Author: theieltsbridge

Dirty river but clean water

Floods can occur in rivers when the flow rate exceeds the capacity of the river channel, particularly at bends or meanders in the waterway. Floods often cause damage to homes and businesses if they are in the natural flood plains of rivers. While riverine flood damage can be eliminated by moving away from rivers and other bodies of water, people have traditionally lived and worked by rivers because the land is usually flat and fertile and because rivers provide easy travel and access to commerce and industry.

A Fire and flood are two of humanity’s worst nightmares. People have, therefore, always sought to control them. Forest fires are snuffed out quickly. The flow of rivers is regulated by weirs and dams. At least, that is how it used to be. But foresters have learned that forests need fires to clear out the brash and even to get seeds to germinate. And a similar revelation is now – dawning on hydrologists. Rivers – and the ecosystems they support – need floods. That is why a man-made torrent has been surging down the Grand Canyon. By Thursday March 6th it was running at full throttle, which was expected to be sustained for 60 hours.

B Floods once raged through the canyon every year. Spring Snow from as far away as Wyoming would melt and swell the Colorado river to a flow that averaged around 1,500 cubic metres (50,000 cubic feet) a second. Every eight years or so, that figure rose to almost 3,000 cubic metres. These floods infused the river with sediment, carved its beaches and built its sandbars.

C However, in the four decades since the building of the Glen Canyon dam, just upstream of the Grand Canyon, the only sediment that it has collected has come from tiny, undammed tributaries. Even that has not been much use as those tributaries are not powerful enough to distribute the sediment in an ecologically valuable way.

D This lack of flooding has harmed local wildlife. The humpback chub, for example, thrived in the rust-redwaters of the Colorado. Recently, though, its population has crashed. At first sight, it looked as if the reason was that the chub were being eaten by trout introduced for sport fishing in the mid-20th century. But trout and chub co-existed until the Glen Canyon dam was built, so something else is going on. Steve Gloss, of the United States’ Geological Survey (USGS), reckons that the chub’s decline is the result of their losing their most valuable natural defense, the Colorado’s rusty sediment. The chub were well adapted to the poor visibility created by the thick, red water which gave the river its name,and depended on it to hide from predators. Without the cloudy water the chub became vulnerable.

E And the chub are not alone. In the years since the Glen Canyon dam was built, several species have vanished altogether. These include the Colorado pike-minnow, the razorback sucker and the round-tail chub. Meanwhile, aliens including fathead minnows, channel catfish and common carp, which would have been hard, put to survive in the savage waters of the undammed canyon, have move din.

F So flooding is the obvious answer. Unfortunately, it is easier said than done. Floods were sent down the Grand Canyon in 1996 and 2004 and the results were mixed. In 1996 the flood was allowed to go on too long. To start with,all seemed well. The floodwaters built up sandbanks and infused the river with sediment. Eventually, however, the continued flow washed most of the sediment out of the canyon. This problem was avoided in 2004, but unfortunately, on that occasion, the volume of sand available behind the dam was too low to rebuild the sandbanks. This time, the USGS is convinced that things will be better. The amount of sediment available is three times greater than it was in 2004. So if a flood is going to do some good, this is the time to unleash one.

G Even so, it may turn out to be an empty gesture. At less than 1,200 cubic metres a second, this flood is smaller than even an average spring flood, let alone one of the mightier deluges of the past. Those glorious inundations moved massive quantities of sediment through the Grand Canyon,wiping the slate dirty, and making a muddy mess of silt and muck that would make modern river rafters cringe.

Questions 1-7
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage?

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

1 Damage caused by fire is worse than that caused by flood.
2 The flood peaks at almost 1500 cubic meters every eight years.
3 Contribution of sediments delivered by tributaries has little impact.
4 Decreasing number of chubs is always caused by introducing of trout since mid 20th century.
5 It seemed that the artificial flood in 1996 had achieved success partly at the very beginning.
6 In fact, the yield of artificial flood water is smaller than an average natural flood at present.
7 Mighty floods drove fast moving flows with clean and high quality water.

Questions 8-13
Complete the summary below. Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer.

The eco-impact of the Canyon Dam

Floods are people’s nightmare. In the past, canyon was raged by flood every year. The snow from far Wyoming would melt in the season of (8)…………………… and caused a flood flow peak in Colorado river. In the four decades after people built the Glen Canyon dam, it only could gather (9)…………………… together from tiny, undammed tributaries.

Humpback chub population on reduced, why?

Then, several species disappeared including Colorado pike-minnow, (10)…………………… and the round-tail chub. Meanwhile, some moved in such as fathead minnows, channel catfish and (11)…………………… . The non-stopped flow leaded to the washing away of the sediment out of the canyon, which poses great threat to the chubs because it has poor (12)…………………… away from predators. In addition, the volume of (13)…………………… available behind the dam was too low to rebuild the bars and flooding became more serious.

Going Bananas

A The world’s favourite fruit could disappear forever in 10 years’ time. The banana is among the world’s oldest crops. Agricultural scientists believe that the first edible banana was discovered around ten thousand years ago. It has been at an evolutionary standstill ever since it was first propagated in the jungles of South-East Asia at the end of the last ice age. Normally the wild banana, a giant jungle herb called Musa acuminata, contains a mass of hard seeds that make the fruit virtually inedible. But now and then, hunter-gatherers must have discovered rare mutant plants that produced seedless, edible fruits. Geneticists now know that the vast majority of these soft-fruited plants resulted from genetic accidents that gave their cells three copies of each chromosome instead of the usual two. This imbalance prevents seeds and pollen from developing normally, rendering the mutant plants sterile. And that is why some scientists believe the world’s most popular fruit could be doomed. It lacks the genetic diversity to fight off pests and diseases that are invading the banana plantations of Central America and the small-holdings of Africa and Asia alike.

B In some ways, the banana today resembles the potato before blight brought famine to Ireland a century and a half ago. But “it holds a lesson for other crops, too”, says Emile Frison, top banana at the International Network for the Improvement of Banana and Plantain in Montpellier, France. “The state of the banana”, Frison warns, “can teach a broader lesson: the increasing standardisation of food crops round the world is threatening their ability to adapt and survive.”

C The first Stone Age plant breeders cultivated these sterile freaks by replanting cuttings from their stems. And the descendants of those original cuttings are the bananas we still eat today. Each is a virtual clone, almost devoid of genetic diversity. And that uniformity makes it ripe for disease like no other crop on Earth. Traditional varieties of sexually reproducing crops have always had a much broader genetic base, and the genes will recombine in new arrangements in each generation. This gives them much greater flexibility in evolving responses to disease – and far more genetic resources to draw on in the face of an attack. But that advantage is fading fast, as growers increasingly plant the same few, high-yielding varieties. Plant breeders work feverishly to maintain resistance in these standardized crops. Should these efforts falter, yields of even the most productive crop could swiftly crash. “When some pest or disease comes along, severe epidemics can occur,” says Geoff Hawtin, director of the Rome-based International Plant Genetic Resources Institute.

D The banana is an excellent case in point. Until the 1950s, one variety, the Gros Michel, dominated the world’s commercial banana business. Found by French botanists in Asian the 1820s, the Gros Michel was by all accounts a fine banana, richer and sweeter than today’s standard banana and without the latte’s bitter aftertaste when green. But it was vulnerable to a soil fungus that produced a wilt known as Panama disease. “Once the fungus gets into the soil it remains there for many years. There is nothing farmers can do. Even chemical spraying won’t get rid of it,” says Rodomiro Ortiz, director of the Inter-national Institute for Tropical Agriculture in Ibadan, Nigeria. So plantation owners played a running game, abandoning infested fields and moving to “clean” land – until they ran out of clean land in the 1950s and had to abandon the Gros Michel. Its successor, and still the reigning commercial king, is the Cavendish banana, a 19th-century British discovery from southern China. The Cavendish is resistant to Panama disease and, as a result, it literally saved the international banana industry. During the 1960s, it replaced the Gros Michel on supermarket shelves. If you buy a banana today, it is almost certainly a Cavendish. But even so, it is a minority in the world’s banana crop.

E Half a billion people in Asia and Africa depend on bananas. Bananas provide the largest source of calories and are eaten daily. Its name is synonymous with food. But the day of reckoning may be coming for the Cavendish and its indigenous kin. Another fungal disease, black Sigatoka, has become a global epidemic since its first appearance in Fiji in 1963. Left to itself, black Sigatoka which causes brown wounds on leaves and premature fruit ripening – cuts fruit yields by 50 to 70 per cent and reduces the productive lifetime of banana plants from 30 years to as little as 2 or 3. Commercial growers keep Sigatoka at bay by a massive chemical assault. Forty sprayings of fungicide a year is typical. But despite the fungicides, diseases such as black Sigatoka are getting more and more difficult to control. “As soon as you bring in a new fungicide, they develop resistance,” says Frison. “One thing we can be sure of is that the Sigatoka won’t lose in this battle.” Poor farmers, who cannot afford chemicals, have it even worse. They can do little more than watch their plants die. “Most of the banana fields in Amazonia have already been destroyed by the disease,” says Luadir Gasparotto, Brazil’s leading banana pathologist with the government research agency EMBRAPA. Production is likely to fall by 70 percent as the disease spreads, he predicts. The only option will be to find a new variety.

F But how? Almost all edible varieties are susceptible to the diseases, so growers cannot simply change to a different banana. With most crops, such a threat would unleash an army of breeders, scouring the world for resistant relatives whose traits they can breed into commercial varieties. Not so with the banana. Because all edible varieties are sterile, bringing in new genetic traits to help cope with pests and diseases is nearly impossible. Nearly, but not totally. Very rarely, a sterile banana will experience a genetic accident that allows an almost normal seed to develop, giving breeders a tiny window for improvement. Breeders at the Honduran Foundation of Agricultural Research have tried to exploit this to create disease-resistant varieties. Further backcrossing with wild bananas yielded a new seedless banana resistant to both black Sigatoka and Panama disease.

G Neither Western supermarket consumers nor peasant growers like the new hybrid. Some accuse it of tasting more like an apple than a banana. Not surprisingly, the majority of plant breeders have till now turned their backs on the banana and got to work on easier plants. And commercial banana companies are now washing their hands of the whole breeding effort, preferring to fund a search for new fungicides instead. “We supported a breeding programme for 40 years, but it wasn’t able to develop an alternative to Cavendish. It was very expensive and we got nothing back,” says Ronald Romero, head of research at Chiquita, one of the Big Three companies that dominate the international banana trade.

H Last year, a global consortium of scientists led by Frison announced plans to sequence the banana genome within five years. It would be the first edible fruit to be sequenced. Well, almost edible. The group will actually be sequencing inedible wild bananas from East Asia because many of these are resistant to black Sigatoka. If they can pinpoint the genes that help these wild varieties to resist black Sigatoka, the protective genes could be introduced into laboratory tissue cultures of cells from edible varieties. These could then be propagated into new, resistant plants and passed on to farmers.

I It sounds promising, but the big banana companies have, until now, refused to get involved in GM research for fear of alienating their customers. “Biotechnology is extremely expensive and there are serious questions about consumer acceptance,” says David McLaughlin, Chiquita’s senior director for environmental affairs. With scant funding from the companies, the banana genome researchers are focusing on the other end of the spectrum. Even if they can identify the crucial genes, they will be a long way from developing new varieties that smallholders will find suitable and affordable. But whatever biotechnology’s academic interest, it is the only hope for the banana. Without banana production worldwide will head into a tailspin. We may even see the extinction of the banana as both a lifesaver for hungry and impoverished Africans and as the most popular product on the world’s supermarket shelves.

Question 14-16
Complete the sentences below with NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the passage.

• Banana was first eaten as a fruit by humans almost (14)…………………… years ago.
• Banana was first planted in (15)…………………… .
• Wild banana’s taste is adversely affected by its (16)……………………

Question 17-23
Look at the following statements (Questions 17-23) and the list of people below. Match each statement with the correct person, A-F. NB You may use any letter more than once.

17 A Pest invasion may seriously damage banana industry.
18 The effect of fungal infection in soil is often long-lasting.
19 A commercial manufacturer gave up on breeding bananas for disease resistant species.
20 Banana disease may develop resistance to chemical sprays.
21 A banana disease has destroyed a large number of banana plantations.
22 Consumers would not accept genetically altered crop.
23 Lessons can be learned from bananas for other crops.

List of people
A Rodomiro
B David Mclaughlin
C Emile Frison
D Ronald Romero
E Luadir Gasparotto
F Geoff Hawtin

Question 24-26
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage? In boxes 24-26 on your answer sheet, write

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

24 Banana is the oldest known fruit.
25 Gros Michel is still being used as a commercial product.
26 Banana is a main food in some countries.

Blue-footed Boobies 2

A Boobies are a small group of seabirds native to tropical and subtropical oceans throughout the world. Their diet consists mainly of fish. They are specialized fish eaters feeding on small school fish like sardines, anchovies, mackerel, and flying fish. When their prey is in sight, they fold their long wings back around their streamlined bodies and plunge into the water from as high as 80 feet, so streamlined they barely make a splash. They travel in parties of about 12 to areas of water with large schools of small fish. When the lead bird sees a fish shoal in the water, it will signal the rest of the group and they will all dive together. Surprisingly, individuals do not eat with the hunting group, preferring to eat on their own, usually in the early morning or late afternoon.

B There are three varieties on the Galapagos: the blue-footed, red-footed, and masked boobies. They are all members of the same family, and are not only different in appearance but also in behaviours. The blue-footed and red-footed boobies mate throughout the year, while the masked boobies have an annual mating cycle that differs from island to island. All catch fish in a similar manner, but in different areas: the blue-footed booby does its fishing close to shore, while the masked booby goes slightly farther out, and the red-footed booby fishes at the farthest distances from shore.

C Although it is unknown where the name “Booby” emanates from, some conjecture it may come from the Spanish word for clown, “bobo”, meaning “stupid”. Its name was probably inspired by the bird’s clumsiness on land and apparently unwarranted bravery. The blue footed booby is extremely vulnerable to human visitors because it does not appear to fear them. Therefore these birds received such name for their clumsiness on land in which they were easily, captured, killed, and eaten by humans.

D The blue-footed booby’s characteristic feet play a significant part in their famous courtship ceremony, the ‘booby dance’. The male walks around the female, raising his bright blue feet straight up in the air, while bringing his ‘shoulders’ towards the ground and crossing the bottom tips of his wings high above the ground. Plus he’ll raise his bill up towards the sky to try to win his mate over. The female may also partake in these activities – lifting her feet, sky pointing, and of course squawking at her mate. After mating, another ritual occurs – the nest-building which ironically is never used because they nest on the bare ground. When the female is ready to lay her eggs, they scrape the existing nest away so she can nest on exposed ground. Sun-baked islands form the booby’s breeding grounds. When ready the female Blue Footed Booby lays one to three eggs.

E After mating, two or three eggs are laid in a shallow depression on flat or gently sloping ground. Both male and female take turns incubating the eggs. Unlike most birds, booby doesn’t develop brood patches (areas of bare skin on the breast) to warm the eggs during incubation. Instead, it uses its broad webbed feet, which have large numbers of prominent blood vessels, to transmit heat essential for incubation. The eggs are thick-shelled so they can withstand the full weight of an incubating bird.

F After hatching, the male plays a major role in bringing fish home. He can bring back a constant supply of small fish for the chicks, which must be fed continuously. The reason is that the male has a longer tail than the female in relation to his body size, which makes him able to execute shallower dives and to feed closer to shore. Then the female takes a greater part as time proceeds. Sooner or later, the need to feed the young becomes greater than the need to protect them and both adults must fish to provide enough.

G When times are good, the parents may successfully fledge all three chicks, but, in harder times, they may still lay as many eggs yet only obtain enough food to raise one. The problem is usually solved by the somewhat callous-sounding system of “opportunistic sibling murder.” The first-born chick is larger and stronger than its nest mate(s) as a result of hatching a few days earlier and also because the parents feed the larger chick. If food is scarce, the first born will get more food than its nest mate(s) and will outcompete them, causing them to starve. The above system optimizes the reproductive capacity of the blue-foot in an unpredictable environment. The system ensures that, if possible, at least one chick will survive a period of shortage rather than all three dying of starvation under a more ‘humane’ system.

Questions 27-32
The reading passage has seven paragraphs, A–G. Choose the correct heading for paragraphs A–G from the list below. Write the correct number, i–ix, in boxes 27-32 on your answer sheet.

List of Headings
i Unusual way of hatching the chicks
ii Feeding habit of the red-footed booby
iii Folding wings for purpose
iv Rearing the young
v Classification of boobies
vi Diving for seafood
vii Surviving mechanism during the food shortage period
viii Mating and breeding
ix Origin of the booby’s name

Paragraph C        ix

27 Paragraph A
28 Paragraph B
29 Paragraph D
30 Paragraph E
31 Paragraph F
32 Paragraph G

Questions 33-35
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage? In boxes 33 – 35 on your answer sheet, write

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

33 Boobies are afraid of human approaching.
34 Female boobies eat more than the male ones.
35 When there is not sufficient food, the larger chicks will be fed at the expense of the survival of its smaller mates.

Questions 36 – 39
Complete the summary below, using NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the Reading Passage for each answer.

The courtship of the Blue-footed Booby consists of the male flaunting his blue feet and dancing to impress the female. During the dance, the male will spread his wings and stamp his feet on the ground with his bills (36)…………………… . After mating, the booby’s unusual demeanor continues with ritual (37) …………………… that really serves no purpose. When the female Booby lays eggs, the parental boobies incubate the eggs beneath their (38) …………………… which contain (39) …………………… to transmit the heat, because of the lack of brood patches.

Tickling and Laughter

A. The fingers of an outstretched aim are nearing your body; you bend away folding your torso, bending your head to your shoulder in hopes that you don’t get tickled; but the inevitable occurs: yon arc tickled and in hysterics you chuckle, titter, and burst into uncontrollable laughter. Why do we laugh when we are tickled?

B. Tickling is caused by a light sensation across our skin. At times the light sensation can cause itching; however, most of the time it causes giggling. If a feather is gently moved across the surface of the skin, it can also cause tickling and giggling. Heavy laughter is caused by someone or something placing repeated pressure on a person and tickling a particular area. The spots tickled often are feet, toes, sides, underarms, and neck which cause a great deal of laughter. Yngve Zotterman from Karolinksk Institute has found that tickling sensations involve signals from nerve fibers. These nerve fibers are associated with pain and touch. Also, Zotterman has discovered tickling sensations to be associated not only with nerve fibers but also with sense of touch because people who have lost pain sensations still laugh when tickled. But really, why do we laugh? Why are we not able to tickle ourselves? What part of the brain is responsible for laughter and humor? Why do we say some people have no sense of humor?

C. Research has shown that laugher is more than just a person’s voice and movement and that it requires the coordination of many muscles throughout the body. Laughter also increases blood pressure and heart rate, changes breathing, reduces levels of certain neurochemicals (catecholamines, hormones) and provides a boost to die immune system. Can laughter improve health? It may be a good way for people to relax because muscle tension is reduced after laughing. Human tests have found some evidence that humorous videos and tapes can reduce feelings of pain, prevent negative stress reactions and boost the brain’s biological battle against infection.

D. Researchers believe we process humor and laughter through a complex pathway of brain activity that encompasses three main brain components. In one new study, researchers used imaging equipment to photograph die brain activity of healthy volunteers while they underwent a sidesplitting assignment of reading written jokes, viewing cartoons from The New Yorker magazine as well as “The Far Side” and listening to digital recordings of laughter. Preliminary results indicate that the humor-processing pathway includes parts of the frontal lobe brain area, important for cognitive processing the supplementary motor area, important for movement; and the nucleus accumbens, associated with pleasure. Investigations support the notion that parts of the frontal lobe are involved in humor. Subjects’ brains were imaged while they were listening to jokes. An area of the frontal lobe was activated only when they thought a joke was funny. In a study that compared healthy individuals with people who had damage to their frontal lobes, the subjects with damaged frontal lobes were more likely to choose wrong punch lines to written jokes and didn’t laugh or smile as much at funny cartoons or jokes.

E. Even though we may know more about what parts of the brain are responsible for humor, it is still hard to explain why we don’t laugh or giggle when we tickle ourselves. Darwin theorized within “The Expressions of the Emotions in Man and Animals” that there was a link between tickling and laughter because of the anticipation of pleasure. Because we cannot tickle ourselves and have caused laughter, Darwin speculated surprise from another person touching a sensitive spot must have caused laughter. Some scientists believe that laughing caused by tickling is a built-in reflex even babies have. If we tickle ourselves in the same spot as our friend tickled us, we do not laugh as we did previously. The information sent to our spinal cord and brain should be exactly the same. Apparently for tickling to work, the brain needs tension and surprise. When we tickle ourself, we know exactly what will happen…there is no tension or surprise. How the brain uses this information about tension and surprise is still a mystery, but there is some evidence that the cerebellum may be involved. Because one part of the brain tells another: “It’s just you. Don’t get excited”. Investigations suggest that during self-tickling, the cerebellum tells an area called the somatosensory cortex what sensation to expect, and that dampens the tickling sensation. It looks as if the killjoy is found in the cerebellum. Further explorations to understand tickling and laughter were conducted by Christenfeld and Harris. Within ‘The Mystery of Ticklish Laughter and “Can a Machine Tickleyn they explained that people laughed equally whether tickled by a machine or by a person. The participants were not aware that who or what was tickling them. However, the laughter was equally resounded. It is suggested that tickling response is a reflex, which, like Darwin suggested earlier, is dependent on the element of surprise.

