach, they will
set up stalls back-to-back in the middle and stay put, explains Dr. Stephen Black, a modeller for
PA. Unfortunately for potential customers at the far ends of the beach, each seller prevents the
other from relocating no other spot would be closer to more people. Introduce a third seller,
however, and the stifling equilibrium is broken as relocations and pricing changes energize the
market. By studying a chain of events such as this, software designers can assess the effect of
change and see the patterns in possible outcomes that may occur. As a result, the use of modeling
makes clients more inclined to look at future repercussions when making business decisions,
Black says.
Where is all this heading? Alongside the increasingly elaborate modeling software, there are also
efforts to develop software that can assist in negotiation and mediation. Two decades ago, Dr.
Clara Ponsati, a Spanish academic, came up with a clever idea. She accepted that, as negotiators
everywhere know, the first side to disclose the maximum amount that it is willing to pay loses
considerable bargaining power. Without leverage, it can be pushed backward in the bargaining
process by a clever opponent. But if neither side reveals the concessions it is prepared to make,
negotiations can become very slow or collapse. However, difficult negotiations can often be
pushed along by neutral mediators, especially if they are entrusted with the secret bottom lines of
all parties. Ponsati's idea was that if a human mediator was not trusted, affordable, or available, a
computer could do the job instead. Negotiating parties would update the software with the
confidential information on their bargaining positions after each round of talks. Once positions
on both sides were no longer mutually exclusive, the software would be used to split the
difference and propose an agreement. Ponsati, now head of the Institute of Economic Analysis at
the Autonomous University of Barcelona in Spain, says such 'mediation machines' could be
employed to push negotiations forward by unlocking information that would otherwise be
withheld from an opponent.
Could mediation which has been achieved using software based on game theory spread from
auction bids and utility pricing to resolving political and military disputes? Today's game theory
software is not yet sufficiently advanced to mediate between warring countries. But one day
opponents on the brink of war might be tempted to use it to exchange information without having
to engage in conflict. According to some game theorists, opponents could learn how a war would
turn out, skip the fighting, and strike a deal. Over-optimistic, perhaps - but game theorists do
have rather an impressive track record when it comes to predicting the future.

Questions 27-31
Choose the correct letter A, B, C, or D. Write the correct letter in boxes 27-31 on your answer
sheet.
27. What does the writer suggest about game theory software in the first paragraph?
A. Traditional negotiating practices should be used to supplement the software.
B. Success of the software depends on the accuracy of the assigned.

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C. This software anticipates the outcome of future events.
D. Future business negotiations will be dominated by this software.
28. Reinier van Oosten says predicting what people will do works best if
A. Participants are honest about how they feel.
B. There is a good understanding of the client's culture.
C. People strongly dislike the other party.
D. Profit is the primary motivator.
29. After using game theory software in 2006, Dr. Milgrom instructed his clients to
A. Buy big licenses.
B. Negotiate with the other parties directly.
C. Make one big offer at the end of the auction.
D. Purchase a mix of licenses.
30. The writer refers to Stephen Black's ice-cream seller example in order to
A. Show the impact new competitors have on business.
B. Highlight the importance of location on business success.
C. Demonstrate that businesses must follow a strategy.
D. Clarify how pricing affects sales.
31. Ponsati believes business negotiations are more likely to progress if
A. A solution is proposed by one of the interested parties.
B. Mediators or computers take over the bargaining process.
C. Both parties follow the rules of negotiating.
D. Sufficient time is allowed for the bargaining process.

Questions 32-35
Do the following statements agree with the claims of the writer in Reading Passage 3?
In boxes 32-35 on your answer sheet, write
YES if the statement agrees with the claims of the writer
NO if the statement contradicts the claims of the writer
NOT GIVEN if it is impossible to say what the writer thinks about this

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32. Game theory software may be unhelpful when dealing with political issues.
33. Dr. Milgrom was confident about applying his software to an auction in 2006.
34. Dr. Ponsati believes 'mediation machines' are an inappropriate method of negotiation in areas
other than business.
35. Military organizations refuse to accept that software based on game theory could prevent
wars.

