Mini test 6
1. The economy recovery was somewhat lopsided: .............. in some of the industrial
economies while robust in others of them.
A. unexpected
B. feeble B
C. swift
D. prophetic
2. Established collectors’ interests are also becoming .............. . Those who once
concentrated on the work of either the 19th century pioneers or the 20th century modernists are
now keen to have comprehensive collections.
A. fickle
B. wide – ranging B
C. antiquarian
D. dormant
3. Now that photographic prints have become a popular field for collecting, auctions are
becoming more .............. . It is not just the entry of new collectors into the field that is causing
this intensification.
A. competitive A
B. tedious
C. exclusive
D. supercilious conceited
4. The skin of poison dart frog contains deadly poisons called batrachotoxins. But the
.............. of the toxins has remained an enigma, as the frog does not produce them. Now an
analysis suggests that the melyrid beetle is the source. Collected beetle specimens all contained
batrachotoxins, suggesting that these beetles are eaten by the frogs.
A. effect
B. origin B
C. purpose
D. role
5. Given the sterling reputation of the committees and the .............. nature of its
investigation, it would be unreasonable to gainsay the committee’s conclusions at first glance.
A. superficial
B. spontaneous C
C. exhaustive
D. intelligible
6. The detection of molecular oxygen on Earth – sixed planets around other stars in the
universe - would not be a/an .............. sign of life: molecular oxygen can be a signature of
photosynthesis ( a biotic process) or merely of the rapid escape of water from the upper reaches
of a planetary atmosphere ( an abiotic process).
A. controversial
B. unambiguous
B
1
C. possible
D. repetitive
7. What is the subject of our controversy with the mother country? Is it this: whether we
shall preserve the security to our lives and properties, which the law of nature, the genius of
the British constitution, and our charters, afford us; or whether we shall resign them into the
hands of the British House of Commons, which is no more privileged to dispose of them than
the Great Mogul.
What does the word afford most nearly mean?
A. sustain
B. manage D
C. entrust
D. grant
8. That Americans are entitled to freedom is incontestable on every rational principle. All
men have one common original: they participate in one common nature, and consequently
have one common right.
What does the word common most nearly mean?
A. customary
B. typical D
C. widespread
D. shared
9. The professor’s habitual air of .............. was misleading front, concealing amazing
reserves of patience and a deep commitment to his students’ learning.
A. cordiality
B. disorganization D
C. difference
D. exasperation
A. During the Renaisance, the use of optical lenses, which were capable of projecting
images onto blank canvases, greatly aided aritists by allowing them to accurately observe and
depict the external world; in other words, these lenses were instrumental in conveying ..............
idealism
B. optimism
C. ambition
D. realism
10. Wilson is going to emphasize the .............. of ants: how ants with full stomachs will
regurgitate liquid food for those without, or how the old will fight so the young can survive.
A. beneficence
B. unpredictability
C. intelligence A
D. fecundity
ability to produce abundant offspring or new growt
2
11. Members of the union’s negotiating team insisted on several changes to the company’s
proposal before they would support it, making it clear that they would .............. no
compromise.
A. disclose D
B. reject
C. repudiate
D. tolerate
12. We often regard natural phenomena like rainfall as mysterious and unpredictable;
although for short time spans and particular places they appear so, in fact on a truly global
scale, nature has been a model of .............. .
A. reliability
B. diversity A
C. complexity
D. plasticity
13. Among the Meakambut people of Papua New Guinea, legends are associated with
specific caves in the Sepik region, and these legends are ..............: only the cave owner can
share its secrets.
A. impenetrable
B. immutable unchangeable A
C. proprietary
D. didactic instructive
14. The political upheaval caught most people by surprise: despite the .............. warnings
of some commentators, it had never seemed that imminent.
A. stern
B. prescient
B
C. indifferent
D. repeated
15. In a book that inclines to .............., an epilogue arguing that ballet is dead arrives simply
as one more overstatement.
A. pessimism
B. misinterpretation D
C. vagueness
D. hyperbole exaggeration
16. The reconstruction known work is beautiful and also probably ..............: it is the only
Hebrew verse written by a woman.
A. singular
B. archaic A
C. counterfeit
D. valuable
3
17. The beauty of the scientific approach is that even when individual reserachers do
.............. bias or partiality, others can correct them using a framework of evidence on which
everyone broadly agrees.
A. overreact to C
B. deviate from
C. succumb to
D. recoil from
18. Advances in imaging technology are helping scientists find new details like this even
in objects as familiar as a chicken eggshell, says Lara Estroff, a materials scientist at Cornell
University who wasn’t part of the research. In connecting the eggshells’ functionality with its
fine – grain structure, the new study could provide inspiration for desgining new kinds of
materials with specific properties.
Which choice best states the primary purpose of the text?