F. Damage to any one part of the brain may affect one’s overall ability to process humor. Peter Derks, a professor of psychology, conducted his research with a group of scientists at NASA-Langley in Hampton. Using a sophisticated electroencephalogram (EEG), they measured the brain activity of 10 people exposed to humorous stimuli. How quickly our brain recognizes the incongruity that deals with most humor and attaches an abstract meaning to it determines whether we laugh. However, different people find different jokes funny. That can be due to a number of factors, including differences in personality, intelligence, mental state and probably mood. But according to Derks, the majority of people recognize when a situation is meant to be humorous. In a series of experiments, he noticed that several patients recovering from brain injuries could not distinguish between something funny and something not.

G. Dr. Shibata of the University of Rochester School of Medicine said our neurons get tickled when we hear a joke. The brain’s ‘Tunny bone” is located at the right frontal lobe just above the right eye and appears critical to our ability to recognize a joke. Dr. Shibata gave his patients MRI scans to measure brain activity, trying to find out what part of the brain is particularly active while telling the punch line of a joke as opposed to the rest of the joke and funny cartoons in comparison to parts of the cartoons that arc not funny. The jokes “tickled” the frontal lobes. The scans also showed activity in the nucleus accumbens, which is likely related to our feeling of mirth after hearing a good joke and our “addiction” to humor. While his research was about humor, the results could help lead to answers and solutions to depression. Parts of the brain that are active during humor are actually abnormal in patients with depression. Eventually brain scans might be used to assess patients with depression and other mood disorders. The research may also explain why some stroke victims lose their sense of humor or suffer from other personality changes. The same part of the brain is also associated with social and emotional judgment and planning.

Question 1-7
Reading Passage 1 has 7 paragraphs A-G. Which paragraph contains the following information?
NB you may use any letter more than once

1. Location of a brain section essential to the recognition of jokes
2. Laughter enhances immunity
3. Individual differences and the appreciation of humour
4. Parts of the brain responsible for tickling reflex
5. Neuropsychological mechanisms by which humor and laughter work
6. The connection between tickling and nerve fibers
7. Patients with emotional disorders

Questions 8-11
Look at the following researchers (listed 8-11) and findings (listed A-F). Match each researcher with the correct finding(s).

A The surprise factor, combined with the anticipation of pleasure, cause laughter when tickled.
B Laughing caused by tickling is a built-in reflex even babies have.
C People also laugh when tickled by a machine if they are not aware of it.
D People have different tastes for jokes and humour.
E Jokes and funny cartoons activates the frontal lobes.
F Tickling sensations involve more than nerve fibers.

8. Darwin
9. Christenfeld and Harris
10. Ygve Zotterman
11. Peter Derks

Questions 12-14

Complete the summary below using NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the passage for each blank.

Write your answers in boxes 12-14 on your answer sheet.

Researchers believe three brain components to be involved in the processing of humor and laughter Results from one study using brain (12)……………………indicate that parts of the brain responsible for (13)……………..…… movement and pleasure are involved through a sophisticated pathway. Test subjects who suffered from frontal lobes damages had greater chances of picking (14)…………..……..of jokes or did not respond to funny cartoons or jokes.

The Farmer! parade of history

A. History of Farmer trading company: In 1909 Robert Laidlaw establishes mail-order company Laidlaw Leeds in Fort Street, Auckland. Then, Branch expansion: purchase of Green and Colebrook chain store; further provincial stores in Auckland and Waikato to follow. Opening of first furniture and boot factory. In 1920, Company now has 29 branches; Whangarei store purchased. Doors open at Hobson Street for direct selling to public. Firm establishes London and New York buying offices. With permission from the Harbour Board, the large FARMERS electric sign on the Wyndham Street frontage is erected.

B. In 1935, if the merchandise has changed, the language of the catalogues hasn’t Robert Laidlaw, the Scottish immigrant who established the century-old business, might have been scripting a modern-day television commercial when he told his earliest customers: Satisfaction, or your money back. “It was the first money back guarantee ever offered in New Zealand by any firm,” says Ian Hunter, business historian. “And his mission statement was, potentially, only the second one ever found in the world.” Laidlaw’s stated aims were simple to build the greatest business in New Zealand, to simplify every transaction, to eliminate all delays, to only sell goods it would pay the customer to buy.

C. This year, the company that began as a mail-order business and now employs 3500 staff across 58 stores turns 100. Its centenary will be celebrated with the release of a book and major community fundraising projects, to be announced next week. Hunter, who is writing the centenary history, says “coming to a Farmers store once a week was a part of the New Zealand way of life”. By 1960, one in every 10 people had an account with the company. It was the place where teenage girls shopped for their first bra, where newlyweds purchased their first dinner sets, where first pay cheques were used to pay off hire purchase furniture, where Santa paraded every Christmas.

D. Gary Blumenthal’s mother shopped there, and so does he. The fondest memory for the Rotorua resident? “We were on holiday in Auckland … I decided that up on the lookout tower on top of the Farmers building would be a unique place to fit the ring on my new fiancee’s finger.” The lovebirds, who had to wait for “an annoying youth” to leave the tower before they could enjoy their engagement kiss, celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary in June.

E. Farmers, says Hunter, has always had a heart. This, from a 1993 North & South interview with a former board chairman, Rawdon Busfield: “One day I was in the Hobson Street shop and I saw a woman with two small children. They were clean and tidily dressed, but poor, you could tell. That week we had a special on a big bar of chocolate for one shilling. I heard the woman say to her boy, ‘no, your penny won’t buy that’. He wasn’t wearing shoes. So I went up to the boy said,’ Son, have you got your penny? ‘He handed it to me. It was hot he’d had it in his hand for hours. I took the penny and gave him the chocolate.”

F. Farmers was once the home of genteel tearooms, children’s playgrounds and an annual sale of celebration for birthday of Hector the Parrot (the store mascot died, aged 131, in the 1970s his stuffed remains still occupy pride of place at the company’s head office). You could buy houses from Farmers. Its saddle factory supplied the armed forces, and its upright grand overstrung pianos offered “the acme of value” according to those early catalogues hand-drawn by Robert Laidlaw himself. Walk through a Farmers store today and get hit by bright lights and big brands. Its Albany branch houses 16 international cosmetics companies. It buys from approximately 500 suppliers, and about 30% of those are locally owned.

G. “Eight, 10 years ago,” says current chief executive Rod McDermott, “lots of brands wouldn’t partner with us. The stores were quite distressed. We were first price point focused, we weren’t fashion focused. “Remove the rose-tinted nostalgia, and Farmers is, quite simply, a business, doing business in hard times. Dancing with the Stars presenter Candy Lane launches a clothing line? “We put a trial on, and we thought it was really lovely, but the uptake wasn’t what we thought it would be. It’s got to be what the customer wants,” says McDermott.

H. He acknowledges retailers suffer in a recession: “We’re celebrating 100 years because we can and because we should.” Farmers almost didn’t pull through one economic crisis. By the mid 1980s, it had stores across the country. It had acquired the South Island’s Calder Mackay chain of stores and bought out Haywrights. Then, with sales topping $375 million, it was taken over by Chase Corporation. Lincoln Laidlaw, now aged 88, and the son of the company’s founder, remembers the dark days following the stock market crash and the collapse of Chase. “I think, once, Farmers was like a big family and all of the people who worked for it felt they were building something which would ultimately be to their benefit and to the benefit of New Zealand… then the business was being divided up and so that kind of family situation was dispelled and it hasn’t been recovered.” For a turbulent few years, the stores were controlled, first by a consortium of Australian banks and later Deka, the Maori Development Corporation and Foodland Associated Ltd. In 2003, it went back to “family” ownership, with the purchase by the James Pascoe Group, owned by David and Anne Norman the latter being the great-granddaughter of James Pascoe, whose first business interest was jewellery.

I. “Sheer power of the brand,” says McDermott, “pulled Farmers through and now we’re becoming the brand it used to be again.” Farmers was the company that, during World War n, topped up the wages of any staff member disadvantaged by overseas service. Robert Laidlaw a committed Christian who came to his faith at a 1902 evangelistic service in Dunedin concluded his original mission statement with the words, “all at it, always at it, wins success”. Next week, 58 Farmers stores across the country will announce the local charities they will raise funds for in their centenary celebration everything from guide dog services to hospices to volunteer fire brigades will benefit. Every dollar raised by the community will be matched by the company. “It’s like the rebirth of an icon,” says McDermott.

Questions 15-18

The reading Passage has seven paragraphs A-I. Which paragraph contains the following information?

15. Innovation of offer made by the head of company.
16. Fashion was not its strong point.
17. A romantic event on the roof of farmers.
18. Farmers was sold to a private owned company.

Questions 19-23
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 19-23 on your answer sheet.

19. Farmers was first founded as a____________in Auckland by Mr. Laidlaw.
20. Farmers developed fast and bought one____________then.
21. During oversea expansion, Farmers set up____________in cities such as London.
22. Farmers held a______________once a year for the well-known parrot.
23. In the opinion of Lincoln Laidlaw, Farmers is like a ______for employees, not just for themselves but for the whole country.

Questions 24-26
Use the information in the passage to match the people (listed A-C) with opinions or deeds below. Write the appropriate letters A-C in boxes 24-26 on your answer sheet. NB you may use any letter more than once

A Lincoln Laidlaw
B Rod McDermott
C Ian Hunter

24 Product became worse as wrong aspect focused.
25 An unprecedented statement made by Farmers in New Zealand.
26 Character of the company was changed.

John Franklin: “the discovery of the slowness”

A. John Franklin (1786-1847) was the most famous vanisher of the Victorian era. He joined the Navy as a midshipman at the age of 14, and fought in the battles of Copenhagen and Trafalgar. When peace with the French broke out. he turned his attention to, and in particular to solving the conundrum of the Northwest Passage, the mythical clear-water route which would, if it existed, link the Atlantic and the Pacific Oceans above the northern coast of the American continent. The first expedition Franklin led to the Arctic was an arduous overland journey from Hudson Bay to the shores of the so-called Polar Ocean east of the Coppermine River. Between 1819 and 1822. Franklin and his twenty-strong team covered 5550 miles on foot. Their expedition was a triumph of surveying – they managed to chart hundreds of miles of previously unknown coastline.

B. There followed a career as a travel writer and salon-goer (the man who ate his boots’ was Franklin’s tag-line), a second long Arctic expedition, and a controversial spell as Governor of Van Diemen’s Land. Then, in May 1845, Franklin set off with two ships – the Erebus and the Terror – and 129 men on the voyage that would kill him. In July, the convoy was seen by two whalers, entering Lancaster Sound. Nothing more would be heard of it for 14 years. Had the ships sunk or been iced in? Were the men dead, or in need of rescue? Or had they broken through to the legendary open polar sea, beyond the ‘ice barrier’?

C. In his personal correspondence and in his published memoirs. Franklin comes across as a man dedicated to the external duties of war and exploration, who kept introspection and self-analysis to a minimum. His blandness makes him an amenably malleable subject for a novelist, and Sten Nadolny has taken full advantage of this licence. Most important, he has endowed his John Franklin with a defining character trait for which there is no historical evidence: (‘slowness’, or ‘calmness’).

D. Slowness influences not only Franklin’s behaviour, but also his vision, his thought and his speech. The opening scene of The Discovery of Slowness (The Discovery of Slowness by Sten Nadolny) – depicts Franklin as a young boy. playing catch badly because his reaction time is too slow. Despite the bullying of his peers, Franklin resolves not to fall into step with ‘their way of doing things’. For Nadolny. Franklin’s fated fascination with the Arctic stems from his desire to find an environment suited to his peculiar slowness.

E. He describes Fremklin as a boy dreaming of the ‘open water euid the time without hours and days’ which exist in the far north, and of finding in the Arctic a place ‘where nobody would find him too slow’. Ice is a slow mover. Ice demands a corresponding patience from those who venture onto it. The explorers who have thrived at high latitude and at high altitudes haven’t usually been men of great speed. They have tended instead to demonstrate unusual self-possession, a considerable capacity for boredom, and a talent for what the Scots call ‘tholing’, the uncomplaining endurance of suffering.

F. These were all qualities which the historical Franklin possessed in abundance, and so Nadolny’s concentration and exaggeration of them isn’t unreasonable. Even as an adult, his slowness of thought means that he is unable to speak fluently, so he memorises ‘entire fleets of words and batteries of response’, and speaks a languid, bric-a-brac language. In the Navy, his method of thinking first and acting later initially provokes mockery from his fellow sailors. But Franklin persists in doing things his way. and gradually earns the respect of those around him. To a commodore who tells him to speed up his report of an engagement, he replies: ‘When I tell something, sir. I use my own rhythm.’ A lieutenant says approvingly of him: ’Because Franklin is so slow, he never loses time.’

G. Since it was first published in Germany in 1983. The Discovery of Slowness has sold more than a million copies and been translated into 13 languages. It has been named as one of German literature’s twenty ‘contemporary classics’, and it has been as a manual and by European pressure groups and institutions representing causes as diverse as sustainable development, the Protestant Church, management science, motoring policy and pacifiam.

H. The various groups that have taken the novel up have one thing in common: a dislike of the high-speed culture of Postmodernity. Nadolny’s Franklin appeals to them because he is immune to ‘the compulsion to be constantly occupied’, and to the idea that ‘someone was better if he could do the same thing fast.’ Several German churches have used him in their and focus groups as an example of peacefulness, piety and self-confidence. A centre scheme (a ‘march of slowness’ or ‘of the slow’), inspired by the novel. Nadolny has appeared as a guest speaker for RIO. a Lucerne-based organisation which aims to reconcile management principles with ideas of environmental sustainability. The novel has even become involved in the debate about speed limits on German roads. Drive down an autobahn today, and you will see large road-side signs proclaiming ‘unhurriedness’ a slogan which deliberately plays off the title of the novel.

I. A management journal in the US described The Discovery of Slowness as a ‘major event not only for connoisseurs of fine historical fiction, but also for those of us who concern themselves with leadership, communication and systems-thinking, issues’. It’s easy to see where the attraction lies for the management crowd. The novel is crammed with quotations about time-efficiency, punctiliousness and profitability: ‘As a rule, there are always three points in time: the right one. the lost one and the premature one’. ‘What did too late mean? They hadn’t waited for it long enough, that’s what it meant.’

Questions 27-32
Reading Passage 3 has seven paragraphs A-H. Which paragraph contains the following information? Write the correct letter A-H, in boxes 27-32 on your answer sheet. NB You may use any letter more than once.

27. What was Sir John Franklin’s occupation before he went on career of the arctic exploration?
28. A story John Franklin reacted strangely when he met bullies by other children.
29. Reason of popularity for the book The Discovery of Slowness
30. A depiction that Sten Nadolny’s biography on John Franklin is not much based on facts.
31. The particular career Sir John Franklin took after his expedition unmatched before.
32. What is the central scheme and environment conveyed by the book The Discovery of Slowness

Questions 33-36
Complete the Summary paragraph described below. In boxes 33-36 on your answer sheet, write the correct answer with one word chosen from the box below

In his personal correspondence to and in his published memoirs by Sten Nadolny, John Franklin was depicted as a man dedicated to the exploration, and the word of “slowness” was used to define his (33)………………..…….when Franklin was in his childhood, his determination to the (34)…………………..………of the schoolboys was too slow for him to fall into step. And Franklin was said to be a boy dreaming finding in a place he could enjoy the (35)………………………in the Arctic. Later in 20th, His biography of discovery of slowness has been adopted as a (36)………………………. as for the movement such as sustainable development, or management science, motoring policy.

A exploration
B blandness
C personality
D policy
E pressure
F guidebook
G management
H timelessness
I sports
J bully
K evidence

Questions 37-40
Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D.

37. Why does the author mention “the ice is a slow in the geological arctic, to demonstrate the idea
A. of the difficulties Franklin conquered
B. that Franklin had a dream since his childhood
C. of fascination with the Arctic exploration
D. that explorer like Franklin should possess the quality of being patient

38. When Franklin was on board with sailors, how did he speak to his follow sailors
A. he spoke in a way mocking his followers
B. he spoke a bric-a-brac language to show his languish attitude
C. he spoke in the words and phrases he previously memorized
D. he spoke in a rhythmical tune to save chatting time

39. His effort to overcome his slowness in marine time life had finally won the
A. understanding of his personality better
B. capacity for coping with boredom
C. respect for him as he insisted to overcome his difficulties
D. valuable time he can use to finish a report

40. why is the book The Discovery of Slowness sold more than a million copies
A. it contains aspects of the life people would like to enjoy
B. it contains the information for the flag language applied in ships
C. it induces a debate about speed limits German
D. it contains the technique for symposia German churches

Cutty Sark: the fastest sailing ship of all time

The nineteenth century was a period of great technological development in Britain, and for shipping the major changes were from wind to steam power, and from wood to iron and steel.

The fastest commercial sailing vessels of all time were clippers, three-masted ships built to transport goods around the world, although some also took passengers. From the l 840s until 1869, when the Suez Canal opened and steam propulsion was replacing sail, clippers dominated world trade. Although many were built, only one has survived more or less intact: Cutty Sark, now on display in Greenwich, southeast London.

Cutty Sark’s unusual name comes from the poem Tam O’Shanter by the Scottish poet Robert Bums. Tam, a farmer, is chased by a witch called Nannie, who is wearing a ‘cutty sark’ – an old Scottish name for a short nightdress. The witch is depicted in Cutty Sark’s figurehead – the carving of a woman typically at the front of old sailing ships. In legend, and in Burn’s poem, witches cannot cross water, so this was a rather strange choice of name for a ship.

Cutty Sark was built in Dumbarton. Scotland, in 1869, for a shipping company owned by John Willis. To carry out construction. Willis chose a new shipbuilding firm. Scott & Linton, and ensured that the contract with them put him in a very strong position. In the end, the firm was forced out of business, and the ship was finished by a competitor.

Willis’s company was active in the lea trade between China and Britain, where speed could bring shipowners both profits and prestige, so Cutty Sark was designed to make the journey more quickly than any other ship. On her maiden voyage, in 1870, she set sail from London, carrying large amounts of goods to China. She returned laden with tea, making the journey back to London in four months. However, Cutty Sark never lived up to the high expectations of her owner, as a result of bad winds and various misfortunes. On one occasion, in 1872, the ship and a rival clipper. Thermopylae, left port in China on the same day. Crossing the Indian Ocean, Cutty Sark gained a lead of over 400 miles, hut then her rudder was severely damaged in stormy seas, making her impossible to steer. The ship’s crew had the daunting task of repairing the rudder at sea, and only succeeded at the second attempt. Cutty Sark reached London a w eek after Thermopylae.

Steam ships posed a growing threat to clippers, as their speed and cargo capacity increased. In addition, the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869, the same year that Cutty Sark was launched, had a serious impact. While steam ships could make use of the quick, direct route between the Mediterranean and the Red Sea, the canal was of no use to sailing ships, which needed the much stronger winds of the oceans, and so had to sail a far greater distance. Steam ships reduced the journey time between Britain and China by approximately two months.

By 1878, tea traders weren’t interested in Cutty Sark, and instead, she look on the much less prestigious work of carrying any cargo between any two ports in the world. In 1880, violence aboard the ship led ultimately to the replacement of the captain with an incompetent drunkard who stole the crew’s wages. He was suspended from service, and a new captain appointed. This marked a turnaround and the beginning of the most successful period in Cult} Sark’s working life, transporting wool from Australia to Britain. One such journey took just under 12 weeks, beating every other ship sailing that year by around a month.

The ship’s next captain, Richard Woodget. was an excellent navigator, who got the best out of both his ship and his crew. As a sailing ship. Cutty Sark depended on the strong trade winds of the southern hemisphere, and Woodget look her further south than any previous captain, bringing her dangerously close to icebergs off the southern tip of South America. I lis gamble paid off, though, and the ship was the fastest vessel in the wool trade for ten years.

As competition from steam ships increased in the 1890s, and Cutty Sark approached the end of her life expectancy, she became less profitable. She was sold to a Portuguese firm, which renamed her Ferreira. For the next 25 years, she again carried miscellaneous cargoes around the world.

Badly damaged in a gale in 1922, she was put into Falmouth harbour in southwest England, for repairs. Wilfred Dowman, a retired sea captain who owned a training vessel, recognised her and tried to buy her, but without success. She returned to Portugal and was sold to another Portuguese company. Dowman was determined, however, and offered a high price: this was accepted, and the ship returned to Falmouth the following year and had her original name restored.

Dowman used Cutty Sark as a training ship, and she continued in this role after his death. When she was no longer required, in 1954, she was transferred to dry dock at Greenw ich to go on public display. The ship suffered from fire in 2007, and again, less seriously, in 2014, but now Cutty Sark attracts a quarter of a million visitors a year.

Questions 1-8
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 1? 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

1 Clippers were originally intended to be used as passenger ships.
2 Cutty Sark was given the name of a character in a poem.
3 The contract between John Willis and Scott & Linton favoured Willis.
4 John Willis wanted Cutty Sark to be the fastest tea clipper travelling between the UK and China.
5 Despite storm damage, Cutty Sark beat Thermopylae back to London.
6 The opening of the Suez Canal meant that steam ships could travel between Britain and China faster than clippers
7 Steam ships sometimes used the ocean route to travel between London and China.
8 Captain Woodget put Cutty Sark at risk of hitting an iceberg

Question 9-13
Complete the sentences below. Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage for each answer.

9 After 1880, Cutty Sark carried……………………………..as its main cargo during its most successful time
10 As a captain and……………………….Woodget was very skilled.
11 Ferreira went to Falmouth to repair damage that a………………………….had caused.
12 Between 1923 and 1954, Cutty Sark was used for…………………….
13 Cutty Sark has twice been damaged by………………………….in the 21st century.

Saving the soil

A More than a third of the world’s soil is endangered, according to a recent UN report. If we don’t slow the decline, all farmable soil could be gone in 60 years. Since soil grows 95% of our food, and sustains human life in other more surprising ways, that is a huge problem.