Questions 36-40
Complete each sentence with the correct ending, A-F, below.
Write the correct letter, A-F, in boxes 36-40 on your answer sheet.
36. According to Reinier van Oosten, game theory software falls when.....
37. Dr. Milgrom's software is successful in detecting if...
38. Dr. Black's game theory software is a helpful tool when...
39. According to Dr. Ponsati, negotiators fall behind if...
40. Dr. Ponsati's mediation machine is useful when...
A something is thought to be worth more than it really is.
B discussions between the parties begin to break down.
C too much information is given to the other parties early on. the other par
D businesses consider possible future developments.
E people allow their feelings to influence decisions.
F a solution requires face-to-face negotiation.
27. C 36. E
28. D 37. A
29. D 38. D
30. A 39. C
31. C 40. B
32. Yes
33. No
34. Not Given
35. No

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Reading Practice

Decision making and Happiness

A

Americans today choose among more options in more parts of life than has ever been
possible before. To an extent, the opportunity to choose enhances our lives. It is only
logical to think that if some choices are good, more is better; people who care about having
infinite options will benefit from them, and those who do not can always just ignore the 273
versions of cereal they have never tried. Yet recent research strongly suggests that,
psychologically, this assumption is wrong, with 5% lower percentage announcing they are
happy. Although some choices are undoubtedly better than none, more is not always better
than less.

Recent research offers insight into why many people end up unhappy rather than pleased
when their options expand. We began by making a distinction between “maximizers” (those
who always aim to make the best possible choice) and “satisficers” (those who aim for
“good enough,” whether or not better selections might be out there).

In particular, we composed a set of statements—the Maximization Scale—to diagnose

people’s propensity to maximize. Then we had several thousand people rate themselves
from 1 to 7 (from “completely disagree” to “completely agree”) on such statements as “I
never settle for second best.” We also evaluated their sense of satisfaction with their
decisions. We did not define a sharp cutoff to separate maximizers from satisficers, but in
general, we think of individuals whose average scores are higher than 4 (the scale’s
midpoint) as maxi- misers and those whose scores are lower than the midpoint as
satisficers. People who score highest on the test—the greatest maximizers—engage in
more product comparisons than the lowest scorers, both before and after they make
purchasing decisions, and they take longer to decide what to buy. When satisficers find an
item that meets their standards, they stop looking. But maximizers exert enormous effort
reading labels, checking out consumer magazines and trying new products. They also
spend more time comparing their purchasing decisions with those of others.

We found that the greatest maximizers are the least happy with the fruits of their efforts.
When they compare themselves with others, they get little pleasure from finding out that
they did better and substantial dissatisfaction from finding out that they did worse. They are
more prone to experiencing regret after a purchase, and if their acquisition disappoints
them, their sense of well-being takes longer to recover. They also tend to brood or ruminate
more than satisficers do.

Does it follow that maximizers are less happy in general than satisficers? We tested this by
having people fill out a variety of questionnaires known to be reliable indicators of
wellbeing. As might be expected, individuals with high maximization scores experienced
less satisfaction with life and were less happy, less optimistic and more depressed than

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people with low maximization scores. Indeed, those with extreme maximization ratings had
depression scores that placed them in the borderline of clinical range.

Several factors explain why more choice is not always better than less, especially for
maximisers. High among these are “opportunity costs.” The quality of any given option
cannot be assessed in isolation from its alternatives. One of the “costs” of making a
selection is losing the opportunities that a different option would have afforded. Thus, an
opportunity cost of vacationing on the beach in Cape Cod might be missing the fabulous
restaurants in the Napa Valley. Early Decision Making Research by Daniel Kahneman and
Amos Tversky showed that people respond much more strongly to losses than gains. If we
assume that opportunity costs reduce the overall desirability of the most preferred choice,
then the more alternatives there are, the deeper our sense of loss will be and the less
satisfaction we will derive from our ultimate decision.

The problem of opportunity costs will be better for a satisficer. The latter’s “good enough”
philosophy can survive thoughts about opportunity costs. In addition, the “good enough”
standard leads to much less searching and inspection of alternatives than the maximizer’s
“best” standard. With fewer choices under consideration, a person will have fewer
opportunity costs to subtract.

Just as people feel sorrow about the opportunities they have forgone, they may also suffer
regret about the option they settled on. My colleagues and I devised a scale to measure
proneness to feeling regret, and we found that people with high sensitivity to regret are less
happy, less satisfied with life, less optimistic and more depressed than those with low
sensitivity. Not surprisingly, we also found that people with high regret sensitivity tend to be
maximizers. Indeed, we think that worry over future regret is a major reason that individuals
become maximizers. The only way to be sure you will not regret a decision is by making
the best possible one. Unfortunately, the more options you have and the more opportunity
costs you incur, the more likely you are to experience regret.