A. The text provides a summary of the findings described in the passage
B. The text proposes a follow - up study about the nanostructure of eggshells
C. The text offers an alternative explanation for how nanostructures form in eggshells
D. The text suggests a practical application for the research discussed in the passage
19. A second experiment was even more starling. This time, a new group of blindfolded
participants explored the same objects by touch. Rather than carefully study, they simply rated
how pleasant each object felt. There was no intentional effort to memorize. A surprise
memory test, occuring one week later, was designed to be more difficult: participants were
no longer blindfolded and had to visually identify which of two nearly identical objects they
had touched before – and without having previously seen either or having another opportunity
to touch. Yet, the accuracy rate remained high. Even when participants felt unsure and had to
guess, they still identified the correct object more often than not.
Which choice best states the primary purpose of the text?
A. The text suggests that certain research results need to be confirmed
B. The text describes a subsequent study that futher probes a research question
C. The text correct some previously overlooked shortcomings of an earlier study
D. The text emphazies that research regarding touch has universal applications
20. A great many animals are discovering that city living can be less stressful than a career
in the wild. Ecologists know that big cities like New York are far more friendly to wildlife
than small ones because the potential habitat is both immense and varied. Parks and
greenways and suburban gardens offer ideal hiding places and travel corridors; urban creeks
and backyard lap pools and corporate fountains yield reliable fresh water. To a 21st century
racoon or deer, New York ( or Atlanta, or Frankfurt) looks like a fine big aninal sanctuary,
with the prime food resources in the middle of the town.
Which choice best states the primary purpose of the text?
4
A.The text explains why large cities offer attractive environments to wildlife A
B. The text identifies specific cities that are especially appealing to wild animals
C. The text reveals how towns are surprisingly safe for racoons and deer
D. The text recommends some changes to help wildlife in large cities
21. The authors of the new paper, led by Amit Bhattacharjee at Erasmus University, believe
this anti – profit bias leads many voters and politicians to endorse anti – profit policies that
are unlikely to lead to the very opposite outcomes for society that they want to achieve.
“Erroneous anti – profit beliefs may lead to systematically worse economic policies for
society, even as they help people satisfy their social and expressive needs on an individual
level,” they said.
Which choice best states the primary purpose of the text? B
A. The text suggests a possible origin of the anti – profit bias
B. The text highlights potential consequences of the anti – profit bias
C. The text summarizes the scholarly consensus about the anti – profit bias
D. The text suggests ways of overcoming the anti – profit bias
22. I stopped only when I became aware it was night outside, the crows silent, the street
lights burning, the traffic thinning, its roar subsiding into a tired growl. The television set in
my landlady’s flat was turned on, the evening soap opera at full volume, and I hadn’t even
noticed it earlier.
C
Which choice best states the primary purpose of the text?
A. The text suggests that the conditions under which the narator lives impede her work
B. The text conveys the quietness the narrator needs to work most efficiently
C. The text illustrates how absorbed the narrator is when she is engaged in her work
D. The text confirms that the narrator devotes nearly all her time to her work
23. We show that incentives make persuaders less effective at communicating sincere
concern for a charitable cause, which means the incentive is having harmful effects on the very
activity it was designed to improve,” says psychological scienctist and study author Alixandra
Barasch of the Stern School of Business at New York University. “This is important because
it helps us understand the costs and benefits of incentives in the context of philanthropy.”
Which choice best states the primary purpose of the text? A
A. The text establishes the implications of the findings detailed in the passage
B. The text characterizes the study’s conclusions identified in the passage as controversial
C. The text clarifies how the methods discussed in the passage build on previous research
D. The text explains how the lead reseacher descibed in the passage formulated her hypothesis
25. Two decades have passed since newspapers launched websites, and yet here we are. Big
city papers have gone under, thousands of journalists have lost their jobs, and the idea that
5
digital news will eventually become a decent business feels like a rumor. The reality is this:
No app, no streamlined website, no “vertival integration,” no social network has come close
to matching the success of print in revenue or readership. And the most crucial assumption
publishers have made about readers, particularly millennials – that they prefer the immediacy
of digital – now seems questionable,too.
Which choice best states the primary purpose of the text?
A. The text introduces the two sides of an ongoing debate about the future of online
newspapers
B. The text establishes a conflict between past expectations about online newspapers and
current circumstances
C. The text describes a commonly held belief about the changing nature of online
newspaper publishing
D. The text summarizes the challenges facing online newspapers in the contemporary
marketplace
26. As a fundamental study and a proof of concept, we demonstrated the approach in a glass
cell filed with a water solution at room temperature and then ran an electrical current through
carbon electrodes that were loaded with nano – sized palladium particles.
Which choice best states the primary purpose of the text?
A. The text notes a challenge in designing an experiment
B. The text introduces a new idea for scientific consideration
C. The text summarizes the findings of an experiment
D. The text illustrates how scientific idea was validated
27. To investigate different aspects of queue design, the author tested different scenarios,
namely single versus parallel queues and a full versus blocked view of the customer lines. The
results were the same across nearly every experimental variation: parallel lines move faster
than single ones.
Which choice best states the primary purpose of the text?
A. The text considers different topics for future study and suggest a framework for potential
experiments
B. The text identifies variuos aspects of a theoretical problem and propose a single solution
to that problem
C. The text itemizes a series of independent research efforts and discuss what they have in
common
D. The text summarizes components of a research project and state a general conclusion