B Peter Groffman, from the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies in New York, points out that soil scientists have been warning about the degradation of the world’s soil for decades. At the same time, our understanding of its importance to humans has grown. A single gram of healthy soil might contain 100 million bacteria, as well as other microorganisms such as viruses and fungi, living amid decomposing plants and various minerals.

That means soils do not just grow our food, but are the source of nearly all our existing antibiotics, and could be our best hope in the fight against antibiotic- resistant bacteria. Soil is also an ally against climate change: as microorganisms within soil digest dead animals and plants, they lock in their carbon content, holding three times the amount of carbon as does the entire atmosphere. Soils also store water, preventing flood damage: in the UK, damage to buildings, roads and bridges from floods caused by soil degradation costs £233 million every year.

C If the soil loses its ability to perform these functions, the human race could be in big trouble. The danger is not that the soil will disappear completely, but that the microorganisms that give it its special properties will be lost. And once this has happened, it may take the soil thousands of years to recover.

Agriculture is by far the biggest problem. In the wild, when plants grow they remove nutrients from the soil, but then when the plants die and decay these nutrients are returned directly to the soil, Humans tend not to return unused parts of harvested crops directly to the soil to enrich it, meaning that the soil gradually becomes less fertile. In the past we developed strategies to get around the problem, such as regularly varying the types of crops grown, or leaving fields uncultivated for a season.

D But these practices became inconvenient as populations grew and agriculture had to be run on more commercial lines. A solution came in the early 20th century with the Haber-Bosch process for manufacturing ammonium nitrate. Farmers have been putting this synthetic fertiliser on their fields ever since.

But over the past few decades, it has become clear this was not such a bright idea. Chemical fertilisers can release polluting nitrous oxide into the atmosphere and excess is often washed away with the rain, releasing nitrogen into rivers. More recently, we have found that indiscriminate use of fertilisers hurts the soil itself, turning it acidic and salty, and degrading the soil they are supposed to nourish.

E One of the people looking for a solution to this problem is Pius Floris, who started out running a tree-care business in the Netherlands and now advises some of the world’s top soil scientists. He came to realise that the best way to ensure his trees flourished was to take care of the soil, and has developed a cocktail of beneficial bacteria, fungi and humus to do this. Researchers at the University of Valladolid in Spain recently used this cocktail on soils destroyed by years of fertiliser overuse. When they applied Floris’s mix to the desert-like test plots, a good crop of plants emerged that were not just healthy at the surface, but had roots strong enough to pierce dirt as hard as rock. The few plants that grew in the control plots, fed with traditional fertilisers, were small and weak.

F However, measures like this are not enough to solve the global soil degradation problem. To assess our options on a global scale we first need an accurate picture of what types of soil are out there, and the problems they face. That’s not easy. For one thing, there is no agreed international system for classifying soil. In an attempt to unify the different approaches, the UN has created the Global Soil Map project. Researchers from nine countries are working together to create a map linked to a database that can be fed measurements from field surveys, drone surveys, satellite imagery, lab analyses and so on to provide real-time data on the state of the soil. Within the next four years, they aim to have mapped soils worldwide to a depth of 100 metres, with the results freely accessible to all.

G But this is only a first step. We need ways of presenting the problem that bring it home to governments and the wider public, says Pamela Chasek at the International Institute for Sustainable Development, in Winnipeg, Canada. ‘Most scientists don’t speak language that policy-makers can understand and vice versa.’ Chasek and her colleagues have proposed a goal of ‘zero net land degradation’. Like the idea of carbon neutrality it is an easily understood target that can help shape expectations and encourage action.

For soils on the brink, that may be too late. Several researchers are agitating for the immediate creation of protected zones for endangered soils. One difficulty here is defining what these areas should conserve: areas where the greatest soil diversity is present? Or areas of unspoilt soils that could act as a future benchmark of quality?

Whatever, we do, if we want our soils to survive, we need to take action now.

Questions 14-17
Complete the summary below. Write ONE WORD ONLY from the passage for each answer.

Why soil degradation could be a disaster for humans
Healthy soil contains a large variety of bacteria and other microorganisms, as well as plant remains and (14)………………….., It provides us with food and also with antibiotics, and its function in storing (15)…………………………..has a significant effect on the climate. In addition, it prevents damage to property and infrastructure because it holds (16)…………………………..

If these microorganisms are lost, soil may lose its special properties. The main factor contributing to soil degradation is the (17)…………………………carried out by humans.

Questions 18-21
Complete each sentence with the correct ending, A-F below. Write the correct letter. A-F. in boxes 18-21 on your answer sheet.

18 Nutrients contained in the unused parts of harvested crops
19 Synthetic fertilisers produced with the Haber-Bosch process
20 Addition of a mixture developed by Pius Floris to the soil
21 The idea of zero net soil degradation

A may improve the number and quality of plants growing there.
B may contain data from up to nine countries.
C may not be put back into the soil.
D may help governments to be more aware of soil-related issues.
E may cause damage to different aspects of the environment.
F may be better for use at a global level.

Questions 22-26
Reading Passage 2 has seven paragraphs, A-G. Which section contains the following information?
NB You may use any letter more than once.

22 a reference to one person’s motivation for a soil-improvement project
23 an explanation of how soil stayed healthy before the development of farming
24 examples of different ways of collecting information on soil degradation
25 a suggestion for a way of keeping some types of soil safe in the near future
26 a reason why it is difficult to provide an overview of soil degradation

Book review

‘Happiness is the ultimate goal because it is self-evidently good. If we are asked why happiness matters we can give no further external reason. It just obviously does matter.’ This pronouncement by Richard Layard, an economist and advocate of ‘positive psychology’, summarises the beliefs of many people today. For Layard and others like him, it is obvious that the purpose of government is to promote a state of collective well-being. The only question is how to achieve it, and here positive psychology – a supposed science that not only identifies what makes people happy but also allows their happiness to be measured – can show the way. Equipped with this science, they say, governments can secure happiness in society in a way they never could in the past.

It is an astonishingly crude and simple-minded way of thinking, and for that very reason increasingly popular. Those who think in this way are oblivious to the vast philosophical literature in which the meaning and value of happiness have been explored and questioned, and write as if nothing of any importance had been thought on the subject until it came to their attention. It was the philosopher Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832) who was more than anyone else responsible for the development of this way of thinking. For Bentham it was obvious that the human good consists of pleasure and the absence of pain. The Greek philosopher Aristotle may have identified happiness with self-realisation in the 4th century BC, and thinkers throughout the ages may have struggled to reconcile the pursuit of happiness with other human values, but for Bentham all this was mere metaphysics or fiction. Without knowing anything much of him or the school of moral theory he established – since they are by education and intellectual conviction illiterate in the history of ideas – our advocates of positive psychology follow in his tracks in rejecting as outmoded and irrelevant pretty much the entirety of ethical reflection on human happiness to date.

But as William Davies notes in his recent book The Happiness Industry, the view that happiness is the only self-evident good is actually a way of limiting moral inquiry. One of the virtues of this rich, lucid and arresting book is that it places the current cult of happiness in a well-defined historical framework. Rightly, Davies begins his story with Bentham, noting that he was far more than a philosopher. Davies writes, ‘Bentham’s activities were those which we might now associate with a public sector management consultant’. In the 1790s, he wrote to the Home Office suggesting that the departments of government be linked together through a set of ‘conversation tubes’, and to the Bank of England with a design for a printing device that could produce unforgeable bank notes. He drew up plans for a ‘frigidarium’ to keep provisions such as meat, fish, fruit and vegetables fresh. His celebrated design for a prison to be known as ‘Panopticon’ in which prisoners would be kept in solitary confinement while being visible at all times to the guards, was very nearly adopted. (Surprisingly Davies does not discuss the fact that Bentham meant his Panopticon not just as a model prison but also as an instrument of control that could be applied to schools and factories).

Bentham was also a pioneer of the ‘science of happiness’. If happiness is to be regarded as a science, it has to be measured and Bentham suggested two ways in which this might be done. Viewing happiness as a complex of pleasurable sensations he suggest that it might be quantified by measuring the human pulse rate. Alternatively, money could be used as the standard for quantification: if two different goods have the same price, it can be claimed that they produce the same quantity of pleasure in the consumer, Bentham was more attracted by the latter measure. By associating money so closely to inner experience Davies writes, Bentham ‘set the stage for the entangling of psychological research and capitalism that would shape the business practices of the 20th century.

The Happiness Industry describes how the project of a science of happiness has become integral to capitalism. We learn much that is interesting about how economic problems are being redefined and treated as psychological maladies. In addition, Davies shows how the belief that inner states of pleasure and displeasure can be objectively measured has informed management studies and advertising. The tendency of thinkers such as J B Watson, the founder of behaviourism, was that human beings could be shaped, or manipulated, by policymakers and managers. Watson had no factual basis for his view of human action. When he became president of the American Psychological Association in 1915, he ’had never even studied a single human being’: his research had been confined to experiments on white rats. Yet Watson’s reductive model is now widely applied, with ‘behaviour change’ becoming the goal of governments: in Britain, a ‘Behaviour Insights Team’ has been established by the government to study how people can be encouraged, at minimum cost to the public purse, to live in what are considered to be socially desirable ways.

Modern industrial societies appear to need the possibility of ever-increasing happiness to motivate them in their labours. But whatever its intellectual pedigree, the idea that governments should be responsible for promoting happiness is always a threat to human freedom.

Questions 27-29
Choose the correct letter, A. B, C or D

27 What is the reviewer’s attitude to advocates of positive psychology?
A They are wrong to reject the ideas of Bentham.
B They are over-influenced by their study of Bentham’s theories.
C They have a fresh new approach to ideas on human happiness.
D They are ignorant about the ideas they should be considering.

28 The reviewer refers to the Greek philosopher Aristotle in order to suggest that happiness
A may not be just pleasure and the absence of pain.
B should not be the main goal of humans.
C is not something that should be fought for.
b is not just an abstract concept.

29 According to Davies, Bentham’s suggestion for linking the price of goods to happiness was significant because
A it was the first successful way of assessing happiness.
B it established a connection between work and psychology
C it was the first successful example of psychological research.
D it involved consideration of the rights of consumers.

Questions 30-34
Complete the summary using the list of words A-G below.

Jeremy Bentham
Jeremy Bentham was active in other areas besides philosophy. In the 1790s he suggested a type of technology to improve (30)…………………………… for different Government departments. He developed a new way of printing banknotes to increase (31)……………………………….and also designed a method for the (32)…………………………….of food. He also drew up plans for a prison which allowed the (33)…………………………………of prisoners at all times, and believed the same design could be used for other institutions as well. When researching happiness, he investigated possibilities for its (34)……………………………. and suggested some methods of doing this.

A measurement
B security
C implementation
E observation
F communication
G preservation

Questions 35-40
Do the following statements agree with the claims of the writer in Reading Passage 3?

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

35 One strength of The Happiness Industry is its discussion of the relationship between psychology and economics.
36 It is more difficult to measure some emotions than others.
37 Watson’s ideas on behaviourism were supported by research on humans he carried out before 1915.
38 Watson’s ideas have been most influential on governments outside America.
39 The need for happiness is linked to industrialisation.
40 A main aim of government should be to increase the happiness of the population.

The Coconut Palm

For millennia, the coconut has been central to the lives of Polynesian and Asian peoples. In the western world, on the other hand, coconuts have always been exotic and unusual, sometimes rare. The Italian merchant traveller Marco Polo apparently saw coconuts in South Asia in the late 13th century, and among the mid-14th-century travel writings of Sir John Mandeville there is mention of ‘great Notes of Ynde’ (great Nuts of India). Today, images of palm-fringed tropical beaches are cliches in the west to sell holidays, chocolate bars fizzy drinks and even romance.

Typically, we envisage coconuts as brown cannonballs that, when opened, provide sweet white flesh. But we see only part of the fruit and none of the plant from which they come. The coconut palm has a smooth, slender, grey trunk, up to 30 metres tall. This is an important source of timber for building houses, and is increasingly being used as a replacement for endangered hardwoods in the furniture construction industry. The trunk is surmounted by a rosette of leaves, each of which may be up to six metres long. The leaves have hard veins in their centres which, in many parts of the world, are used as brushes after the green part of the leaf has been stripped away. Immature coconut flowers are tightly clustered together among the leaves at the top of the trunk. The flower stems may be tapped for their sap to produce a drink, and the sap can also be reduced by boiling to produce a type of sugar used for cooking.

Coconut palms produce as many as seventy fruits per year, weighing more than a kilogram each. The wall of the fruit has three layers: a waterproof outer layer, a fibrous middle layer and a hard, inner layer. The thick fibrous middle layer produces coconut fibre, ‘coir’, which has numerous uses and is particularly important in manufacturing ropes. The woody innermost layer, the shell, with its three prominent ‘eyes’, surrounds the seed. An important product obtained from the shell is charcoal, which is widely used in various industries as well as in the home as a cooking fuel. When broken in half, the shells are also used as bowls in many parts of Asia.

Inside the shell are the nutrients (endosperm) needed by the developing seed. Initially, the endosperm is a sweetish liquid, coconut water, which is enjoyed as a drink, but also provides the hormones which encourage other plants to grow more rapidly and produce higher yields. As the fruit matures, the coconut water gradually solidifies to form the brilliant white, fat-rich, edible flesh or meat. Dried coconut flesh, ‘copra’, is made into coconut oil and coconut milk, which are widely used in cooking in different parts of the world, as well as in cosmetics. A derivative of coconut fat, glycerine, acquired strategic importance in a quite different sphere, as Alfred Nobel introduced the world to his nitroglycerine-based invention: dynamite.

Their biology would appear to make coconuts the great maritime voyagers and coastal colonizers of the plant world. The large, energy-rich fruits are able to float in water and tolerate salt, but cannot remain viable indefinitely; studies suggest after about 110 days at sea they are no longer able to germinate. Literally cast onto desert island shores, with little more than sand to grow in and exposed to the full glare of the tropical sun, coconut seeds are able to germinate and root. The air pocket in the seed, created as the endosperm solidifies, protects the embryo. In addition, the fibrous fruit wall that helped it to float during the voyage stores moisture that can be taken up by the roots of the coconut seedling as it starts to grow.

There have been centuries of academic debate over the origins of the coconut. There were no coconut palms in West Africa, the Caribbean or the east coast of the Americas before the voyages of the European explorers Vasco da Gama and Columbus in the late 15th and early 16th centuries. 16th century trade and human migration patterns reveal that Arab traders and European sailors are likely to have moved coconuts from South and Southeast Asia to Africa and then across the Atlantic to the east coast of America. But the origin of coconuts discovered along the west coast of America by 16th century sailors has been the subject of centuries of discussion. Two diametrically opposed origins have been proposed: that they came from Asia, or that they were native to America. Both suggestions have problems. In Asia, there is a large degree of coconut diversity and evidence of millennia of human use – but there are no relatives growing in the wild. In America, there are close coconut relatives, but no evidence that coconuts are indigenous. These problems have led to the intriguing suggestion that coconuts originated on coral islands in the Pacific and were dispersed from there.

Questions 1-8
Complete the table below. Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage.

The Coconut Palm

Part	Description	Uses
Trunk	up to 30 meters	timber for houses and the making of (1)…………………..
Leaves	up to 6 meters long	to make brushes
Flowers	at the top of the trunk	stems provide sap, used as a drink or a source of (2)…………….
Fruits	– outer layer – middle layer (coir) – inner layer (shell) – coconut water – coconut flesh	– used for (3)………………..etc – a source of (4)………………(when halved) for (5)……………….. – a drink and a source of (6)…………………for other plants – oil and milk for cooking and (7)………………glycerine (an ingredient in (8)…………………)

Questions 9-13
Do the following statements agree with the information given in the passage. Write

TRUE                                       if the statement agrees with the information
FALSE                                     if the statement contradicts the information
NOT GIVEN                          if there is no mention of this

9. Coconut seeds need shade in order to germinate.
10. Coconuts were probably transported to Asia from America in the 16th century.
11. Coconuts found on the west coast of America were a different type from those found on the east coast.
12. All the coconuts found in Asia are cultivated varieties.
13. Coconuts are cultivated in different ways in America and the Pacific.

How Baby Talk Gives Infant Brains A Boost

A The typical way of talking to a baby – high-pitched, exaggerated and repetitious – is a source of fascination for linguists who hope to understand how ‘baby talk’ impacts on learning. Most babies start developing their hearing while still in the womb, prompting some hopeful parents to play classical music to their pregnant bellies. Some research even suggests that infants are listening to adult speech as early as 10 weeks before being born, gathering the basic building blocks of their family’s native tongue.

B Early language exposure seems to have benefits to the brain – for instance, studies suggest that babies raised in bilingual homes are better at learning how to mentally prioritize information. So how does the sweet if sometimes absurd sound of infant- directed speech influence a baby’s development? Here are some recent studies that explore the science behind baby talk.

C Fathers don’t use baby talk as often or in the same ways as mothers – and that’s perfectly OK, according to a new study. Mark Van Dam of Washington State University at Spokane and colleagues equipped parents with recording devices and speech-recognition software to study the way they interacted with their youngsters during a normal day. ‘We found that moms do exactly what you’d expect and what’s been described many times over,’ VanDam explains. ‘But we found that dads aren’t doing the same thing. Dads didn’t raise their pitch or fundamental frequency when they talked to kids.’ Their role may be rooted in what is called the bridge hypothesis, which dates back to 1975. It suggests that fathers use less familial language to provide their children with a bridge to the kind of speech they’ll hear in public. The idea is that a kid gets to practice a certain kind of speech with mom and another kind of speech with dad, so the kid then has a wider repertoire of kinds of speech to practice,’ says VanDam.

D Scientists from the University of Washington and the University of Connecticut collected thousands of 30-second conversations between parents and their babies, fitting 26 children with audio-recording vests that captured language and sound during a typical eight-hour day. The study found that the more baby talk parents used, the more their youngsters began to babble. And when researchers saw the same babies at age two, they found that frequent baby talk had dramatically boosted vocabulary, regardless of socioeconomic status. Those children who listened to a lot of baby talk were talking more than the babies that listened to more adult talk or standard speech,’ says Nairan Ramirez-Esparza of the University of Connecticut. ‘We also found that it really matters whether you use baby talk in a one-on-one context,’ she adds. The more parents use baby talk one-on-one, the more babies babble, and the more they babble, the more words they produce later in life.’

E Another study suggests that parents might want to pair their youngsters up so they can babble more with their own kind. Researchers from McGill University and Universite du Quebec a Montreal found that babies seem to like listening to each other rather than to adults – which may be why baby talk is such a universal tool among parents. They played repeating vowel sounds made by a special synthesizing device that mimicked sounds made by either an adult woman or another baby. This way, only the impact of the auditory cues was observed. The team then measured how long each type of sound held the infants’ attention. They found that the ‘infant’ sounds held babies’ attention nearly 40 percent longer. The baby noises also induced more reactions in the listening infants, like smiling or lip moving, which approximates sound making. The team theorizes that this attraction to other infant sounds could help launch the learning process that leads to speech. It may be some property of the sound that is just drawing their attention,’ says study co-author Linda Polka. ‘Or maybe they are really interested in that particular type of sound because they are starting to focus on their own ability to make sounds. We are speculating here but it might catch their attention because they recognize it as a sound they could possibly make.’

F In a study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, a total of 57 babies from two slightly different age groups – seven months and eleven and a half months – were played a number of syllables from both their native language (English) and a non-native tongue (Spanish). The infants were placed in a brain- activation scanner that recorded activity in a brain region known to guide the motor movements that produce speech. The results suggest that listening to baby talk prompts infant brains to start practicing their language skills. Finding activation in motor areas of the brain when infants are simply listening is significant, because it means the baby brain is engaged in trying to talk back right from the start, and suggests that seven-month-olds’ brains are already trying to figure out how to make the right movements that will produce words,’ says co-author Patricia Kuhl. Another interesting finding was that while the seven-month-olds responded to all speech sounds regardless of language, the brains of the older infants worked harder at the motor activations of non-native sounds compared to native sounds. The study may have also uncovered a process by which babies recognize differences between their native language and other tongues.

Questions 14-17
Look at the following ideas (Questions 14-17) and the list of researchers below. Match each idea with the correct researcher, A, B or C. NB You may use any letter more than once.

14 the importance of adults giving babies individual attention when talking to them
15 the connection between what babies hear and their own efforts to create speech
16 the advantage for the baby of having two parents each speaking in a different way
17 the connection between the amount of baby talk babies hear and how much vocalising they do themselves

List of researchers
A Mark VanDam
B Nairan Ramirez-Esparza
C Patricia Kuhl

Questions 18-23
Complete the summary below. Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer.

Research into how parents talk to babies
Researchers at Washington State University used (18)……………………………., together with specialised computer programs, to analyse how parents interacted with their babies during a normal day. The study revealed that (19)………………………..tended not to modify their ordinary speech patterns when interacting with their babies. According to an idea known as the (20)……………………………, they may use a more adult type of speech to prepare infants for the language they will hear outside the family home. According to the researchers, hearing baby talk from one parent and ‘normal’ language from the other expands the baby’s (21)………………………..of types of speech which they can practise.

Meanwhile, another study carried out by scientists from the University of Washington and the University of Connecticut recorded speech and sound using special (22)…………………………that the babies were equipped with. When they studied the babies again at age two, they found that those who had heard a lot of baby talk in infancy had a much larger (23)………………………..than those who had not.

Questions 24-26
Reading Passage 2 has six paragraphs, A-F.

Which paragraph contains the following information?