In a classic demonstration of the power of sunk costs, people were offered season
subscriptions to a local theatre company. Some were offered the tickets at full price and
others at a discount. Then the researchers simply kept track of how often the ticket
purchasers actually attended the plays over the course of the season. Full-price payers
were more likely to show up at performances than discount payers. The reason for this, the
investigators argued, was that the full-price payers would experience more regret if they did
not use the tickets because not using the more costly tickets would constitute a bigger loss.
To increase sense of happiness, we can decide to restrict our options when the decision is
not crucial. For example, make a rule to visit no more than two stores when shopping for
clothing.

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Questions 1-4
Look at the following descriptions or deeds (Questions 1-4) and the list of categories below.
Match each description or deed with the correct category, A-D.
Write the correct letter, A-D, in boxes 1-4 on your answer sheet.

A “maximizers”
B “satisficers”
C neither “maximizers” nor “satisficers”
D both “maximizers” and “satisficers”

1..................... rated to the Maximization Scale of making choice

2..................... don’t take much time before making a decision

3..................... are likely to regret about the choice in the future

4..................... choose the highest price in the range of purchase

Questions 5-8
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage?
In boxes 5-8 on you answer sheet, write

TRUE if the statement is true

FALSE if the statement is false

NOT GIVEN if the information is not given in the passage

5..................... In today’s world, since the society is becoming wealthier, people are
happier.

6..................... In society, there are more maximisers than satisficers.

7..................... People tend to react more to loses than gains.

8..................... Females and males acted differently in the study of choice making.

Questions 9-13
Choose the correct letter A, B, C or D.
Write the correct letter in boxes 9-13 on your answer sheet.

9 The Maximization Scale is aimed to

A know the happiness when they have more choices.

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B measure how people are likely to feel after making choices.

C help people make better choices.

D reduce the time of purchasing.

10 According to the text, what is the result of more choices?

A People can make choices more easily

B Maximizers are happier to make choices.

C Satisficers are quicker to make wise choices.

D People have more tendency to experience regret.

11 The example of theatre ticket is to suggest that

A they prefer to use more money when buying tickets.

B they don’t like to spend more money on theatre.

C higher-priced things would induce more regret if not used properly

D full-price payers are real theatre lovers.

12 How to increase the happiness when making a better choice?

A use less time

B make more comparisons

C buy more expensive products

D limit the number of choices in certain situations

13 What is the best title for Reading Passage 1?

A Reasoning of Worse Choice Making

B Making Choices in Today’s World

C The Influence of More Choices

D Complexity in Choice Making

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Solution:
1. D 8. NOT GIVEN
2. B 9. B
3. A 10. D
4. C 11. C
5. FALSE 12. D
6. NOT GIVEN 13. C
7. TRUE

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Reading Practice

Memory Decoding
Try this memory test: Study each face and compose a vivid image for the person’s first and
last name. Rose Leo, for example, could be a rosebud and a lion. Fill in the blanks on the
next page. The Examinations School at Oxford University is an austere building of oak-
paneled rooms, large Gothic windows, and looming portraits of eminent dukes and earls. It
is where generations of Oxford students have tested their memory on final exams, and it is
where, last August, 34 contestants gathered at the World Memory Championships to be
examined in an entirely different manner.

In timed trials, contestants were challenged to look at and then recite a two-page poem,
memorize rows of 40-digit numbers, recall the names of 110 people after looking at their
photographs, and perform seven other feats of extraordinary retention. Some tests took just
a few minutes; others lasted hours. In the 14 years since the World Memory
Championships was founded, no one has memorized the order of a shuffled deck of
playing cards in less than 30 seconds. That nice round number has become the four-
minute mile of competitive memory, a benchmark that the world’s best “mental athletes,” as
some of them like to be called, is closing in on. Most contestants claim to have just average
memories, and scientific testing confirms that they’re not just being modest. Their feats are
based on tricks that capitalize on how the human brain encodes information. Anyone can
learn them.