24 a reference to a change which occurs in babies’ brain activity before the end of their first year
25 an example of what some parents do for their baby’s benefit before birth
26 a mention of babies’ preference for the sounds that other babies make

Whatever Happened To The Harappan Civilisation?

A The Harappan Civilisation of ancient Pakistan and India flourished 5,000 years ago, but a thousand years later their cities were abandoned. The Harappan Civilisation was a sophisticated Bronze Age society who built ‘megacities’ and traded internationally in luxury craft products, and yet seemed to have left almost no depictions of themselves. But their lack of self-imagery – at a time when the Egyptians were carving and painting representations of themselves all over their temples – is only part of the mystery.

B ‘There is plenty of archaeological evidence to tell us about the rise of the Harappan Civilisation, but relatively little about its fall,’ explains archaeologist Dr Cameron Petrie of the University of Cambridge. ‘As populations increased, cities were built that had great baths, craft workshops, palaces and halls laid out in distinct sectors. Houses were arranged in blocks, with wide main streets and narrow alleyways, and many had their own wells and drainage systems. It was very much a “thriving civilisation.’ Then around 2100 BC, a transformation began. Streets went uncleaned, buildings started to be abandoned, and ritual structures fell out of use. After their final demise, a millennium passed before really large-scale cities appeared once more in South Asia.

C Some have claimed that major glacier-fed rivers changed their course, dramatically affecting the water supply and agriculture; or that the cities could not cope with an increasing population, they exhausted their resource base, the trading economy broke down or they succumbed to invasion and conflict; and yet others that climate change caused an environmental change that affected food and water provision. ‘It is unlikely that there was a single cause for the decline of the civilisation. But the fact is, until now, we have had little solid evidence from the area for most of the key elements,’ said Petrie. ‘A lot of the archaeological debate has really only been well- argued speculation.’

D A research team led by Petrie, together with Dr Ravindanath Singh of Banaras Hindu University in India, found early in their investigations that many of the archaeological sites were not where they were supposed to be, completely altering understanding of the way that this region was inhabited in the past. When they carried out a survey of how the larger area was settled in relation to sources of water, they found inaccuracies in the published geographic locations of ancient settlements ranging from several hundred metres to many kilometres. They realised that any attempts to use the existing data were likely to be fundamentally flawed. Over the course of several seasons of fieldwork they carried out new surveys, finding an astonishing 198 settlement sites that were previously unknown.

E Now, research published by Dr Yama Dixit and Professor David Hodell, both from Cambridge’s Department of Earth Sciences, has provided the first definitive evidence for climate change affecting the plains of north-western India, where hundreds of Harappan sites are known to have been situated. The researchers gathered shells of Melanoides tuberculata snails from the sediments of an ancient lake and used geochemical analysis as a means of tracing the climate history of the region. ’As today, the major source of water into the lake is likely to have been the summer monsoon,’ says Dixit. ‘But we have observed that there was an abrupt change about 4,100 years ago, when the amount of evaporation from the lake exceeded the rainfall – indicative of a drought.’ Hodell adds: ‘We estimate that the weakening of the Indian summer monsoon climate lasted about 200 years before recovering to the previous conditions, which we still see today.’

F It has long been thought that other great Bronze Age civilisations also declined at a similar time, with a global-scale climate event being seen as the cause. While it is possible that these local-scale processes were linked, the real archaeological interest lies in understanding the impact of these larger-scale events on different environments and different populations. ‘Considering the vast area of the Harappan Civilisation with its variable weather systems,’ explains Singh, ‘it is essential that we obtain more climate data from areas close to the two great cities at Mohenjodaro and Harappa and also from the Indian Punjab.’

G Petrie and Singh’s team is now examining archaeological records and trying to understand details of how people led their lives in the region five millennia ago. They are analysing grains cultivated at the time, and trying to work out whether they were grown under extreme conditions of water stress, and whether they were adjusting the combinations of crops they were growing for different weather systems. They are also looking at whether the types of pottery used, and other aspects of their material culture, were distinctive to specific regions or were more similar across larger areas. This gives us insight into the types of interactive networks that the population was involved in, and whether those changed.

H Petrie believes that archaeologists are in a unique position to investigate how past societies responded to environmental and climatic change. ’By investigating responses to environmental pressures and threats, we can learn from the past to engage with the public, and the relevant governmental and administrative bodies, to be more proactive in issues such as the management and administration of water supply, the balance of urban and rural development, and the importance of preserving cultural heritage in the future.’

Questions 27-31
Reading Passage 3 has eight paragraphs, A-H.

Which paragraph contains the following information? NB You may use any letter more than once.

27 proposed explanations for the decline of the Harappan Civilisation
28 reference to a present-day application of some archaeological research findings
29 a difference between the Harappan Civilisation and another culture of the same period
30 a description of some features of Harappan urban design
31 reference to the discovery of errors made by previous archaeologists

Questions 32-36
Complete the summary below. Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage for answer.

Looking at evidence of climate change
Yama Dixit and David Hodell have found the first definitive evidence of climate change affecting the plains of north-western India thousands of years ago. By collecting the (32)……………………………of snails and analysing them, they discovered evidence of a change in water levels in a (33)……………………….in the region. This occurred when there was less (34)…………………………… than evaporation, and suggests that there was an extended period of drought.

Petrie and Singh’s team are using archaeological records to look at (35)…………………………….. from five millennia ago, in order to know whether people had adapted their agricultural practices to changing climatic conditions. They are also examining objects including (36)……………………………., so as to find out about links between inhabitants of different parts of the region and whether these changed over time.

Questions 37-40
Look at the following statements (Questions 37-40) and the list of researchers below. Match each statement with the correct researcher, A. B. C or D.
NB You may use any letter more than once.

37 Finding further information about changes to environmental conditions in the region is vital.
38 Examining previous patterns of behaviour may have long-term benefits.
39 Rough calculations indicate the approximate length of a period of water shortage.
40 Information about the decline of the Harappan Civilisation has been lacking.

List of researchers 

A Cameron Petrie
B Ravindanath Singh
C Yama Dixit
D David Hodell

Bringing Cinnamon to Europe

Cinnamon is a sweet, fragrant spice produced from the inner bark of trees of the genus Cinnamomum, which is native to the Indian sub-continent. It was known in biblical times, and is mentioned in several books of the Bible, both as an ingredient that was mixed with oils for anointing people’s bodies, and also as a token indicating friendship among lovers and friends. In ancient Rome, mourners attending funerals burnt cinnamon to create a pleasant scent. Most often, however, the spice found its primary use as an additive to food and drink. In the Middle Ages, Europeans who could afford the spice used it to flavour food, particularly meat, and to impress those around them with their ability to purchase an expensive condiment from the exotic’ East. At a banquet, a host would offer guests a plate with various spices piled upon it as a sign of the wealth at his or her disposal. Cinnamon was also reported to have health benefits, and was thought to cure various ailments, such as indigestion.

Toward the end of the Middle Ages, the European middle classes began to desire the lifestyle of the elite, including their consumption of spices. This led to a growth in demand for cinnamon and other spices. At that time, cinnamon was transported by Arab merchants, who closely guarded the secret of the source of the spice from potential rivals. They took it from India, where it was grown, on camels via an overland route to the Mediterranean. Their journey ended when they reached Alexandria. European traders sailed there to purchase their supply of cinnamon, then brought it back to Venice. The spice then travelled from that great trading city to markets all around Europe. Because the overland trade route allowed for only small quantities of the spice to reach Europe, and because Venice had a virtual monopoly of the trade, the Venetians could set the price of cinnamon exorbitantly high. These prices, coupled with the increasing demand, spurred the search for new routes to Asia by Europeans eager to take part in the spice trade.

Seeking the high profits promised by the cinnamon market, Portuguese traders arrived on the island of Ceylon in the Indian Ocean toward the end of the 15th century. Before Europeans arrived on the island, the state had organized the cultivation of cinnamon. People belonging to the ethnic group called the Salagama would peel the bark off young shoots of the cinnamon plant in the rainy season, when the wet bark was more pliable. During the peeling process, they curled the bark into the ‘stick’ shape still associated with the spice today. The Salagama then gave the finished product to the king as a form of tribute. When the Portuguese arrived, they needed to increase production significantly, and so enslaved many other members of the Ceylonese native population, forcing them to work in cinnamon harvesting. In 1518, the Portuguese built a fort on Ceylon, which enabled them to protect the island, so helping them to develop a monopoly in the cinnamon trade and generate very high profits. In the late 16th century, for example, they enjoyed a tenfold profit when shipping cinnamon over a journey of eight days from Ceylon to India.

When the Dutch arrived off the coast of southern Asia at the very beginning of the 17th century, they set their sights on displacing the Portuguese as kings of cinnamon. The Dutch allied themselves with Kandy, an inland kingdom on Ceylon. In return for payments of elephants and cinnamon, they protected the native king from the Portuguese. By 1640, the Dutch broke the 150-year Portuguese monopoly when they overran and occupied their factories. By 1658, they had permanently expelled the Portuguese from the island, thereby gaining control of the lucrative cinnamon trade.

In order to protect their hold on the market, the Dutch, like the Portuguese before them, treated the native inhabitants harshly Because of the need to boost production and satisfy Europe’s ever-increasing appetite for cinnamon, the Dutch began to alter the harvesting practices of the Ceylonese. Over time, the supply of cinnamon trees on the island became nearly exhausted, due to systematic stripping of the bark. Eventually, the Dutch began cultivating their own cinnamon trees to supplement the diminishing number of wild trees available for use.
Then, in 1796, the English arrived on Ceylon, thereby displacing the Dutch from their control of the cinnamon monopoly. By the middle of the 19th century, production of cinnamon reached 1.000 tons a year, after a lower grade quality of the spice became acceptable to European tastes By that time, cinnamon was being grown in other parts of the Indian Ocean region and in the West Indies, Brazil, and Guyana. Not only was a monopoly of cinnamon becoming impossible, but the spice trade overall was diminishing in economic potential, and was eventually superseded by the rise of trade in coffee, tea, chocolate, and sugar.

Questions 1-9
Complete the notes below. Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage.

The early history of Cinnamon

Biblical times: added to (1)…………..
Used to show (2)……………………between people

Ancient Rome: used for its sweet smell at (3)………………….
Was an indication of a person’s (4)…………………….
Known as a treatment for (5)……………………………..and other health problems
Grown in (6)…………………………
Merchants used (7)……………………………to bring it to the Mediterranean
Arrived in the Mediterranean at (8)………………………
Traders took it to (9)………………………and sold it to destinations around Europe

Questions 10-13
Do the following statements agree with the information given in the passage. 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

10. The Portuguese had control over the cinnamon trade in Ceylon throughout the 16th century.
11. The Dutch took over the cinnamon trade from the Portuguese as soon as they arrived in Ceylon.
12. The trees planted by the Dutch produced larger quantities of cinnamon than the wild trees.
13. The spice trade maintained its economic importance during the 19th century.

Oxytocin

A Oxytocin is a chemical, a hormone produced in the pituitary gland in the brain. It was through various studies focusing on animals that scientists first became aware of the influence of oxytocin. They discovered that it helps reinforce the bonds between prairie voles, which mate for life, and triggers the motherly behaviour that sheep show towards their newborn lambs. It is also released by women in childbirth, strengthening the attachment between mother and baby. Few chemicals have as positive a reputation as oxytocin, which is sometimes referred to as the ‘love hormone’. One sniff of it can, it is claimed, make a person more trusting, empathetic, generous and cooperative. It is time, however, to revise this wholly optimistic view. A new wave of studies has shown that its effects vary greatly depending on the person and the circumstances, and it can impact on our social interactions for worse as well as for better.

B Oxytocin’s role in human behaviour first emerged in 2005. In a groundbreaking experiment, Markus Heinrichs and his colleagues at the University of Freiburg, Germany, asked volunteers to do an activity in which they could invest money with an anonymous person who was not guaranteed to be honest. The team found that participants who had sniffed oxytocin via a nasal spray beforehand invested more money than those who received a placebo instead. The study was the start of research into the effects of oxytocin on human interactions. ‘For eight years, it was quite a lonesome field,’ Heinrichs recalls. ‘Now, everyone is interested.’ These follow-up studies have shown that after a sniff of the hormone, people become more charitable, better at reading emotions on others’ faces and at communicating constructively in arguments. Together, the results fuelled the view that oxytocin universally enhanced the positive aspects of our social nature.

C Then, after a few years, contrasting findings began to emerge. Simone Shamay- Tsoory at the University of Haifa, Israel, found that when volunteers played a competitive game, those who inhaled the hormone showed more pleasure when they beat other players, and felt more envy when others won. What’s more, administering oxytocin also has sharply contrasting outcomes depending on a person’s disposition. Jennifer Bartz from Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York, found that it improves people’s ability to read emotions, but only if they are not very socially adept to begin with. Her research also shows that oxytocin in fact reduces cooperation in subjects who are particularly anxious or sensitive to rejection.

D Another discovery is that oxytocin’s effects vary depending on who we are interacting with. Studies conducted by Carolyn DeClerck of the University of Antwerp, Belgium, revealed that people who had received a dose of oxytocin actually became less cooperative when dealing with complete strangers. Meanwhile, Carsten De Dreu at the University of Amsterdam in the Netherlands discovered that volunteers given oxytocin showed favouritism: Dutch men became quicker to associate positive words with Dutch names than with foreign ones, for example. According to De Dreu, oxytocin drives people to care for those in their social circles and defend them from outside dangers. So, it appears that oxytocin strengthens biases, rather than promoting general goodwill, as was previously thought.

E There were signs of these subtleties from the start. Bartz has recently shown that in almost half of the existing research results, oxytocin influenced only certain individuals or in certain circumstances. Where once researchers took no notice of such findings, now a more nuanced understanding of oxytocin’s effects is propelling investigations down new lines. To Bartz, the key to understanding what the hormone does lies in pinpointing its core function rather than in cataloguing its seemingly endless effects. There are several hypotheses which are not mutually exclusive. Oxytocin could help to reduce anxiety and fear. Or it could simply motivate people to seek out social connections. She believes that oxytocin acts as a chemical spotlight that shines on social clues – a shift in posture, a flicker of the eyes, a dip in the voice – making people more attuned to their social environment. This would explain why it makes us more likely to look others in the eye and improves our ability to identify emotions. But it could also make things worse for people who are overly sensitive or prone to interpreting social cues in the worst light.

F Perhaps we should not be surprised that the oxytocin story has become more perplexing. The hormone is found in everything from octopuses to sheep, and its evolutionary roots stretch back half a billion years. ‘It’s a very simple and ancient molecule that has been co-opted for many different functions,’ says Sue Carter at the University of Illinois, Chicago, USA. ‘It affects primitive parts of the brain like the amygdala, so it’s going to have many effects on just about everything.’ Bartz agrees. ‘Oxytocin probably does some very basic things, but once you add our higher-order thinking and social situations, these basic processes could manifest in different ways depending on individual differences and context.’

Questions 14-17
Reading Passage 2 has six paragraphs, A-F. Which paragraph contains the following information?
Write the correct letter, A-F, in boxes 14-17 on your answer sheet.
NB You may use any letter more than once.

14 reference to research showing the beneficial effects of oxytocin on people
15 reasons why the effects of oxytocin are complex
16 mention of a period in which oxytocin attracted little scientific attention
17 reference to people ignoring certain aspects of their research data

Questions 18-20
Look at the following research findings (Questions 18-20) and the list of researchers below.
Match each research finding with the correct researcher, A-F Write the correct letter, A-F, in boxes 18-20 on your answer sheet.

18 People are more trusting when affected by oxytocin.
19 Oxytocin increases people’s feelings of jealousy.
20 The effect of oxytocin varies from one type of person to another.

List of researchers
A Markus Heinrichs
B Simone Shamay-Tsoory
C Jennifer Bartz
D Carolyn DeClerck
E Carsten De Dreu
F Sue Carter

Questions 21-26
Complete the summary below. Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage for each answer.
Write your answers in boxes 21-26 on your answer sheet.

Oxytocin research

The earliest findings about oxytocin and bonding came from research involving (21)……………………….. it was also discovered that humans produce oxytocin during (22)………………………. An experiment in 2005, in which participants were given either oxytocin or a (23)………………………….reinforced the belief that the hormone had a
positive effect.

However, later research suggests that this is not always the case. A study at the University of Haifa where participants took part in a (24)………………………..revealed the negative emotions which oxytocin can trigger. A study at the University of Antwerp showed people’s lack of willingness to help (25)……………………….while under the influence of oxytocin. Meanwhile, research at the University of Amsterdam revealed that people who have been given oxytocin consider (26)…………………………..that are familiar to them in their own country to have more positive associations than those from other cultures.

Making the most of trends

Most managers can identify the major trends of the day. But in the course of conducting research in a number of industries and working directly with companies, we have discovered that managers often fail to recognize the less obvious but profound ways these trends are influencing consumers’ aspirations, attitudes, and behaviors. This is especially true of trends that managers view as peripheral to their core markets.

Mam ignore trends in their innovation strategies or adopt a wait-and-see approach and let competitors take the lead. At a minimum, such responses mean missed profit opportunities. At the extreme, they can jeopardize a company by ceding to rivals the opportunity to transform the industry. The purpose of this article is twofold: to spur managers to think more expansively about how trends could engender new value propositions in their core markets, and to provide some high-level advice on how’ to make market research and product development personnel more adept at analyzing and exploiting trends.

One strategy, known as ‘infuse and augment’, is to design a product or service that retains most of the attributes and functions of existing products in the category but adds others that address the needs and desires unleashed by a major trend. A case in point is the Poppy range of handbags, which the firm Coach created in response to the economic downturn of 2008. The Coach brand had been a symbol of opulence and luxury for nearly 70 years, and the most obvious reaction to the downturn would have been to lower prices. However, that would have risked cheapening the brand’s image. Instead, they initiated a consumer-research project which revealed that customers were eager to lift themselves and the country out of tough limes. Using these insights. Coach launched the lower-priced Poppy handbags, which were in vibrant colors, and looked more youthful and playful than conventional Coach products. Creating the sub-brand allowed Coach to avert an across-the-board price cut. In contrast to the many companies that responded to the recession by cutting prices. Coach saw the new consumer mindset as an opportunity for innovation and renewal.

A further example of this strategy was supermarket Tesco’s response to consumers’ growing concerns about the environment. With that in mind. Tesco, one of the world’s top five retailers, introduced its Greener Living program, which demonstrates the company’s commitment to protecting the environment by involving consumers in ways that produce tangible results. For example. Tesco customers can accumulate points for such activities as reusing bags, recycling cans and printer cartridges, and buying home-insulation materials. Like points earned on regular purchases, these green points can be redeemed for cash. Tesco has not abandoned its traditional retail offerings but augmented its business with these innovations, thereby infusing its value proposition with a green streak.

A more radical strategy is ‘combine and transcend’. This entails combining aspects of the product s existing value proposition with attributes addressing changes arising from a trend, to create a novel experience – one that may land the company in an entirely new market space. At first glance, spending resources to incorporate elements of a seemingly irrelevant trend into one’s core offerings sounds like it’s hardly worthwhile. But consider Nike’s move to integrate the digital revolution into its reputation for high-performance athletic footwear. In 2006, they teamed up with technology company Apple to launch Nike-f. a digital sports kit comprising a sensor that attaches to the running shoe and a wireless receiver that connects to the user’s iPod, By combining Nike’s original value proposition for amateur athletes with one for digital consumers, the Nike • sports kit and web interface moved the company from a focus on athletic apparel to a new plane of engagement with its customers.

A third approach, known as ‘counteract and reaffirm’, involves developing products or services that stress the values traditionally associated with the category in ways that allow consumers to oppose or at least temporarily escape from the aspects of trends they view as undesirable. A product that accomplished this is the ME2, a video game created by Canada’s iToys. By reaffirming the toy category’s association with physical play, the ME2 counteracted some of the widely perceived negative impacts of digital gaming devices. Like other handheld games, the device featured a host of exciting interactive games, a lull-color LCD screen, and advanced 3D graphics. What set it apart was that it incorporated the traditional physical component of children’s play: it contained a pedometer, which tracked and awarded points for physical activity (walking, running, biking, skateboarding, climbing stairs). The child could use the points to enhance various virtual skills needed for the video game. The ME2, introduced in mid- 2008, catered to kids’ huge desire to play video games while countering the negatives, such as associations with lack of exercise and obesity.

Once you have gained perspective on how trend-related changes in consumer opinions and behaviors impact on your category, you can determine which of our three innovation strategies to pursue. When your category’s basic value proposition continues to be meaningful for consumers influenced by the trend, the infuse-and-augment strategy will allow you to reinvigorate the category. If analysis reveals an increasing disparity between y our category and consumers’ new focus, your innovations need to transcend the category to integrate the two worlds. Finally, if aspects of the category clash with undesired outcomes of a trend, such as associations with unhealthy lifestyles, there is an opportunity to counteract those changes by reaffirming the core values of your category.

Trends – technological, economic, environmental, social, or political – that affect how people perceive the world around them and shape what they expect from products and services present firms with unique opportunities for growth.

Questions 27-31
Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D.

27 In the first paragraph, the writer says that most managers
A fail to spot the key consumer trends of the moment.
B make the mistake of focusing only on the principal consumer trends.
C misinterpret market research data relating to current consumer trends.
D are unaware of the significant impact that trends have on consumers’ lives.

28 According to the third paragraph, Coach was anxious to
A follow what some of its competitors were doing.
B maintain its prices throughout its range.
C safeguard its reputation as a manufacturer of luxury goods.
D modify the entire look of its brand to suit the economic climate.

29 What point is made about Tesco’s Greener Living programme?
A It did not require Tesco to modify its core business activities.
B It succeeded in attracting a more eco-conscious clientele.
C Its main aim was to raise consumers’ awareness of environmental issues.
D It was not the first time that Tesco had implemented such an initiative.

30 What does the writer suggest about Nike’s strategy?
A It was an extremely risky strategy at the time.
B It was a strategy that only a major company could afford to follow.
C It was the type of strategy that would not have been possible in the past.
D It was the kind of strategy which might appear to have few obvious benefits.

31 What was original about the ME2?
A It contained technology that had been developed for the sports industry.
B It appealed to young people who were keen to improve their physical fitness.
C It took advantage of a current trend for video games with colourful 3D graphics.
D It was a handheld game that addressed people’s concerns about unhealthy lifestyles

Questions 32-37
Look at the following statements and the list of companies below. Match each statement with the correct company A, B, C or D.

32. It turned the notion that its products could have harmful effects to its own advantage.
33. It extended its offering by collaborating with another manufacturer.
34. It implemented an incentive scheme to demonstrate its corporate social responsibility.
35. It discovered that customers had a positive attitude towards dealing with difficult circumstances.
36. It responded to a growing lifestyle trend in an unrelated product sector.
37. It successfully avoided having to charge its customers less for its core products.

List of companies
A Coach
B Tesco
C Nike
D iToys

Questions 38-40
Complete each sentence with the correct ending. A, B, C or D below.

38 If there are any trend-related changes impacting on your category, you should
39 If a current trend highlights a negative aspect of your category, you should
40 If the consumers’ new focus has an increasing lack of connection with your offering, you should

A employ a combination of strategies to maintain your consumer base.
B identify the most appropriate innovation strategy to use.
C emphasise your brand’s traditional values with the counteract-and- affirm strategy.
D use the combine-and-transcend strategy to integrate the two worlds.

Case Study: Tourism New Zealand Website

New Zealand is a small country of four million inhabitants, a long-haul flight from all the major tourist-generating markets of the world. Tourism currently makes up 9% of the country’s gross domestic product, and is the country’s largest export sector. Unlike other export sectors, which make products and then sell them overseas, tourism brings its customers to New Zealand. The product is the country itself – the people, the places and the experiences. In 1999, Tourism New Zealand launched a campaign to communicate a new brand position to the world. The campaign focused on New Zealand’s scenic beauty, exhilarating outdoor activities and authentic Maori culture, and it made New Zealand one of the strongest national brands in the world.

A key feature of the campaign was the website www.newzealand.com, which provided potential visitors to New Zealand with a single gateway to everything the destination had to offer. The heart of the website was a database of tourism services operators, both those based in New Zealand and those based abroad which offered tourism services to the country. Any tourism-related business could be listed by filling in a simple form. This meant that even the smallest bed and breakfast address or specialist activity provider could gain a web presence with access to an audience of long-haul visitors. In addition, because participating businesses were able to update the details they gave on a regular basis, the information provided remained accurate. And to maintain and improve standards, Tourism New Zealand organised a scheme whereby organisations appearing on the website underwent an independent evaluation against a set of agreed national standards of quality. As part of this, the effect of each business on the environment was considered.

To communicate the New Zealand experience, the site also carried features relating to famous people and places. One of the most popular was an interview with former New Zealand All Blacks rugby captain Tana Umaga. Another feature that attracted a lot of attention was an interactive journey through a number of the locations chosen for blockbuster films which had made use of New Zealand’s stunning scenery as a backdrop. As the site developed, additional features were added to help independent travellers devise their own customised itineraries. To make it easier to plan motoring holidays, the site catalogued the most popular driving routes in the country, highlighting different routes according to the season and indicating distances and times.

Later a Travel Planner feature was added, which allowed visitors to click and ‘bookmark’ : paces or attractions they were interested in, and then view the results on a map. The Travel Planner offered suggested routes and public transport options between the chosen locations. There were also links to accommodation in the area. By registering with the website, users could save their Travel Plan and return to it later, or print it out take on the visit. The website also had a ‘Your Words’ section where anyone could submit a blog of their New Zealand travels for possible inclusion on the website.

The Tourism New Zealand website won two Webby awards for online achievement and innovation. More importantly perhaps, the growth of tourism to New Zealand was impressive. Overall tourism expenditure increased by an average of 6.9% per year between 1999 and 2004. From Britain, visits to New Zealand grew at an average annual rate of 13% between 2002 and 2006, compared to a rate of 4% overall for British visits abroad.

The website was set up to allow both individuals and travel organisations to create itineraries and travel packages to suit their own needs and interests. On the website, visitors can search for activities not solely by geographical location, but also by the particular nature of the activity. This is important as research shows that activities are the key driver of visitor satisfaction, contributing 74% to visitor satisfaction, while transport and accommodation account for the remaining 26%. The more activities that visitors undertake, the more satisfied they will be. It has also been found that visitors enjoy cultural activities most when they are interactive, such as visiting a marae (meeting ground) to learn about traditional Maori life. Many long-haul travellers enjoy such earning experiences, which provide them with stories to take home to their friends and family. In addition, it appears that visitors to New Zealand don’t want to be ‘one of the crowd’ and find activities that involve only a few people more special and meaningful.

It could be argued that New Zealand is not a typical destination. New Zealand is a small country with a visitor economy composed mainly of small businesses. It is generally perceived as a safe English-speaking country with a reliable transport infrastructure. Because of the long-haul flight, most visitors stay for longer (average 20 days) and want to see as much of the country as possible on what is often seen as a once-in-a-lifetime visit. However, the underlying lessons apply anywhere-the effectiveness of a strong brand, a strategy based on unique experiences and a comprehensive and user-friendly website.

Questions 1-7
Complete the table below. Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage for each answer.
Write your answers in boxes 1-7 on your answer sheet.

Section of website	Comments
Database of tourism	– easy for tourism-related businesses to get on the list – allowed businesses to (1)………………………information regularly – provided a country-wide evaluation of businesses including their impact on the (2)……………..
Special features on local topics	– e.g. an interview with a former a sports (3)………………..and an interactive tour of various locations used in (4)………………….
Information on driving routes	– varied depending on the (5)……………….
Travel planner	– included a map showing selected places, details of public transport and local (6)……………..
Your Words	– travellers could send a link to their (7)………………….

Questions 8-13
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 1?
In boxes 8-13 on your answer sheet, write

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

8. The website www.newzealand.com aimed to provide ready-made itineraries and packages for travel companies and individual tourists.
9. It was found that most visitors started searching on the website by geographical location.
10. According to research, 26% of visitor satisfaction is related to their accommodation.
11. Visitors to New Zealand like to become involved in the local culture.
12. Visitors like staying in small hotels in New Zealand rather than in larger ones.
13. Many visitors feel it is unlikely that they will return to New Zealand after their visit.

Why Being Bored Is Stimulating – And Useful Too

A We all know how it feels – it’s impossible to keep your mind on anything, time stretches out, and all the things you could do seem equally unlikely to make you feel better. But defining boredom so that it can be studied in the lab has proved difficult. For a start, it can include a lot of other mental states, such as frustration, apathy, depression and indifference. There isn’t even agreement over whether Boredom is always a low-energy, flat kind of emotion or whether feeling agitated and restless counts as boredom, too. In his book, Boredom: A Lively History, Peter Toohey at the University of Calgary, Canada, compares it to disgust – an emotion that motivates us to stay away from certain situations. ‘If disgust protects humans from infection, boredom may protect them from “infectious” social situations,’ he suggests.

B By asking people about their experiences of boredom, Thomas Goetz and his team at the University of Konstanz in Germany have recently identified five distinct types: indifferent, calibrating, searching, reactant and apathetic. These can be plotted on two axes – one running left to right, which measures low to high arousal, and the other from top to bottom, which measures how positive or negative the feeling is. Intriguingly, Goetz has found that while people experience all kinds of boredom, they tend to specialise in one. Of the five types, the most damaging is ‘reactant’ boredom with its explosive combination of high arousal and negative emotion. The most useful is what Goetz calls ‘indifferent’ boredom: someone isn’t engaged in anything satisfying but still feels relaxed and calm. However, it remains to be seen whether there are any character traits that predict the kind of boredom each of us might be prone to.

C Psychologist Sandi Mann at the University of Central Lancashire, UK, goes further. All emotions are there for a reason, including boredom,’ she says Mann has found that being bored makes us more creative. ‘We’re all afraid of being bored but in actual fact it can lead to all kinds of amazing things,’ she says. In experiments published last year, Mann found that people who had been made to feel bored by copying numbers out of the phone book for 15 minutes came up with more creative ideas about how to use a polystyrene cup than a control group. Mann concluded that a passive, boring activity is best for creativity because it allows the mind to wander. In fact, she goes so far as to suggest that we should seek out more boredom in our lives.

D Psychologist John Eastwood at York University in Toronto, Canada isn’t convinced. ‘If you are in a state of mind-wandering you are not bored,’ he says. ‘In my view, by definition boredom is an undesirable state.’ That doesn’t necessarily mean that it isn’t adaptive, he adds. ‘Pain is adaptive – if we didn’t have physical pain, bad things would happen to us. Does that mean that we should actively cause pain? No. But even if boredom has evolved to help us survive, it can still be toxic if allowed to fester.’ For Eastwood, the central feature of boredom is a failure to put our ‘attention system’ into gear. This causes an inability to focus on anything, which makes time seem to go painfully slowly. What’s more, your efforts to improve the situation can end up making you feel worse. ‘People try to connect with the world and if they are not successful there’s that frustration and irritability,’ he says. Perhaps most worryingly, says Eastwood, repeatedly failing to engage attention can lead to a state where we don’t know what to do any more, and no longer care.

E Eastwood’s team is now trying to explore why the attention system fails. It’s early days but they think that at least some of it comes down to personality. Boredom proneness has been linked with a variety of traits. People who are motivated by pleasure seem to suffer particularly badly. Other personality traits, such as curiosity, are associated with a high boredom threshold. More evidence that boredom has detrimental effects comes from studies of people who are more or less prone to boredom. It seems those who bore easily face poorer prospects in education, their career and even life in general. But of course, boredom itself cannot kill -it’s the things we do to deal with it that may put us in danger. What can we do to alleviate it before it comes to that? Goetz’s group has one suggestion. Working with teenagers, they found that those who ‘approach’ a boring situation – in other words, see that it’s boring and get stuck in anyway – report less boredom than those who try to avoid it by using snacks, TV or social media for distraction.

F Psychologist Francoise Wemelsfelder speculates that our over-connected lifestyles might even be a new source of boredom. ‘In modern human society there is a lot of overstimulation but still a lot of problems finding meaning,’ she says. So instead of seeking yet more mental stimulation, perhaps we should leave our phones alone, and use boredom to motivate us to engage with the world in a more meaningful way.

Questions 14-19
Reading Passage 2 has six paragraphs, A-F.

Choose the correct heading for each paragraph from the list of headings below.
Write the correct number, i-viii, in boxes 14-19 on your answer sheet.

List of Headings
i The productive outcomes that may result from boredom
ii What teachers can do to prevent boredom
iii A new explanation and a new cure for boredom
iv Problems with a scientific approach to boredom
v A potential danger arising from boredom
vi Creating a system of classification for feelings of boredom
vii Age groups most affected by boredom
viii Identifying those most affected by boredom

14. Paragraph A
15. Paragraph B
16. Paragraph C
17. Paragraph D
18. Paragraph E
19. Paragraph F

Questions 20-23
Look at the following people (Questions 20-23) and the list of ideas below.
Match each person with the correct idea, A-E. Choose the correct letter, A-E, in boxes 20-23 on your answer sheet.

20. Peter Toohey
21. Thomas Goetz
22. John Eastwood
23. Francoise Wemelsfelder

List of Ideas
A The way we live today may encourage boredom.
B One sort of boredom is worse than all the others.
C Levels of boredom may fall in the future.
D Trying to cope with boredom can increase its negative effects.
E Boredom may encourage us to avoid an unpleasant experience.

Questions 24-26
Complete the summary below. Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage for each answer.
Write your answers in boxes 24-26 on your answer sheet.

Responses to boredom
For John Eastwood, the central feature of boredom is that people cannot (24)………………………………, due to a failure in what he calls the ‘attention system’, and as a result they become frustrated and irritable. His team suggests that those for whom (25) …………………………………….is an important aim in life may have problems in coping with boredom, whereas those who have the characteristic of 26………….. generally cope with it.

Artificial Artists

The Painting Fool is one of a growing number of computer programs which, so their makers claim, possess creative talents. Classical music by an artificial composer has had audiences enraptured, and even tricked them into believing a human was behind the score. Artworks painted by a robot have sold for thousands of dollars and been hung in prestigious galleries. And software has been built which creates art that could not have been imagined by the programmer.

Human beings are the only species to perform sophisticated creative acts regularly. If we can break this process down into computer code, where does that leave human creativity? This is a question at the very core of humanity,’ says Geraint Wiggins, a computational creativity researcher at Goldsmiths, University of London. ‘It scares a lot of people. They are worried that it is taking something special away from what it means to be human.’

To some extent, we are all familiar with computerised art. The question is: where does the work of the artist stop and the creativity of the computer begin? Consider one of the oldest machine artists, Aaron, a robot that has had paintings exhibited in London’s Tate Modern and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Aaron can pick up a paintbrush and paint on canvas on its own. Impressive perhaps, but it is still little more than a tool to realise the programmer’s own creative ideas.

Simon Colton, the designer of the Painting Fool, is keen to make sure his creation doesn’t attract the same criticism. Unlike earlier ‘artists’ such as Aaron, the Painting Fool only needs minimal direction and can come up with its own concepts by going online for material. The software runs its own web searches and trawls through social media sites. It is now beginning to display a kind of imagination too, creating pictures from scratch. One of its original works is a series of fuzzy landscapes, depicting trees and sky. While some might say they have a mechanical look, Colton argues that such reactions arise from people’s double standards towards software-produced and human-produced art. After all, he says, consider that the Painting Fool painted the landscapes without referring to a photo. ‘If a child painted a new scene from its head, you’d say it has a certain level of imagination,’ he points out. The same should be true of a machine.’ Software bugs can also lead to unexpected results. Some of the Painting Fool’s paintings of a chair came out in black and white, thanks to a technical glitch. This gives the work an eerie, ghostlike quality. Human artists like the renowned Ellsworth Kelly are lauded for limiting their colour palette – so why should computers be any different?

Researchers like Colton don’t believe it is right to measure machine creativity directly to that of humans who have had millennia to develop our skills’. Others, though, are fascinated by the prospect that a computer might create something as original and subtle as our best artists So far, only one has come close. Composer David Cope invented a program called Experiments in Musical Intelligence, or EMI, Not only did EMI create compositions in Cope s style, but also that of the most revered classical composers, including Bach, Chopin and Mozart. Audiences were moved to tears, and EMI even fooled classical music experts into thinking they were hearing genuine Bach. Not everyone was impressed however. Some, such as Wiggins, have blasted Cope’s work as pseudoscience, and condemned him for his deliberately vague explanation of how the software worked. Meanwhile. Douglas Hofstadter of Indiana University said EMI created replicas which still rely completely on the original artist’s creative impulses, When audiences found out the truth they were often outraged with Cope, and one music lover even tried to punch him. Amid such controversy, Cope destroyed EMI’s vital databases.

But why did so many people love the music, yet recoil when they discovered how it was composed? A study by computer scientist David Moffat of Glasgow Caledonian University provides a clue. He asked both expert musicians and non-experts to assess six compositions. The participants weren’t told beforehand whether the tunes were composed by humans or computers, but were asked to guess, and then rate how much they liked each one. People who thought the composer was a computer tended to dislike the piece more than those who believed it was human. This was true even among the experts, who might have been expected to be more objective in their analyses.

Where does this prejudice come from? Paul Bloom of Yale University has a suggestion: he reckons part of the pleasure we get from art stems from the creative process behind the work. This can give it an ‘irresistible essence’, says Bloom. Meanwhile, experiments by Justin Kruger of New York University have shown that people s enjoyment of an artwork increases if they think more time and effort was needed to create it. Similarly, Colton thinks that when people experience art, they wonder what the artist might have been thinking or what the artist is trying to tell them. It seems obvious, therefore, that with computers producing art, this speculation is cut short – there’s nothing to explore. But as technology becomes increasingly complex, finding those greater depths in computer art could become possible. This is precisely why Colton asks the Painting Fool to tap into online social networks for its inspiration: hopefully this way it will choose themes that will already be meaningful to us.

Questions 27-31
Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D

27. What is the writer suggesting about computer-produced works in the first paragraph?
A People’s acceptance of them can vary considerably.
B A great deal of progress has already been attained in this field.
C They have had more success in some artistic genres than in others.
D The advances are not as significant as the public believes them to be.

28. According to Geraint Wiggins, why are many people worried by computer art?
A It is aesthetically inferior to human art.
B It may ultimately supersede human art.
C It undermines a fundamental human quality.
D It will lead to a deterioration in human ability.

29. What is a key difference between Aaron and the Painting Fool?
A its programmer’s background
B public response to its work
C the source of its subject matter
D the technical standard of its output

30. What point does Simon Colton make in the fourth paragraph?
A Software-produced art is often dismissed as childish and simplistic.
B The same concepts of creativity should not be applied to all forms of art.
C It is unreasonable to expect a machine to be as imaginative as a human being.
D People tend to judge computer art and human art according to different criteria.

31. The writer refers to the paintings of a chair as an example of computer art which
A achieves a particularly striking effect.
B exhibits a certain level of genuine artistic skill.
C closely resembles that of a well-known artist.
D highlights the technical limitations of the software.

Questions 32-37
Complete each sentence with the correct ending, A-G below. Write the correct letter, A-G, in boxes 32-37 on your answer sheet.

32. Simon Colton says it is important to consider the long-term view when
33. David Cope’s EMI software surprised people by
34. Geraint Wiggins criticised Cope for not
35. Douglas Hofstadter claimed that EMI was
36. Audiences who had listened to EMI’s music became angry after
37. The participants in David Moffat’s study had to assess music without

List of Ideas
A generating work that was virtually indistinguishable from that of humans.
B knowing whether it was the work of humans or software.
C producing work entirely dependent on the imagination of its creator.
D comparing the artistic achievements of humans and computers.
E revealing the technical details of his program.
F persuading the public to appreciate computer art.
G discovering that it was the product of a computer program.

Questions 38-40
Do the following statements agree with the claims of the writer in Reading Passage 3? In boxes 38-40 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

38. Moffat’s research may help explain people’s reactions to EMI.
39. The non-experts in Moffat’s study all responded in a predictable way.
40. Justin Kruger s findings cast doubt on Paul Bloom’s theory about people’s prejudice towards computer art.

HOT AIR BALLOONING

The birth of the hot air balloon is largely contributed to the efforts of two French brothers, Joseph and Etienne Montgolfier, who employed the fact that hot air was lighter than cool air and using this, managed to lift a small silk balloon 32 metres into the air. The brothers went on to elevate a balloon into the air ten thousand metres before it started to descend and then exploded. Arguably limited success, but their work came to the eye of the French Science Academy as the discovery of the properties of hot air balloons helped scientists to study weather patterns and the atmosphere.

It was not until some considerable time later that a balloon was launched that was capable of carrying passengers. Initial flights were trialled by animals, but after the success of these voyages, two passengers, Jean Francois Pilatre and Francois Laurent d’Arlendes, were sent up in a balloon which travelled across Paris for 29 minutes. The men fuelled the fire in the centre of their wicker basket to keep the balloon elevated and the trip across Paris was a great success.

The discovery of hydrogen-fuelled flights led to the death in 1785 of Pilatre, a tragedy which caused a downfall in the popularity of hot air ballooning but an increase in the popularity of hydrogen. Hot air ballooning lost further ground when alternate modes of air travel were introduced» but in the 1950s, ballooning experienced something of a revival as a leisure activity and sport. Today there are balloons of all shapes and sizes, with many unique designs.

In 1987, British entrepreneur Richard Branson crossed the Atlantic in a balloon named Virgin Atlantic Flyer. At the time, this balloon was the largest ever constructed at 65 thousand cubic metres, but four years later, he and Per Lindstrand from Sweden flew nearly 8000 kilometres from Japan to Northern Canada in their balloon the Virgin Pacific Flyer, which was nearly 10 thousand cubic metres bigger and was the longest flight in a hot air balloon ever made. The Pacific Flyer was designed to fly in the trans-oceanic jet streams and recorded the highest ground speed for a manned balloon at 394 kilometres per hour.

There are now a wide variety of designs and equipment available, from baskets with room for two people right up to 35 or more, separated compartments and specially designed flame resistant fabrics, but the basic parts of the balloon have remained relatively unchanged. There is a basket, commonly made of wicker, inside which are stored the propane fuel tanks. Immediately above the basket and partly wrapped around by the skirt are the burners, attached on suspension wires. The balloon itself is made of strips of fabric called gores which run from the skirt to the top of the balloon; they are further broken into individual panels. This section of the craft is referred to as the envelope. At the top of the envelope is a self closing flap that allows hot air to escape at a controlled rate to slow ascents or cause the balloon to descend descents. This is named the parachute valve, and is controlled by the vent line – the cable that runs the length of the envelope and hangs just above the basket so the pilot can open and close the parachute valve.

At the mercy of prevailing wind currents, piloting a balloon takes a huge amount of skill but the controls used are fairly straight forward. To lift a balloon the pilot moves the control which releases propane. The pilot can control the speed of the balloon by increasing or decreasing the flow of propane gas, but they cannot control horizontal direction. As a result, balloons are often followed by ground crew, who may have to pick up the pilot, passengers and balloon from any number of landing sites. A pilot who wants to fly a hot air balloon must have his commercial pilot’s license to fly and must have at least 35 hours of flight instruction. There are no official safety requirements for passengers onboard, but they should know whom they’re flying with and what qualifications they may have. For safety reasons, hot air balloons don’t fly in the rain because the heat in the balloon can cause water to boil on top of the balloon and destroy the fabric.