Psychologists Elizabeth Valentine and John Wilding, authors of the monograph Superior
Memory, recently teamed up with Eleanor Maguire, a neuroscientist at University College
London to study eight people, including Karsten, who had finished near the top of the World
Memory Championships. They wondered if the contestants’ brains were different in some
way. The researchers put the competitors and a group of control subjects into an MRI
machine and asked them to perform several different memory tests while their brains were
being scanned. When it came to memorizing sequences of three-digit numbers, the
difference between the memory contestant and the control subjects was, as expected,
immense. However, when they were shown photographs of magnified snowflakes, images
that the competitors had never tried to memorize before, the champions did no better than
the control group. When the researchers analyzed the brain scans, they found that the
memory champs were activating some brain regions that were different from those the
control subjects were using. These regions, which included the right posterior
hippocampus, are known to be involved in visual memory and spatial navigation.

It might seem odd that the memory contestants would use visual imagery and spatial
navigation to remember numbers, but the activity makes sense when their techniques are
revealed. Cooke, a 23-year-old cognitive-science graduate student with a shoulder-length
mop of curly hair, is a grand master of brain storage. He can memorize the order of 10
decks of playing cards in less than an hour or one deck of cards in less than a minute. He
is closing in on the 30-second deck. In the Lamb and Flag, Cooke pulled out a deck of
cards and shuffled it. He held up three cards – the 7 of spades, the queen of clubs, and the

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10 of spades. He pointed at a fireplace and said, “Destiny’s Child is whacking Franz
Schubert with handbags.” The next three cards were the king of hearts, the king of spades,
and the jack of clubs.

How did he do it? Cooke has already memorized a specific person, verb, and object that he
associates with each card in the deck. For example, for the 7 of spades, the person (or, in
this case, persons) is always the singing group Destiny’s Child, the action is surviving a
storm, and the image is a dinghy. The queen of clubs is always his friend Henrietta, the
action is thwacking with a handbag, and the image is of wardrobes filled with designer
clothes. When Cooke commits a deck to memory, he does it three cards at a time. Every
three-card group forms a single image of a person doing something to an object. The first
card in the triplet becomes the person, the second the verb, the third the object. He then
places those images along a specific familiar route, such as the one he took through the
Lamb and Flag. In competitions, he uses an imaginary route that he has designed to be as
smooth and downhill as possible. When it comes time to recall, Cooke takes a mental walk
along his route and translates the images into cards. That’s why the MRIs of the memory
contestants showed activation in the brain areas associated with visual imagery and spatial
navigation.

The more resonant the images are, the more difficult they are to forget. But even
meaningful information is hard to remember when there’s a lot of it. That’s why competitive
memorizers place their images along an imaginary route. That technique, known as the loci
method, reportedly originated in 477 B.C. with the Greek poet Simonides of Ceos.
Simonides was the sole survivor of a roof collapse that killed all the other guests at a royal
banquet. The bodies were mangled beyond recognition, but Simonides was able to
reconstruct the guest list by closing his eyes and recalling each individual around the
dinner table. What he had discovered was that our brains are exceptionally good at
remembering images and spatial information. Evolutionary psychologists have offered an
explanation: Presumably, our ancestors found it important to recall where they found their
last meal or the way back to the cave. After Simonides’ discovery, the loci method became
popular across ancient Greece as a trick for memorizing speeches and texts. Aristotle
wrote about it, and later a number of treatises on the art of memory were published in
Rome. Before printed books, the art of memory was considered a staple of classical
education, on a par with grammar, logic, and rhetoric.

The most famous of the naturals was the Russian journalist S.V. Shereshevski, who could
recall long lists of numbers memorized decades earlier, as well as poems, strings of
nonsense syllables, and just about anything else he was asked to remember. “The capacity
of his memory had no distinct limits,” wrote Alexander Luria, the Russian psychologist who
studies Shereshevski also had synesthesia, a rare condition in which the senses become
intertwined. For example, every number may be associated with a color or every word with
a taste. Synesthetic reactions evoke a response in more areas of the brain, making
memory easier.

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K. Anders Ericsson, a Swedish-born psychologist at Florida State University, thinks anyone
can acquire Shereshevski’s skills. He cites an experiment with S. F., an undergraduate who
was paid to take a standard test of memory called the digit span for one hour a day, two or
three days a week. When he started, he could hold, like most people, only about seven
digits in his head at any given time (conveniently, the length of a phone number). Over two
years, S. F. completed 250 hours of testing. By then, he had stretched his digit span from 7
to more than 80. The study of S. F. led Ericsson to believe that innately superior memory
doesn’t exist at all. When he reviewed original case studies of naturals, he found that
exceptional memorizers were using techniques – sometimes without realizing it – and lots
of practice. Often, exceptional memory was only for a single type of material, like digits. “If
we look at some of these memory tasks, they’re the kind of thing most people don’t even
waste one hour practicing, but if they wasted 50 hours, they’d be exceptional at it,”
Ericsson says. It would be remarkable, he adds, to find a “person who is exceptional across
a number of tasks. I don’t think that there’s any compelling evidence that there are such
people.”