One of the largest hot air balloon organisations is the Balloon Federation of America. Founded in 1961, membership in the BFA attracts those with a fascination with ballooning (or ‘Lighter Than Air’ flight). With an active discussion forum, meetings and displays all around the USA and beyond, the BFA runs on a number of guiding principles, primarily that the future of ballooning is directly related to the safety of enthusiasts. They run a number of training courses, from a novice who is interested in getting a basic licence to pilot achievement courses. They even boast of a balloon simulator, which although will not directly lead to a pilot’s license, it can give participants a degree of the sensation enjoyed by professional balloon pilots.

Questions 1 – 4
Do the following statements agree with the given in the reading passage?

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

1. The Montgolfier brothers were the first people to fly in a hot air balloon.
2. Hot air ballooning became less popular in the late eighteenth century.
3. The largest hot air balloon had a capacity of over 75000 cubic metres.
4. Membership of the BFA is only open to people in America.

Questions 5 – 7
Answer the questions below using NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER from the passage for each answer.

5. Who accompanied the entrepreneur on the longest balloon flight?
6. Who follows a hot air balloon’s flight to retrieve the craft when it lands?
7. What can give newcomers to the sport some idea of the feeling of flying a balloon?

Questions 8 – 11
Label the diagram below using NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer.

ILLEGAL DOWNLOADS

A. Downloading music from the internet has become a simple, fast and easy thing to do. The correct or legal way of going about it seems to be ignored by those who find it too costly. Illegal music downloads have reached an all time high, and a recent survey of high school students revealed an estimated 3.6 billion songs being downloaded per month. There are now endless possibilities available to the public where music can be downloaded for free and people are choosing to take this route even though it is illegal. iTunes Is one of the most well known sites where music can be bought legally for just over 51 per track. So when it is this cheap why are people still going to alternative unauthorized sites? Or is the legal route still considered a costly way to go about it?

B. If you think that copying music results in simply a slap on the wrist, think twice. Under government law, record companies are entitled to $750 to $30,000 per infringement but the law allows the jury to increase that to as much as $150,000 per song if it finds the infringements were deliberate. The music industry has threatened about 35,000 people with charges of copyright Infringement over the past decade. In recent months there have been more cases of music piracy heading to the courts. The industry estimates that more than a hundred of these cases remain unsettled in court, with fewer than 10 offenders actively arguing the case against them. The penalties for breaching the copyright act differ slightly depending upon whether the infringing is for commercial or private financial gain, with the latter punishment being far milder.

C. Nonetheless, the potential gain from illegal downloading versus the punitive measures that can be taken are. In many cases, poles apart. Recently, an American woman shared 27 illegally downloaded songs with her friends and was ordered to pay $1.92 million to the record company for deliberate infringement of the companies’ copyrights. More recently in America a 12 year old girl was sued for downloading music illegally and could face a penalty of 1150,000 per song. The order of payment from the courts to the American woman who shared the 27 tracks with her friends has spurred controversy as the public disagree with the ordered Infringement. The woman shared 27 songs at $1.99 per song, so should she be liable to pay such a large and impossible amount?

D. It has also been noted that of all measures that can be taken, fining is actually the least likely method of preventing further abuse. With driving, for example, statistics have shown that those that repeatedly drive over the speed limit are not discouraged by the loss of a sum of money, but this attitude quickly changed when the penalty was possibly losing their driving licence or even spending time in prison.

E. Being a difficult thing to police, the music industry has decided that it would be much easier to go after the internet service provider than to try and track down each individual case. The music industry feels internet piracy has decreased their artists’ sales dramatically and is a danger to their business, although on the other hand, online music sales promote individual tracks to be sold rather than albums, therefore increasing the amount spent by the purchaser.

F. If there are so many issues around the downloading of music, you might wonder why sales of MP3 players and CD burners are increasing rapidly The answer is simple – these devices do have a legitimate purpose defined as ‘fair use’. You can choose to make your personal back-up copy to use in a MP3 player, or you may visit one of many web sites, like iTunes, which offers music that you pay for as you download. While some may wonder why you would pay for something that can be had for free, those who do prefer to obey the copyright protection laws have purchased over 150 million songs from the iTunes site alone.

G. Online music sales are a business just like any other and music companies are fighting to salvage their industry. Cary Sherman, the President of RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America), stated that when your product is being regularly stolen, there comes a time when you have to take appropriate action. At the same time, the RIAA has offered amnesty to the illegal downloaded who decide to come forward and agree to stop illegally downloading music over the Internet. People who have already been sued are obviously not eligible for amnesty.

H. When high school students were asked how they felt about the business of downloading illegally from the net they appeared to be divided on the issue. Some seemed to think there was absolutely nothing wrong with it. Others felt that it should be thought of as a serious crime like any other form of theft.

Questions 12 – 16
The reading passage has eight paragraphs, A-H. Which paragraph contains the following information?

12. The disparity between fines and costs
13. The potential costs of piracy to the defendant
14. The number of songs illegally obtained from the internet
15. Ambivalence towards the problem
16. A reprieve for illegal downloaders

Questions 17 – 20
Answer the questions below using NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER from the passage for each answer.

17. The maximum fine that a record company can impose is ________________.
18. The penalty for breaking copyright laws is harsher when undertaken for _______________ benefit.
19. The music industry targets each ________________ rather than each specific person downloading illegally.
20. Appliances used in connection with illegal downloads are sold under the term_______________.

Questions 21 – 23
Do the following statements agree with the information given in the reading passage?

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

21. Most people sued for illegal downloading actively fight back against the record company.
22. Illegal downloading can be difficult to monitor and control.
23. High school students are responsible for illegally downloading the most music.

Reading Passage 3

A. The natural world is dominated by cycles that are constant and repeated – the moon’s rotation around the earth, the changing of the seasons, the changes between night and day. It is these cycles or rhythms that in part control changes in our metabolism, mood and behaviour, and even the patterns of our sleep.

B. The circadian rhythm is the cycle that indicates when to be awake and when to be asleep. This is a daily cycle that is controlled by changes in amplitude (highs and lows) of light and temperature. As day turns to night, the sun sets and it becomes cooler. The triggers of less light and lower temperatures signal to the body that it is time to slow and begin the pattern of sleep. Of course, there may be many hours between sunset and the time people actually go to bed, but it is from this time that we generally become increasingly less alert and reaction times can be noticeably slower.

C. There are a number of factors that can affect our circadian rhythm. Working night shifts, which requires people to act in contradiction to the body’s natural rhythm, is perhaps the most damaging. Despite getting a good 8 hours sleep during the day, night shift workers still tend to feel drowsy for at least some of the night. This is the main factor for the increase in workplace accidents on this shift when compared to the day shift. The seasons can also affect our natural rhythm, with people having less energy during winter months when there is less sunlight and warmth to stimulate the brain. International travel, notably when travelling in excess of 4 hours, can also have a significant effect; in extreme cases, it can take up to 7 days for your rhythm to reset due to this, a phenomenon referred to as jet lag. A similar, although milder, effect can be felt in countries with daylight savings time, when the clocks are moved forward and backward depending on the season.

D. There are some tips for helping your body work with your circadian rhythm. First thing in the morning take a short walk outside or open all the curtains to get as much light as possible through the eyes and into the brain. Lighting levels that affect circadian rhythm in humans are higher than the levels usually used in artificial lighting in homes. In addition to the strength of the light, wavelength (or colour) of light is a factor, the best being that present in sunlight. Plan your work and other activities around the highs and lows of your temperature rhythm. For example, plan easier activities for first thing in the morning when you’re not operating at your physical best. Late morning is better for challenging tasks. After lunch you may feel like nodding off. Take scheduled breaks. The best time to exercise is in the late afternoon – your body temperature reaches its daily high, it is warmed up and stretched from spending your day at work. Avoid driving during sleep times. Sleepy drivers should stop for a nap – playing loud music or leaving windows open is an overrated misconception. At night, close the blinds and curtains and sleep in a dark room. If you work the night shift, use bright lights and music in the workplace to keep your brain alert. Wear an eye mask to block out the light when you want to go to sleep.

E. Every human – in fact, most non-nocturnal animals – follow the basic rules of the circadian rhythm. However, we also have our own unique body clocks which control the daily changes in how we think and feel, and oversee a number of our personal characteristics such as sleep patterns. Your body clock dictates whether you are a night owl, happy to work late into the night, an early bird who prefers the morning or a humming bird, happy to work both ends of the day. Your body clock determines not only your personal sleep patterns, but also whether or not you are grumpy before you have your morning coffee, when and what you need to eat throughout the day, whether you work better In the morning or the afternoon and the best time for you to do exercise. It also affects physical performance, such as temperature, blood pressure, digestion, hormone levels and brain activity (such as mood, behaviour, and alertness). Your body clock is what causes you to gain a few kilograms in autumn and winter time and to make it easier to lose weight in spring and summer.

F. Being aware of a few issues can help us maintain the best rhythms for our body docks, but there are some tips and tools for that can help. Keeping to the same bedtime routine and wake-up schedule, even on your days off, is particularly important – there should be no more than a few hours difference in the time you go to bed. Avoiding interruptions to your sleep is also very important. If there is intermittent, irregular noise, use a fan or any white noise device that generates calming sounds. This is particularly important for night shift workers, for whom daytime noises are generally louder; soft, background noise can help drown out daytime activity noises. Eat small frequent meals to help stoke your metabolism. This is not only helpful in weight maintenance, but reinforces the “day” phase of your circadian clock. Eat most of your energy foods earlier in the day and avoid eating a heavy meal near bedtime. Avoid all-nighters, like studying all night before an assessment. Cutting back on sleep the night before may mean that you perform less well. Reduce changes to your work shift, such as changing from night shift to day shift. Avoid alcohol and cigarettes before sleep time. If you feel sleepy during the day, take a short nap. Set an alarm so you sleep for no more than about 20 minutes. Anything more than just a ‘catnap’ and you will enter into Stage 3 (deep sleep) and find it harder to wake up from.

Questions 24 – 30
Do the following statements agree with the information given in the reading passage?

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

24. Our reactions are at their slowest at sunset.
25. There are more accidents on the night shift because workers tend to get less sleep.
26. Limited air travel has minimal effect on the body’s circadian rhythm.
27. The circadian rhythm starts when light reaches the brain.
28. If a driver is tired, taking a short sleep, listening to music or winding down the window are all equally effective measures for keeping awake.
29. Humans share the same trends with regards their body clocks.
30. Many people take a short rest just after eating lunch.

Questions 31 – 36
Answer the questions below using NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the passage for each answer.

31. As well as the intensity, what else is important in sunlight for our circadian rhythm?
32. What specific part of the day is the body at its warmest?
33. What should night shift workers use to help them sleep?
34. What type of person works equally well in the morning and the evening?
35. What does our body clock make it easier to do after the winter?
36. What should you avoid before bed to help you get a good night’s sleep?

Questions 37 – 40
Complete the summary below. Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from Reading Passage 3 for each answer.

Keep a good (37)_______________ by following routines. Try to sleep and wake at roughly the same times when working and on days off. Use (38)______________ noise to help you sleep if there are external distractions. Small and regular meals keep your (39)_______________ operating at its best. Limit changes to your work shift, and if necessary take a short (40)_____________ during the day.

The Impact of the Potato

A The potato was first cultivated in South America between three and seven thousand years ago, though scientists believe they may have grown wild in the region as long as 13,000 years ago. The genetic patterns of potato distribution indicate that the potato probably originated in the mountainous west-central region of the continent.

B Early Spanish chroniclers who misused the Indian word batata (sweet potato) as the name for the potato noted the importance of the tuber to the Incan Empire. The Incas had learned to preserve the potato for storage by dehydrating and mashing potatoes into a substance called Chuchu could be stored in a room for up to 10 years, providing excellent insurance against possible crop failures. As well as using the food as a staple crop, the Incas thought potatoes made childbirth easier and used it to treat injuries.

C The Spanish conquistadors first encountered the potato when they arrived in Peru in 1532 in search of gold, and noted Inca miners eating chuchu. At the time the Spaniards failed to realize that the potato represented a far more important treasure than either silver or gold, but they did gradually begin to use potatoes as basic rations aboard their ships. After the arrival of the potato in Spain in 1570，a few Spanish farmers began to cultivate them on a small scale, mostly as food for livestock.

D Throughout Europe, potatoes were regarded with suspicion, distaste and fear. Generally considered to be unfit for human consumption, they were used only as animal fodder and sustenance for the starving. In northern Europe, potatoes were primarily grown in botanical gardens as an exotic novelty. Even peasants refused to eat from a plant that produced ugly, misshapen tubers and that had come from a heathen civilization. Some felt that the potato plant’s resemblance to plants in the nightshade family hinted that it was the creation of witches or devils.

E In meat-loving England, farmers and urban workers regarded potatoes with extreme distaste. In 1662, the Royal Society recommended the cultivation of the tuber to the English government and the nation, but this recommendation had little impact. Potatoes did not become a staple until, during the food shortages associated with the Revolutionary Wars, the English government began to officially encourage potato cultivation. In 1795, the Board of Agriculture issued a pamphlet entitled “Hints Respecting the Culture and Use of Potatoes”； this was followed shortly by pro-potato editorials and potato recipes in The Times. Gradually, the lower classes began to follow the lead of the upper classes.

F A similar pattern emerged across the English Channel in the Netherlands, Belgium and France. While the potato slowly gained ground in eastern France (where it was often the only crop remaining after marauding soldiers plundered wheat fields and vineyards), it did not achieve widespread acceptance until the late 1700s. The peasants remained suspicious, in spite of a 1771 paper from the Facult de Paris testifying that the potato was not harmful but beneficial. The people began to overcome their distaste when the plant received the royal seal of approval: Louis XVI began to sport a potato flower in his buttonhole, and Marie-Antoinette wore the purple potato blossom in her hair.

G Frederick the Great of Prussia saw the potato’s potential to help feed his nation and lower the price of bread, but faced the challenge of overcoming the people’s prejudice against the plant. When he issued a 1774 order for his subjects to grow potatoes as protection against famine, the town of Kolberg replied: “The things have neither smell nor taste, not even the dogs will eat them, so what use are they to us?” Trying a less direct approach to encourage his subjects to begin planting potatoes, Frederick used a bit of reverse psychology: he planted a royal field of potato plants and stationed a heavy guard to protect this field from thieves. Nearby peasants naturally assumed that anything worth guarding was worth stealing, and so snuck into the field and snatched the plants for their home gardens. Of course, this was entirely in line with Frederick’s wishes.

H Historians debate whether the potato was primarily a cause or an effect of the huge population boom in industrial-era England and Wales. Prior to 1800，the English diet had consisted primarily of meat, supplemented by bread, butter and cheese. Few vegetables were consumed, most vegetables being regarded as nutritionally worthless and potentially harmful. This view began to change gradually in the late 1700s. The Industrial Revolution was drawing an ever increasing percentage of the populace into crowded cities, where only the richest could afford homes with ovens or coal storage rooms, and people were working 12-16 hour days which left them with little time or energy to prepare food. High yielding, easily prepared potato crops were the obvious solution to England’s food problems.

I Whereas most of their neighbors regarded the potato with suspicion and had to be persuaded to use it by the upper classes, the Irish peasantry embraced the tuber more passionately than anyone since the Incas. The potato was well suited to the Irish the soil and climate, and its high yield suited the most important concern of most Irish farmers: to feed their families.

J The most dramatic example of the potato’s potential to alter population patterns occurred in Ireland, where the potato had become a staple by 1800. The Irish population doubled to eight million between 1780 and 1841，this without any significant expansion of industry or reform of agricultural techniques beyond the widespread cultivation of the potato. Though Irish landholding practices were primitive in comparison with those of England, the potato’s high yields allowed even the poorest farmers to produce more healthy food than they needed with scarcely any investment or hard labor. Even children could easily plant, harvest and cook potatoes, which of course required no threshing, curing or grinding. The abundance provided by potatoes greatly decreased infant mortality and encouraged early marriage.

Questions 1-5
Do the following statements agree with the views of the writer in Reading Passage 1?

YES                          if the statement is true
NO                            if the statement is false
NOT GIVEN         if the information is not given in the passage

1. The early Spanish called potato as the Incan name ‘Chuchu，.
2. The purposes of Spanish coming to Peru were to find out potatoes.
3. The Spanish believed that the potato has the same nutrients as other vegetables.
4. Peasants at that time did not like to eat potatoes because they were ugly.
5. The popularity of potatoes in the UK was due to food shortages during the war.

Questions 6-13
Complete the sentences below with NO MORE THAN ONE WORD from the passage 1 for each answer.

6. In France，people started to overcome their disgusting about potatoes because the King put a potato ___________________ in his button hole.
7. Frederick realized the potential of potato but he had to handle the ______________________ against potatoes from ordinary people.
8. The King of Prussia adopted some _________________________ psychology to make people accept potatoes.
9. Before 1800，the English people preferred eating _____________________________ with bread, butter and cheese.
10. The obvious way to deal with England food problems were high yielding potato ______________________
11. The Irish _____________________________and climate suited potatoes well.
12. Between 1780 and 1841，based on the ___________________________ of the potatoes, the Irish population doubled to eight million.
13. The potato’s high yields help the poorest farmers to produce more healthy food almost without _____________________

Life-Casting and Art

Julian Bames explores the questions posed by Life-Casts, an exhibition of plaster moulds of living people and objects which were originally used for scientific purposes

A Art changes over time and our idea of what art is changes too. For example, objects originally intended for devotional, ritualistic or re-creational purposes may be recategorised as art by members of other later civilisations, such as our own, which no longer respond to these purposes.

B What also happens is that techniques and crafts which would have been judged inartistic at the time they were used are reassessed. Life-casting is an interesting example of this. It involved making a plaster mould of a living person or thing. This was complex, technical work, as Benjamin Robert Haydon discovered when he poured 250 litres of plaster over his human model and nearly killed him. At the time, the casts were used for medical research and, consequently, in the nineteenth century life-casting was considered inferior to sculpture in the same way that, more recently, photography was thought to be a lesser art than painting. Both were viewed as unacceptable shortcuts by the ’senior 1 arts. Their virtues of speed and unwavering realism also implied their limitations; they left little or no room for the imagination.

C For many, life-casting was an insult to the sculptor’s creative genius. In an infamous lawsuit of 1834, a moulder whose mask of the dying French emperor Napoleon had been reproduced and sold without his permission was judged to have no rights to the image. In other words, he was specifically held not to be an artist. This judgement reflect the view of established members of the nineteenth-century art world such as Rodin, who commented that life-casting ‘happens fast but it doesn’t make Art’. Some even feared that ‘if too much nature was allowed in, it would lead Art away from its proper course of the Ideal.

D The painter Gauguin, at the end of the nineteenth century, worried about future developments in photography. If ever the process went into colour, what painter would labour away at a likeness with a brush made from squirrel-tail? But painting has proved robust. Photography has changed it, of course, just as the novel had to reassess narrative after the arrival of the cinema. But the gap between the senior and junior arts was always narrower than the traditionalists implied. Painters have always used technical back-up such as studio assistants to do the boring bits, while apparently lesser crafts involve great skill, thought, preparation and, depending on how we define it， imagination.

E Time changes our view in another way, too. Each new movement implies a reassessment of what has gone before. What is done now alters what was done before. In some cases this is merely self-serving, with the new art using the old to justify itself. It seems to be saying, look at how all of that points to this! Aren’t we clever to be the culmination of all that has gone before? But usually it is a matter of re-alerting the sensibility, reminding us not to take things for granted. Take, for example, the cast of the hand of a giant from a circus, made by an anonymous artist around 1889, an item that would now sit happily in any commercial or public gallery. The most significant impact of this piece is on the eye, in the contradiction between unexpected size and verisimilitude. Next, the human element kicks in. you note that the nails are dirt-encrusted, unless this is the caster’s decorative addition, and the fingertips extend far beyond them. Then you take in the element of choice, arrangement, art if you like, in the neat, pleated, buttoned sleeve-end that gives the item balance and variation of texture. This is just a moulded hand, yet the part stands utterly for the whole. It reminds us slyly, poignantly, of the full-size original.

F But is it art? And, if so, why? These are old tediously repeated questions to which artists have often responded, ‘It is art because I am an artist and therefore what I do is art. However, what doesn’t work for literature works much better for art – works of art do float free of their creators’ intentions. Over time the “reader” does become more powerful. Few of us can look at a medieval altarpiece as its painter intended. We believe too little and aesthetically know too much, so we recreate and find new fields of pleasure in the work. Equally, the lack of artistic intention of Paul Richer and other forgotten craftsmen who brushed oil onto flesh, who moulded, cast and decorated in the nineteenth century is now irrelevant. What counts is the surviving object and our response to it. The tests are simple: does it interest the eye, excite the brain, move the mind to reflection and involve the heart. It may, to use the old dichotomy, be beautiful but it is rarely true to any significant depth. One of the constant pleasures of art is its ability to come at us from an unexpected angle and stop us short in wonder.

Questions 14-18
Reading Passage 2 has six paragraphs, A-F. Which paragraph contains the following information?

14. an example of a craftsman’s unsuccessful claim to ownership of his work
15. an example of how trends in art can change attitudes to an earlier work
16. the original function of a particular type of art
17. ways of assessing whether or not an object is art
18. how artists deal with the less interesting aspects of their work

Questions 19-24
Do the following statements agree with the claims of the writer in Reading Passage 2?

YES                            if the statement is true
NO                              if the statement is false
NOT GIVEN           if the information is not given in the passage

19. Nineteenth-century sculptors admired the speed and realism of life-casting.
20. Rodin believed the quality of the life-casting would improve if a slower process were used.
21. The importance of painting has decreased with the development of colour photography.
22. Life-casting requires more skill than sculpture does.
23. New art encourages us to look at earlier work in a fresh way.
24. The intended meaning of a work of art can get lost over time.

Questions 25-26
Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D.

25. The most noticeable contrast in the cast of the gianfs hand is between the
A dirt and decoration
B size and realism
C choice and arrangement
D balance and texture

26. According to the writer, the importance of any artistic object lies in
A the artist’s intentions
B the artist’s beliefs
C the relevance it has to modem life
D the way we respond to it

Honey bees in trouble

A Recently, ominous headlines have described a mysterious ailment, colony collapse disorder(CCD)，that is wiping out the honeybees that pollinate many crops. Without honeybees, the story goes, fields will be sterile, economies will collapse, and food will be scarce.

B But what few accounts acknowledge is that what’s at risk is not itself a natural state of affairs. For one thing, in the United States, where CCD was first reported and has had its greatest impacts, honeybees are not a native species. Pollination in modem agriculture isn’t alchemy, it’s industry. The total number of hives involved in the U.S. pollination industry has been somewhere between 2.5 million and 3 million in recent years. Meanwhile, American farmers began using large quantities of organophosphate insecticides, planted large-scale crop monocultures, and adopted “clean farming” practices that scrubbed native vegetation from field margins and roadsides. These practices killed many native bees outright—they’re as vulnerable to insecticides as any agricultural pest—and made the agricultural landscape inhospitable to those that remained. Concern about these practices and their effects on pollinators isn’t new—in her 1962 ecological alarm cry Silent Spring, Rachel Carson warned of a ‘Fruitless Fall’ that could result from the disappearance of insect pollinators.

C If that ‘Fruitless Fall, has not—yet—occurred, it may be largely thanks to the honeybee, which farmers turned to as the ability of wild pollinators to service crops declined. The honeybee has been semi-domesticated since the time of the ancient Egyptians, but it wasn’t just familiarity that determined this choice: the bees’ biology is in many ways suited to the kind of agricultural system that was emerging. For example, honeybee hives can be closed up and moved out of the way when pesticides are applied to a field. The bees are generalist pollinators, so they can be used to pollinate many different crops. And although they are not the most efficient pollinator of every crop, honeybees have strength in numbers, with 20,000 to 100,000 bees living in a single hive. “Without a doubt, if there was one bee you wanted for agriculture, it would be the honeybee, “says Jim Cane, of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The honeybee, in other words, has become a crucial cog in the modem system of industrial agriculture. That system delivers more food, and more kinds of it, to more places, more cheaply than ever before. But that system is also vulnerable, because making a farm field into the photosynthetic equivalent of a factory floor, and pollination into a series of continent-long assembly lines, also leaches out some of the resilience characteristic of natural ecosystems.

D Breno Freitas, an agronomist, pointed out that in nature such a high degree of specialization usually is a very dangerous game: it works well while all the rest is in equilibrium, but runs quickly to extinction at the least disbalance. In effect, by developing an agricultural system that is heavily reliant on a single pollinator species, we humans have become riskily overspecialized. And when the human-honeybee relationship is disrupted, as it has been by colony collapse disorder, the vulnerability of that agricultural system begins to become clear.

E In fact, a few wild bees are already being successfully managed for crop pollination. “The problem is trying to provide native bees in adequate numbers on a reliable basis in a fairly short number of years in order to service the crop，” Jim Cane says. “You’re talking millions of flowers per acre in a two-to three-week time frame, or less, for a lot of crops.” On the other hand, native bees can be much more efficient pollinators of certain crops than honeybees, so you don’t need as many to do the job. For example, about 750 blue orchard bees (Osmia lignaria) can pollinate a hectare of apples or almonds, a task that would require roughly 50,000 to 150,000 honeybees. There are bee tinkerers engaged in similar work in many comers of the world. In Brazil, Breno Freitas has found that Centris tarsata, the native pollinator of wild cashew, can survive in commercial cashew orchards if growers provide a source of floral oils, such as by interplanting their cashew trees with Caribbean cherry.

F In certain places, native bees may already be doing more than they’re getting credit for. Ecologist Rachael Winfree recently led a team that looked at pollination of four summer crops (tomato, watermelon, peppers, and muskmelon) at 29 farms in the region of New Jersey and Pennsylvania. Winfiree’s team identified 54 species of wild bees that visited these crops, and found that wild bees were the most important pollinators in the system: even though managed honeybees were present on many of the farms, wild bees were responsible for 62 percent of flower visits in the study. In another study focusing specifically on watermelon, Winfree and her colleagues calculated that native bees alone could provide sufficient pollination at 90 percent of the 23 farms studied. By contrast, honeybees alone could provide sufficient pollination at only 78 percent of farms.

G “The region I work in is not typical of the way most food is produced，” Winfree admits. In the Delaware Valley, most farms and farm fields are relatively small, each fanner typically grows a variety of crops, and farms are interspersed with suburbs and other types of land use which means there are opportunities for homeowners to get involved in bee conservation, too. The landscape is a bee-friendly patchwork that provides a variety of nesting habitat and floral resources distributed among different kinds of crops, weedy field margins, fallow fields, suburban neighborhoods, and semi natural habitat like old woodlots, all at a relatively small scale. In other words, ’’pollinator-friendly” farming practices would not only aid pollination of agricultural crops, but also serve as a key element in the over all conservation strategy for wild pollinators, and often aid other wild species as well.

H Of course, not all farmers will be able to implement all of these practices. And researchers are suggesting a shift to a kind of polyglot agricultural system. For some small-scale farms, native bees may indeed be all that’s needed. For larger operations, a suite of managed bees—with honeybees filling the generalist role and other, native bees pollinating specific crops—could be augmented by free pollination services from resurgent wild pollinators. In other words, they’re saying, we still have an opportunity to replace a risky monoculture with something diverse, resilient, and robust.

Questions 27-30
Do the following statements agree with the claims of the writer in Reading Passage 3? In boxes 27-30 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

27. In the United States, farmers use honeybees in a large scale over the past few years.
28. Cleaning farming practices would be harmful to farmers’
29. The blue orchard bee is the most efficient pollinator among native bees for every crop.
30. It is beneficial to other local creatures to protect native bees.

Questions 31-35
Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D.

31. The example of the ‘Fruitless Fair underlines the writer’s point about
A needs for using pesticides.
B impacts of losing insect pollinators.
C vulnerabilities of native bees.
D benefits in building more pollination industries.

32. Why can honeybees adapt to the modem agricultural system?
A the honeybees can pollinated more crops efficiently
B The bees are semi-domesticated since ancient times.
C Honeybee hives can be protected away from pesticides.
D The ability of wild pollinators using to serve crops declines.

33. The writer mentions factories and assembly lines to illustrate
A one drawback of the industrialised agricultural system.
B a low cost in modem agriculture.
C the role of honeybees in pollination.
D what a high yield of industrial agriculture.

34. In the 6th paragraph，Wlnfree’s experiment proves that
A honeybee can pollinate various crops.
B there are many types of wild bees as the pollinators.
C the wild bees can increase the yield to a higher percentage
D wild bees work more efficiently as a pollinator than honey bees in certain cases

35. What does the writer want to suggest in the last paragraph?
A the importance of honey bees in pollination
B adoption of different bees in various sizes of agricultural system
C the comparison between the intensive and the rarefied agricultural system
D the reason why farmers can rely on native pollinators

Questions 36-40
Complete each sentence with the correct ending, A-F, below.

36. Headline of colony collapse disorder states that
37. Viewpoints of Freitas manifest that
38. Examples of blue orchard bees have shown that
39. Centris tarsata is mentioned to exemplify that
40. One finding of the research in Delaware Valley is that

A. native pollinators can survive when a specific plant is supplied.
B. it would cause severe consequences both to commerce and agriculture.
C. honey bees cannot be bred.
D. some agricultural landscapes are favorable in supporting wild bees.
E. a large scale of honey bees are needed to pollinate.
F. an agricultural system is fragile when relying on a single pollinator

Reiki

A. The spiritual practice of Reiki was first introduced in early 20th century in Japan and continues to be used by its followers today with the intention of treating physical, emotional and mental imbalances and consequent ill-health. The principles of Reiki involve techniques employed by practitioners they say will channel healing energy through the subject’s body, and advocates hold that these techniques can also be used for self-healing. The name of the practice itself stems from two Japanese characters, pronounced ‘rei’ which translates to ‘unseen’ or ‘spiritual’ and ‘ki’ meaning ‘life force’ or ‘energy’.

B. According to Reiki philosophy, only by undergoing an attunement process performed by a Reiki Master is an individual able to access, then channel this positive energy within, this ability once established is considered to be enduring. Once attuned, it is said that an individual has the ability to allow energy to flow to weak or diseased areas of the body, so activating a natural healing process. Reiki energy is considered to be ‘intelligent energy’ in that it automatically flows to such areas; for this reason, practitioners believe that diagnosis of a specific problem is unnecessary beforehand and that the practice can be used as preventative medicine and encourage healing prior to the onset of tangible symptoms. Since healing initiated by Reiki treatment is entirely natural, many practitioners are confident that it can be used alongside any other type of treatment without adverse affect; however, others recommend that since the patient may undergo significant internal improvement for certain ailments – diabetes, for example – careful monitoring is required since such improvements may establish a need for an alteration in medication requirements.

C. A ‘whole body’ Reiki treatment session typically lasts between to 90 minutes. The subject is required to lie down – often on a treatment table – clothed in comfortable and loose fitting attire. Treatment may involve the practitioner placing their hands on the recipient in a variety of positions; however, some therapists take a non-touching approach, holding their hands a few centimeters away from the body. Hands are usually held in one position for up to 5 minutes before moving on to the next part of the body; between 12 and 20 hand positions are generally used. Those who have undergone a Reiki treatment session often state that they experienced a pleasant warmness in the area of focus and a feeling of contentment and relaxation throughout the session.

D. The healing energy is said to originate in the universe itself and is not the passing of personal energy from practitioner to patient; it is therefore thought to be inexhaustible and the personal well-being of the practitioner uncompromised. While some masters and teachers hold that subjects must be receptive to the concept in order for energy to flow, others believe that the attitude of the patient is of no consequence and that benefits will follow regardless; for this reason, those following the latter school of thought say that since Reiki requires no conscious belief it can also benefit the well-being of animals and plant life.

E. Controversy surrounds the practice of Reiki, some in opposition as they say that Reiki may offer only a perceived improvement in health and therefore only a ‘placebo’ effect. Whilst the practice of Reiki itself is not necessarily considered potentially harmful, some medical practitioners are concerned that its benefits may be over-estimated by patients and that, as a result, they’ may ignore or bandon conventional treatments. Others argue against the reliability of Reiki due to the lack of regulation of practitioners, holding that patients may be left vulnerable to illegitimate therapists who lack knowledge and skill. While Reiki is not connected to any particular religious doctrine, some religious leaders oppose the practice for spiritual reasons; however, others hold that the meditative principles involved in treatment have enhanced their own ability to explore and embrace their own particular religion.

F. Limited scientific studies in the authenticity of Reiki have been conducted. During research conducted by the Institute of Neurological Studies at South Glasgow University Hospital it was observed that there was a significant decrease in heart rate and blood pressure amongst subjects receiving 30 minutes of Reiki treatment as opposed to a group receiving placebo treatment of 30 minutes rest. Since the test group consisted of a small number of subjects just 45 – the research recommendations concluded a requirement for further studies. A similarly small preliminary study into the potential effects of Reiki on patients suffering mild dementia, conducted in the USA, tentatively suggested that treatment had a positive effect on the subjects’ memory abilities; however, research limitations included insufficient analysis of potential placebo affects.

G. Other studies have also attempted to determine correlation between Reiki treatment and improvement in cancer and stroke patients. Whilst investigations into the first condition indicated a seemingly positive effect on degrees of fatigue, pain and stress experienced by sufferers, the second project failed to reveal a link between treatment and improvement in the subjects’ condition and rehabilitation. Theories have been put forward that the benefits of energy treatments such as Reiki may be scientifically attributed to the effect of electromagnetic fields; however, the majority researchers agree that more extensive investigation is required.

Questions 1 – 3
Choose THREE letters A-H. Write your answers in boxes 1- 3 on your answer sheet

Which THREE of the following statements are true of Reiki?
A. Principles for self-healing differ to those used on others.
B. Attunement is said to have a permanent effect on the recipient.
C. Its preventative properties are more significant than cure.
D. There are differences in opinion regarding its use with other therapies.
E. The treatment typically involves contact between the therapist and the patient.
F. The recipient’s own energy is the key to the philosophy.
G. Some therapists believe a pessimistic approach affects results.
H. It is only practiced on human subjects.

Questions 4 – 9
Reading Passage 1 has seven paragraphs A-G.

Which paragraph contains the following information? You can use each paragraph more than once.

4. A scientific explanation of why Reiki may have positive effects.
5. An overview of the practicalities of how Reiki is performed.
6. The pre-requisite required to experience Reiki benefits.
7. When patients faith and expectations cause concern.
8. The immediate effects that can be experienced by recipients.
9. The safety of conducting therapy for practitioners.

Questions 10 – 13
According to the information in Reading Passage 1, classify the following research findings into the benefits of Reiki as relating to

A. The Institute of Neurological Studies
B. Research conducted in the USA
C. Cancer research
D. Stroke research

Write the correct letter A, B, C or D in boxes 10 – 13 your answer sheet

10. The groups’ comfort and quality of life appeared to improve.
11. No apparent links were identified.
12. Results were compared to a control group who did not receive Reiki treatment
13. Recollection ability seemed to be enhanced.

Sculpture

A. Sculpture, the practice of creating a three-dimensional object for artistic and aesthetic purposes, dates back as far as prehistoric times. Since objects created are intended to be enduring, traditionally sculptures have been forged from durable materials such as bronze, stone, marble and jade; however, some branches of the art also specialise in creating figurines of a more ephemeral nature, ice sculpture, for example. The practice of sculpting in many countries has traditionally been associated with religious philosophy; for example, in Asia many famous sculptures are related to Hinduism or Buddhism.

B. In Africa, perhaps more than any other region in the world, three-dimensional artwork is favoured and given more emphasis than two dimensional paintings. Whilst some experts hold that the art of sculpture in the continent dates back to the Nokcivilisation of Nigeria in 500 BC, this is disputed due to evidence of the art’s existence in Pharaonic Africa.

C. To the expert eye, African art is clearly defined by the region from which it is from and easily identifiable from the differences in technique used and material from which it is made. Figurines from the West African region are sculpted in two distinctly different forms. The first is characterised by angular forms and features with elongated bodies, such sculptures being traditionally used in religious rituals. Conversely, the traditional wood statues of the Mande speaking culture possess cylindrical arms and legs with broad, flat surfaces. Metal sculptures which hail from the eastern regions of West Africa, are heralded by many as amongst the most superior art forms ever crafted.

D. Central African sculpture may be a little more difficult to identify for the novice observer as a wider variety of materials may be used, ranging from wood to ivory, stone or metal. However, despite tills, the distinct style of usage of smooth lines and circular forms still helps to define the origin of such works. In both Eastern and Southern Africa, typically, art depicts a mixture of human and animal features. Art from the former region Is usually created in the form of a pole carved in human shape and topped with a human or animal image which has a strong connection with death, burial and the spiritual world. Such creations are less recognised as art in the traditional sense than those from other parts of Africa. In Southern Africa, the human/animal hybrid representations are fashioned from clay, the oldest known examples dating back to from between 400 and 600 A.D.

E. Although these distinct and defining regional differences in artistic expression exist, there are also universal similarities which define African art as a whole. Primarily a common characteristic is that focus is predominantly on representation of the human form. A second common trait of African art is that it is often inspired by a ceremonial or performance-related purpose; the meaning behind the art and its purpose often intended to be interpreted in a different way depending on an individual’s age, gender or even social and educational status.

F. Throughout the African continent, artworks tend to be more abstract in nature than intending to present a realistic and naturalistic portrayal of the subject in question. Artists such as Picasso, Van Gogh and Gauguin are said to have been influenced and inspired by African art. Its ability to stimulate emotional reaction and imagination generated a great deal of interest from western artists at the beginning of the 20th century. As a result, new European works began to emerge which were of a more abstract nature than previously conceived. More intellectually and emotionally stimulating art was born than had been seen before in a culture which had traditionally faithfully represented and depicted the true and exact form of its subjects.

G. The ‘Modernism’ movement of the 20th century embraced innovation in literature and art, its devotees wishing to move beyond realism in artistic expression. The sculptor Henry Spencer Moore, born in 1898 in Yorkshire, was one of the key players involved in introducing and developing his own particular style of modernism to the British art world. He is best known for his abstract bronze sculptures of the human form, many critics drawing parallels between the undulating landscapes and hills of his home county Yorkshire and the shapes and lines of his sculptures.

H. By the 1950s, Moore’s work was increasingly in demand and he began to secure high profile commissions including an artwork for the UNESCO building in Paris. By the end of Moore’s career, due to his popularity and the scale of the projects he undertook, the sculptor was extremely affluent; however, a huge proportion of his wealth was donated to the Henry Moore Foundation established with the aim of supporting education and promotion of the arts. The foundation is a registered charity and has continued to offer funding to a wide range of projects including grants to arts institutions and bursaries and fellowships for students and artists since Moore’s death in 1986.

Questions 14 –17
Complete the summary. Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage for each answer.

In Africa, sculpture is more predominant and more highly (14)______________ than canvas art, for example. In Asia, many prestigious works are connected to (15)______________ values. Sculpture is an ancient art in which figurines are created from materials which are, in the main, (16)_____________ to ensure longevity of the art form; however, though more (17)____________, materials such as ice are used in certain spheres.

Questions 18 – 22
Complete the table. Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer.

REGIONAL AFRICAN ART

Region	Style	Additional Information
Eastern Africa	subjects similar to the (18)…………………..area of the century	less sought-after than other styles of African art
Southern Africa	artwork representing human and animal form	made from (19)……………….
Western Africa	– Style 1: sharp lines, long bodies – Style 2: cylindrical, broad and flat lines crafted from (21)…………..	– conventionally made for the purpose of (20)…….. – made by Mande speakers
Central Africa	smooth lines and circular forms	often more difficult to recognise due to the diversity of (22)…………………used

Questions 23 – 27
Answer the questions below using NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the passage for each answer.

23. Verification of art in which civilisation sheds doubt on the theory that African art dates back to the Nok period?
24. What material is used for the African sculptures many consider to be the best?
25. What ceremonial event are the creations from Eastern Africa connected with?
26. Due to African influence, what did Western art become that allowed it to be more intellectually and emotionally stimulating?
27. What did Moore most often depict which brought him the greatest recognition?

Genealogy

A. Genealogy, the study of tracing family connections and relationships through history – so building a cohesive family tree, has become an increasingly popular hobby from non-specialist enthusiasts over recent decades. The introduction of the Internet has, in many ways, spurred interest levels since historical information has been made far more accessible than previously. Experts warn, however, that sources obtained from the internet must be considered with caution as they may often contain inaccuracies, often advising novice genealogists to join a family history society where they are able to learn useful skills from experienced researchers.

B. Originally, prior to developing a more mainstream following, the practice of genealogy focused on establishing the ancestral links of rulers and noblemen often with the purpose of disputing or confirming the legitimacy of inherited rights to wealth or position. More recently, genealogists are often interested in not only where and when previous generations of families lived but also details of their lifestyle and motivations, interpreting the effects of law, political restrictions, immigration and the social conditions on an individual’s or family’s behaviour at the given time. Genealogy searches may also result in location of living relatives and consequently family reunions, in some cases helping to reunite family members who had been separated in the past due to fostering/adoptlon, migration or war.

C. In Australia, there has been a great deal of interest of late, from families wishing to trace their links to the early settlers. As a result of the loss of the American colonies in the 1700s, Britain was in need of an alternative destination for prisoners who could not be accommodated in the country’s overcrowded penal facilities. In 1787, the ‘First Fleet’ which consisted of a flotilla of ships carrying just over 1300 people (of which 753 were convicts or their children and the remainder marines, officers and their family members) left Britain’s shores for Australia. On January 26, 1788 – now celebrated as Australia Day – the fleet landed at Sydney Cove and the first steps to European settlement began.

D. Genealogy research has led to a shift in attitudes towards convict heritage amongst contemporary Australian society, as family members have been able to establish that their ancestors were, in fact, not hardened and dangerous criminals, but had, in most cases, been harshly punished for minor crimes inspired by desperation and dire economic circumstances. So dramatic has the shift in attitudes been that having family connections to passengers on the ‘First Fleet’ is considered nothing less than prestigious. Convicts Margaret Dawson and Elizabeth Thakery were amongst the first European women to ever set foot on Australian soil. Details about the former, whose initial death sentence passed for stealing clothes from her employer was commuted to deportation, and the latter expelled for stealing handkerchiefs along with others of similar fate are now available on the internet for eager descendants to track.

E. Although many of the deported convicts were forbidden to return to Britain, others such as Dawson, were, in theory, expelled for a given term. In reality, however, the costs of attempting to return to the mother country were well beyond the means of the majority. Genealogists now attribute the successful early development of Australia to such ex-convicts who decided to contribute fully to society once their sentence had been served. Many rewards were available to prisoners who displayed exemplary behaviour, including land grants of 30 acres or more, tools for developing and farming the land and access to convict labour. Genealogy studies also show that many former prisoners went on to hold powerful positions in the newly forming Australia society, examples being Francis Greenway – a British architect expelled on conviction of fraud – who went on to design many of Sydney’s most prominent colonial buildings, and Alexander Munro, transported after stealing cheese at the age of 15, who would later build Australia’s first gas works and hold the position of Town Mayor.