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Questions 1-5
The Reading Passage has seven paragraphs A-G.

Which paragraph contains the following information?

Write the correct letter A-G, in boxes 1-5 on your answer sheet.

1..................... The reason why the competence of super memory is significant in

academic settings

2..................... Mention of a contest for extraordinary memory held in consecutive years

3..................... A demonstrative example of extraordinary person did an unusual recalling

game

4..................... A belief that extraordinary memory can be gained through enough practice

5..................... A depiction of the rare ability which assists the extraordinary memory
reactions

Questions 6-10
Complete the following summary of the paragraphs of Reading Passage.

Using NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the Reading Passage for each answer.

Write your answers in boxes 6-10 on your answer sheet.

Using visual imagery and spatial navigation to remember numbers are investigated and
explained. A man called Ed Cooke in a pub, spoke a string of odd words when he held 7 of
the spades (the first one of any cards group) was remembered as he encoded it to
a 6..................... and the card deck to memory are set to be one time of an order
of 7.....................; When it comes time to recall, Cooke took a 8..................... along his way
and interpreted the imaginary scene into cards. This superior memory skill can be traced
back to Ancient Greece, the strategy was called 9..................... which had been a major
subject was in ancient 10......................

Questions 11-12
Choose TWO correct letters, A-E.

Write your answers in boxes 11-12 on your answer sheet.

According to World Memory Championships, what activities need good memory?

A order for a large group of each digit

B recall people’s face

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C resemble a long Greek poem

D match name with pictures and features

E recall what people ate and did yesterday

Questions 13-14
Choose TWO correct letters, A-E.

Write your answers in boxes 13-14 on your answer sheet.

What is the result of Psychologists Elizabeth Valentine and John Wilding’s MRI Scan
experiment find out?

A the champions’ brains are different in some way from common people

B difference in the brain of champions’ scan image to control subjects are shown when
memorizing sequences of three-digit numbers

C champions did much worse when they are asked to remember photographs

D the memory-champs activated more brain regions than control subjects

E there is some part in the brain coping with visual and spatial memory

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Solution:
1. E 8. mental walk
2. A 9. loci method
3. C 10. education
4. G 11. A
5. F 12. D
6. specific person 13. B
7. three cards 14. E

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READING PASSAGE 1

Multitask
A

Do you read while listening to music? Do you like to watch TV while finishing your homework?
People who have these kinds of habits are called multi-taskers.

Multitasks are able to complete two tasks at the same time by dividing their focus. However,
Thomas Lehman, a researcher in Psychology, believes people never really do multiple things
simultaneously. Maybe a person is reading while listening to music, but in reality, the brain can
only focus on one task. Reading the words in a book will cause you to ignore some of the words
of the music. When people think they are accomplishing two different tasks efficiently, what
they are really doing is dividing their focus. While listening to music, people become less able to
focus on their surroundings. For example, we all have experience of times when we talk with
friends and they are not responding properly. Maybe they are listening to someone else talk, or
maybe they are reading a text on their smartphone and don’t hear what you are saying. Lehman
called this phenomenon “email voice”

the world has been changed by computers and its spin offs like smart-phones or cellphones. Now
that most individuals have a personal device, like a smart-phoneor a laptop, they are frequently
reading, watching or listening to virtual information. This raises the occurrence of multitasking
in our day to day life. Nowwhen you work, you work with your typewriter, your cellphone, and
some colleagues who may drop by at any time to speak with you. In professional meetings, when
one normally focuses and listens to one another, people are more likely to have a cell phone in
their lap, reading or communicating silently with more people than ever, liven inventions such as
the cordless phone has increased multitasking. In the old days, a traditional wall phone would
ring, and then the housewife would have to stop her activities to answer it. When it rang, the
housewife will sit down with her legs up. and chat, with no laundry or sweeping or answering the
door. In the modern era, our technology is convenient enough to not interrupt our daily tasks.

Earl Miller, an expert at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, studied the prefrontal
cortex, which controls the brain while a person is multitasking. According to his studies, the size
of this cortex varies between species. He found that for humans, the size of this part constitutes
one third of the brain, while it is only 4 to 5 percent in dogs, and about 15% in monkeys. Given
that this cortex is larger on a human, it allows a human to be more flexible and accurate in his or
her multitasking. However, Miller wanted to look further into whether the cortex was truly
processing information about two different tasks simultaneously. He designed an experiment
where he presents visual stimulants to his subjects in a wax that mimics multi-tasking. Miller
then attached sensors to the patients ” heads to pick up the electric patterns of the brain. This
sensor would show if” the brain particles, called neurons, were truly processing two different

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tasks. What he found is that the brain neurons only lit up in singular areas one at a time, and
never simultaneously.

Davis Meyer, a professor of University of Michigan, studied the young adults in a similar
experiment. He instructed them to simultaneously do math problems and classify simple words
into different categories. For this experiment. Meyer found that when you think you are doing
several jobs at the same time, you are actually switching between jobs. Even though the people
tried to do the tasks at the sametime, and both tasks were eventually accomplished, overall, the
task took more time than if the person focused on a single task one at a time.

People sacrifice efficiency when multitasking, Gloria Mark set office workers as his subjects. He
found that they were constantly multitasking. He observed that nearly every 11 minutes people at
work were disrupted. He found that doing different jobs at the same time may actually save time.
However, despite the fact that they are faster, it does not mean they are more efficient. And we
are equally likely to self-interrupt as be interrupted by outside sources. He found that in office
nearly every 12 minutes an employee would stop and with no reason at all,check a website on
their computer, call someone or write an email. If they concentrated for more than 20 minutes,
they would feel distressed. He suggested that the average person may suffer from a short
concentration span. This short attention span might be natural, but others suggest that new
technology may be the problem. With cellphones and computers at our sides at all times, people
will never run out of distractions. The format of media, such as advertisements, music, news
articles and TV shows are also shortening, so people are used to paying attention to information
for a very short time

So even though focusing on one single task is the most efficient way for our brains to work, it
is not practical to use this method in real life. According to human nature, people feel more
comfortable and efficient in environments with a variety of tasks, Edward Hallowell said that
people are losing a lot of efficiency in the workplace due to multitasking, outside distractions and
self-distractions. As it matter of fact, the changes made to the workplace do not have to be
dramatic.

No one is suggesting we ban e-mail or make employees focus on only one task. However, certain
common workplace tasks, such as group meetings, would be more efficient if we banned cell-
phones, a common distraction. A person can also apply these tips to prevent self-
distraction. Instead of arriving to your office and checking all of your e-mails for new tasks, a
common workplace ritual, a person could dedicate an hour to a single task first thing in the
morning. Self-timing is a great way to reduce distraction and efficiently finish tasks one by one,
instead of slowing ourselves down with multi-tasking.

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Questions 1-5
Reading Passage 1 has six paragraphs, A-F.

Which paragraph contains the following information?

Write the correct letter, A-F, in boxes 1-5 on your answer sheet

1 a reference to a domestic situation that does not require multitasking

2 a possible explanation of why we always do multitask together

3 a practical solution to multitask in work environment

4 relating multitasking to the size of prefrontal cortex

5 longer time spent doing two tasks at the same time than one at a time

Questions 6-10
Look at the following statements (Questions 6-10) and the list of scientists below.

Match each statement with the correct scientist, A-E.

Write the correct letter, A-E, in boxes 6-10 on your answer sheet.

NB You may use any letter more than once.

List of Scientists

A Thomas Lehman

B Earl Miller

C David Meyer

D Gloria Mark

E Edward Hallowell

6 When faced with multiple visual stimulants, one can only concentrate on one of them.

7 Doing two things together may be faster but not better.

8 People never really do two things together even if you think you do.

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9 The causes of multitasking lie in the environment.

10 Even minor changes in the workplace will improve work efficiency

Questions 11-13
Complete the sentences below.

Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer. Write your
answers in boxes 11-13 on your answer sheet.

A term used to refer to a situation when you are reading a text and cannot focus on your
surroundings is 11… .

The 12… part of the brain controls multitasking.

The practical solution of multitask in work is not to allow use of cellphone in 13… .

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1. B 8. A

2. E 9. E

3. F 10. E

4. C 11. email voice

5. D 12. prefrontal cortex

6. B 13. group meetings

7. D

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