F. In North America, the Mormon Church, headquartered in Salt Lake City, Utah, holds wo major genealogical databases, the International Genealogical Index and the Ancestral File, which contain records of hundreds of million individuals who lived between 1500 and 1900 in the United States, Canada and Europe. Resources available to genealogy enthusiasts include the Salt Lake City based Family History Library and more than 4000 branches where microfilms and microfiches can be rented for research and the newer Family Search internet site which provides open access to numerous databases and research sources. Such data sharing practices are central and crucial to genealogical research and the internet has proven to be a major tool in facilitating ease of transfer of information in formats suitable for use in forums and via email. The global level of interest in and demand for such information has proven so intense, that traffic load on release of sources such as Family Search and the British Census for 1901 led to temporary collapse of the host servers.

G. Experts advise that reliability of sources used for genealogical research should be evaluated in light of four factors which may influence their accuracy, these being the knowledge of the informant, the bias and mental state of the informant, the passage of time and potential for compilation error. First, genealogists should consider who the information was provided by and what he or she could be ascertained to have known. For example, a census record alone is considered unreliable as no named source for the information is likely to be found. A death certificate signed by an identified doctor, however, can be accepted as more reliable. In the case of bias or mental state, researchers are advised to consider that even when information is given by what could be considered a reliable source, that there may have been motivation to be untruthful – continuing to claim a government benefit or avoidance of taxation, for example.

H. Generally, data recorded at the same time or close to the event being researched is considered to be more reliable than records written at a later point in time, as – while individuals may intend to give a true representation of events – factual information may be misrepresented due to lapses in memory and forgotten details. Finally, sources may be classified as either original or derivative. The latter refers to photocopies, transcriptions, abstracts, translations, extractions, and compilations and has more room for error due to possible misinterpretations, typing errors or loss of additional and crucial parts of the original documentation.

Questions 28 – 32
Reading Passage 3 has eight paragraphs A-H. Choose the correct heading for paragraphs B and D-G from the list of headings below.

List of Headings
i. An Embarrassing Heritage
ii. Assessing Validity
iii. Diversity of Application
iv. Interpretation Errors
v. Past Usage
vi. Useful Sources
vii. Australasian Importance
viii. Changing Viewpoints
ix. Significant Roles

Example: Paragraph C;                 Answer: vii

28. Paragraph B
29. Paragraph D
30. Paragraph E
31. Paragraph F
32. Paragraph G

Questions 33 – 36
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 3?

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

33. Early applications of genealogy focused on behaviour, movement and settlement of populations.
34. The punishment of deportation was reserved for those who posed a serious threat to British society.
35. Some ex-convicts chose to stay in Australia due to the opportunities it presented.
36. Overwhelming interest in obtaining genealogical information has led to technological difficulties.

Questions 37 – 40
Choose the correct letter A, B, C or D

37. Why has recreational genealogy become more popular?
A. Because it is now a fashionable hobby.
B. Because more people wish to trace missing relatives.
C. Because there are less political barriers.
D. Because it is no longer requires so much effort.

38. Whose original sentence for breaking the law was reduced?
A. Francis Greenway.
B. Margaret Dawson.
C. Alexander Munro.
D. Elizabeth Thakery.

39. What is fundamental to genealogical research?
A. Original records.
B. Electronic transfer.
C. Pooling of information.
D. The IG Index.

40. Why does census information need to be approached with caution?
A. Because it cannot easily be attributed to a particular individual.
B. Because it is often not validated by a physician.
C. Because administration practices in the past were unreliable.
D. Because informants may not have been truthful due to financial motivations.

Depression

A. It is often more difficult for outsiders and non-sufferers to understand mental rather than physical illness in others. While it may be easy for us to sympathise with individuals living with the burden of a physical illness or disability, there is often a stigma attached to being mentally ill, or a belief that such conditions only exist in individuals who lack the strength of character to cope with the real world. The pressures of modern life seem to have resulted in an increase in cases of emotional disharmony and government initiatives in many countries have, of late, focussed on increasing the general public’s awareness and sympathy towards sufferers of mental illness and related conditions.

B. Clinical depression, or ‘major depressive disorder’, a state of extreme sadness or despair, is said to affect up to almost 20% of the population at some point in their lives prior to the age of 40. Studies have shown that this disorder is the leading cause of disability in North America; in the UK almost 3 million people are said to be diagnosed with some form of depression at any one time, and experts believe that as many as a further 9 million other cases may go undiagnosed. World Health Organisation projections indicate that clinical depression may become the second most significant cause of disability’ on a global scale by 2020. However, such figures are not unanimously supported, as some experts believe that the diagnostic criteria used to identify՛ the condition are not precise enough, leading to other types of depression being wrongly classified as ‘clinical’.

C. Many of us may experience periods of low morale or mood and feelings of dejection, as a natural human response to negative events in our lives such as bereavement, redundancy or breakdown of a relationship. Some of us may even experience periods of depression and low levels of motivation which have no tangible reason or trigger. Clinical depression is classified as an on-going state of negativity, with no tangible cause, where sufferers enter a spiral of persistent negative thinking, often experiencing irritability, perpetual tiredness and listlessness. Sufferers of clinical depression are said to be at higher risk of resorting to drug abuse or even suicide attempts than the rest of the population.

D. Clinical depression is generally diagnosed when an individual is observed to exhibit an excessively depressed mood and/or ‘anhedonia’ – an inability to experience pleasure from positive experiences such as enjoying a meal or pleasurable social interaction – for a period of two weeks or more, in conjunction with five or more additional recognised symptoms. These additional symptoms may include overwhelming feelings of sadness; inability to sleep, or conversely, excessive sleeping; feelings of guilt, nervousness, abandonment or fear; inability to concentrate; interference with memory capabilities; fixation with death or extreme change in eating habits and associated weight gain or loss.

E. Clinical depression was originally solely attributed to chemical imbalance in the brain, and while anti-depressant drugs which work to optimise levels of ‘feel good’ chemicals – serotonin and norepinephrine – are still commonly prescribed today, experts now believe that onset of depression may be caused by a number, and often combination of, physiological and socio-psychological factors. Treatment approaches vary quite dramatically from place to place and are often tailored to an individual’s particular situation; however, some variation of a combination of medication and psychotherapy is most commonly used. The more controversial electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) may also be used where initial approaches fail. In extreme cases, where an individual exhibits behaviour which Indicates that they may cause physical harm to themselves, psychiatric hospitalisation may be necessary as a form of intensive therapy.

F. Some recent studies, such as those published by the Archives of General Psychiatry, hold that around a quarter of diagnosed clinical depression cases should actually be considered as significant but none-the-less ordinary sadness and maladjustment to coping with trials in life, indicating that in such cases, psychotherapy rather than treatment through medication is required. Recovery as a result of psychotherapy tends, in most cases, to be a slower process than improvements related to medication; however, improvements as a result of psychological treatment, once achieved, have been observed in some individuals to be more long term and sustainable than those attained through prescription drugs. Various counselling approaches exist, though all focus on enhancing the subject’s ability to function on a personal and interpersonal level. Sessions involve encouragement of an individual to view themselves and their relationships in a more positive manner, with the intention of helping patients to replace negative thoughts with a more positive outlook.

G. It is apparent that susceptibility to depression can run in families. However, it remains unclear as to whether this is truly an inherited genetic trait or whether biological and environmental factors common to family members may be at the root of the problem. In some cases, sufferers of depression may need to unlearn certain behaviours and attitudes they have established in life and develop new coping strategies designed to help them deal with problems they may encounter, undoing patterns of destructive behaviour they may have observed in their role models and acquired for themselves.

Questions 1 – 5
Reading Passage 1 has seven sections A-G. Which paragraph contains the following information?

1. Details of treatment alternatives for worst case scenario depression.
2. Information regarding cases where drug treatment is inappropriate.
3. Details of how those diagnosed with depression may be more vulnerable than other members of society,
4. Information about society’s attitudes to depression and similar illnesses.
5. Information regarding why estimates of incidence of future growth in cases may be overly exaggerated.

Questions 6 – 8
Choose THREE letters A-G.

Which THREE of the following statements are true of depression?
A. Governments have generally failed to take action to educate the general public about the condition.
B. The highest reported number of cases are in the USA.
C. In Britain, it is likely that there are more individuals who live with the condition without the help of a doctor than those being officially treated.
D. Clinical depression may be triggered by divorce.
E. Lethargy may be one of the symptoms of depression.
F. Prescribed pharmaceuticals have radically changed over recent years.
G. Approaches to treating depression are not universal.

Questions 9 – 13
Complete the summary of paragraphs F and G with the list of words A-L below.

Whilst recovery through counselling rather than medicine may be more (9)__________ , results once achieved may have more (10)___________with some patients. Counselling sessions are geared towards improving the subject’s relationship with others and their own (11)__________, encouraging sufferers of depression to take on a more (12)__________ outlook. The extent to which genetic disposition and sociological factors impact on state of mind is (13)__________. Many people undergoing counselling therapy do so with the purpose of unlearning negative behaviour and reactions.

A. gratifying                                     B. longevity
C. ambition                                      D. optimistic
E. pessimistic                                  F. difficulty
G. inconclusive                               H. self-image
I. gradual                                         J. unequivocal
K. immediate                                  L. categorical

THE FACE OF MODERN MAN?

A. In response to the emergence of the ‘metro-sexual’ male, In other words, an urban, sophisticated man who is fashionable, well-groomed and unashamedly committed to ensuring his appearance is the best it can be, a whole new industry has developed. According to research conducted on behalf of a leading health and beauty retailer in the UK, the market for male cosmetics and related products has grown by 800% since the year 2000 and is expected to continue to increase significantly. The male grooming products market has become the fastest growing sector within the beauty and cosmetics industry, currently equivalent to around 1.5 billion pounds per annum.

B. Over the last decade, a large number of brands and companies catering for enhancement of the male image have been successfully established, such operations ranging from male-only spas, boutiques, personal hygiene products, hair and skin care ranges, and male magazines with a strong leaning towards men’s fashion. Jamie Cawley, proprietor of a successful chain of London-based male grooming boutiques, holds that his company’s success in this highly competitive market can be attributed to the ‘exclusivity’ tactics they have employed, in that their products and services are clearly defined as male- orientated and distinctly separate to feminine products offered by other organisations. However, market analyst, Kim Sawyer, believes that future growth in the market can also be achieved through sale of unisex products marketed to both genders, this strategy becoming increasingly easy to implement as men’s interest in appearance and grooming has become more of a social norm.

C. Traditionalists such as journalist Jim Howrard contend that the turn-around in male attitudes which has led to the success of the industry w’ould have been inconceivable a decade ago, given the conventional male role, psyche and obligation to exude masculinity; however, behavioural scientist Professor Ruth Chesterton argues that the metro-sexual man of today is in fact a modern incarnation of the ‘dandy’ of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century. British dandies of that period, who were often of middle class backgrounds but imitated aristocratic lifestyles, were devoted to cultivation of their physical appearance, development of a refined demeanour and hedonistic pursuits. In France, she adds, dandyism, in contrast, was also strongly linked to political ideology and embraced by youths wishing to clearly define themselves from members of the working class revolutionary social groups of the period.

D. Over recent decades, according to sociologist Ben Cameron, gender roles for both sexes have become less defined. According to research, he says, achievement of status and success have become less important in younger generations of men, as has the need to repress emotions. Cameron defines the traditional masculine role within western societies – hegemonic masculinity – as an expectation that males demonstrate physical strength and fitness, be decisive, self-assured, rational, successful and in control. Meeting this list of criteria and avoiding situations of demonstrating weakness, being overly emotional or in any way ’inferior’, he says, has placed a great deal of pressure on many members of the male population. So restrictive can society’s pressure to behave in a ‘masculine’ fashion on males be, Professor Chesterton states that in many situations men may respond in a way they deem acceptable to society, given their perceived gender role, rather than giving what they may actually consider to be the best and most objective response.

E. Jim Howard says that learning and acquiring gender identity makes up a huge component of a child’s socialisation and that a child who exhibits non-standard behavioural characteristics often encounters social and self image difficulties due to the adverse reactions of their peers. According to Kim Sawyer, media images and messages also add to pressures associated with the male image, stating that even in these modern and changing times, hegemonic masculinity is often idolised and portrayed as the definitive male persona.

F. Whilst male stereotypes and ideals vary from culture to culture, according to Professor Chesterton, a universal trait in stereotypical male behaviour is an increased likelihood to take risks than is generally found in female behaviour patterns. For this reason, she attributes such behaviour to the influence of genetic predisposition as opposed to socially learned behaviour. Men, she says, are three times more likely to die due to accident than females, a strong indication he says of their greater willingness to involve themselves in precarious situations. Ben Cameron also says that an attitude of invincibility is more dominant in males and is a predominant factor in the trend for fewer medical checkups in males and late diagnosis of chronic and terminal illness than in their more cautious and vigilant female counterparts.

G. Jamie Cawley, however, remains optimistic that the metro-sexual culture will continue and that what society accepts as the face of masculinity will continue to change. He attributes this to a male revolt against the strict confines of gender roles, adding that such changes of attitudes have led and will continue to lead to establishment of greater equality between the sexes.

Questions 14 – 18
Reading Passage 2 has seven paragraphs A-G. Choose the correct heading for paragraphs B-D and F-G from the list of headings below.

List of Headings
i. Basis and predictions
ii. Revolution or recurrence?
iii. Servicing a growing demand
iv. The surfacing of a new phenomenon
v. A long-held mindset and its downsides
vi. Influence on minors
vii. Hereditary predilection
viii. Effects of external pressures

Example: Paragraph E;              Answer: viii

14. Paragraph B
15. Paragraph C
16. Paragraph D
17. Paragraph F
18. Paragraph G

Questions 19 – 22
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 2?

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

19. Sales in the female health and beauty market have slightly declined over recent years.
20. The rise of ‘dandyism’ in England and France is attributed to similar factors.
21. Emotional reaction is contradictory to hegemonic masculine behaviour.
22. There is a correlation between men’s belief that they are indestructible and their decreased likelihood to seek medical advice.

Questions 23 – 27
Look at the following list of statements (Questions 23-27) based on changes in male image and behavior. Match each statement with the correct person A-E.

23. Male behaviour patterns have changed in a way that would have been considered implausible in the past.
24. Traditional benchmarks of masculinity are often exacerbated by the press.
25. Metro-sexual culture has developed as a response to modern men’s dissatisfaction with traditional images.
26. The need to conform to society’s expectations of male behaviour may impede men’s decision-making and judgement.
27. There is potential in a market which makes no differentiation between products for males and females.

List of Contributors
A. Jamie Cawley
B. Kim Sawyer
C. Jim Howard
D. Professor Ruth Chesterton
E. Ben Cameron

CLINICAL TRIALS

A. The benefits of vitamins to our well-being are now familiar to most; however, when the link between diets lacking in citrus fruits and the development of the affliction ‘scurvy’ in sailors was first discovered by James Lind in 1747, the concept of vitamins was yet to be discovered. Scurvy, which causes softening of the gums, oral bleeding and, in extreme cases, tooth loss, is now known to present as a result of lack of Vitamin C in the diet. Additional symptoms include depression, liver spots on the skin – particularly arms and legs – loss of colour in the face and partial immobility; high incidence of the ailment aboard ships took an enormous toll on the crew’s ability to complete essential tasks while at sea.

B. Suggestions that citrus fruit may lower the incidence or indeed prevent scurvy had been made as early as 1600. It was Lind, however, who would conduct the first clinical trial by studying the effect within scientific experimental parameters. However, while the correlation between consuming citrus fruit and avoidance of scurvy was established, the preventative properties were attributed to the presence of acids in the fruit and not what would later be identified as vitamin content.

C. Lind’s subjects for his trial consisted of twelve sailors already exhibiting symptoms of scurvy. These individuals were split into six groups; each pair common diet. Pair 1 were rationed a daily quart of cider, pair 2 elixir of vitriol, pair 3 a given quantity of vinegar, pair 4 seawater, pair 5 oranges and a lemon and pair 6 barley water. Despite the trial having to be aborted after day five, when supplies of fruit were depleted, the findings of the interventional study showed that only the control group who were given fruit supplements showed any significant improvement in their condition (one had, in fact, recovered to the extent that he was fit enough to return to work). The immediate impact on sailors’ health and incidence of scurvy on board ship was, however, limited as Lind and other physicians remained convinced that the curative effect was acid based. Therefore, while consumption of citrus fruit was recommended, it was often replaced by cheaper acid supplements. The preventative Qualities of citrus fruit against scurvy were not truly recognised until 1800, though throughout the latter part of the 1700s, lemon juice was increasingly administered as a cure for sailors already afflicted.

D. Nowadays, the implementation of findings discovered in clinical trials into mainstream medicine remains an arduous and lengthy process and the clinical trials themselves represent only a small stage of the process of developing a new drug from research stage to launch in the marketplace. On average, for every thousand drugs conceived, only one of the thousand actually makes it to the stage of clinical trial, other projects being abandoned for a variety of reasons. Stages which need to be fulfilled prior to clinical trial – where the treatment is actually tested on human subjects -include discovery, purification, characterisation and laboratory testing.

E. A new pharmaceutical for treatment of a disease such as cancer typically takes a period of 6 years or more before reaching the stage of clinical trial. Since legislation requires subjects participating in such trials to be monitored for a considerable period of time so that side-effects and benefits can be assessed correctly, a further eight years typically passes between the stage of a drug entering clinical trial and being approved for general use. One of the greatest barriers to clinical trial procedures is availability of subjects willing to participate, Criteria for selection is rigorous and trials where subjects are required to be suffering from the disease in question, experience tremendous recruitment difficulties as individuals already vulnerable due to the effects of their condition, are often reluctant to potentially put their health at higher levels of risk.

F. Clinical trials are conducted in line with a strict protocol and the stages of a trial are generally defined by five distinct phases. A drug that is deemed safe and effective enough to reach the end of stage three is most often, at that point, approved for use in mainstream medicine. Phase 0 involves a first-in-human trial (usually conducted using a small population often to fifteen subjects) with the purpose of ascertaining that the drug’s effect is, in fact, the same as predicted in pre-clinical studies. If no concerns are raised, the drug then enters Phase 1 of trial where a modest selection (usually between twenty and eighty subjects) of usually healthy volunteers, is exposed to the drug. However, for HIV and cancer drugs, this stage is conducted using patients suffering from the condition in question. There are two main variations of Phase I testing, these being SAD (single ascending dose) and MAD (multiple ascending dose). The former involves a single administration of a drug at a pre-determined level to one group of subjects, and the second involves administration of a pre-determined sequence of dosages.

G. Phases 0 and 1 are geared towards establishing the safety of a pharmaceutical and once this has been confirmed, drugs pass into Phase II testing where, while safety continues to be monitored, the drug’s effectiveness is also assessed using a larger group of subjects, ranging from twenty up to three hundred. In some trials, Phase II is regarded as involving two sub-stages, in that Phase 11(a) may be concerned with establishing optimum dosage levels and Phase 11(b) to evaluate effectiveness. Phase III is the most expensive, time-consuming and complex stage of the trial process, often involving as many as 3000 patients. At this stage, a new drug’s effectiveness is rigorously tested and compared to that of the best of the existing alternatives already approved and in common use. Where research indicates that a pharmaceutical has passed all requirements of Phases 0, I, II and III, submissions to relevant regulatory and licensing bodies are then made.

H. The final phase of clinical testing, Phase IV, is conducted over a lengthy period of time post-launch for general usage. This stage is, in essence, a safety net which involves continued monitoring of the drug, its properties and side-effects through which any long term adverse reactions, which remained undetected in the pre-launch clinical testing time frame can be discovered. Identification of harmful effects at this stage, on occasion, has led to withdrawal of a drug from the market; for example, as was the case with cerivastin, a cholesterol-lowering drug, which was later found to have an adverse effect on muscle reaction which, on occasion, had fatal consequences.

Questions 28 – 31
Complete the sentences below. Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer.

28. In advanced cases of scurvy suffers may experience ___________ along with numerous other symptoms.
29. Fruit adds were mistakenly heralded as having __________ in incidents of scurvy prior to the identification of vitamins.
30. Lind’s subjects for the first clinical trial were seamen who were at the time of _________ the condition in question.
31. All groups in Lind’s experiment were given a _________ along with specific rations which were varied for each control group.

Questions 32 – 35
Choose the correct letter A, B, C or D

32. The first clinical trial was conducted for only 5 days because
A. that period of time was the planned protocol.
B. the subjects in the relevant control group had already recovered.
C. resources fundamental to the experiment were used up.
D. those taking part in the trial were too sick to continue.

33. The impact of findings from the trial were not used to full potential because
A. Lind failed to recommend consumption of citrus fruit.
B. ineffective substitutes were often made available.
C. other physicians were unconvinced by his evidence.
D. the trial was not conducted over a long enough period to be valid.

34. One of the greatest hindrances to clinical testing today is
A. low volunteer rates.
B. the poor success rate.
C. the strict protocol.
D. shortage of laboratory staff.

35. Clinical testing for HIV and cancer drugs differs from usual procedures because
A. the clinical trial phase is much longer.
B. the MAD instead of the SAD approach is used during Phase I.
C. subjects exhibiting no symptoms of the illness are not used.
D. effectiveness is more rigorously tested than safety.

Questions 36 – 40
Complete the flowchart. Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage for each answer.

Phases of Clinical Testing

Phase 0: 10-15 subjects tested to confirm assumptions made in the (36)____________ stages were accurate.
Phase 1: 2 different approaches may be used. One involving one-off exposure to the drug the other involving a (37)________________.
Phase 2: May involve two sub-stages to establish (38)________________ quantities and usefulness.
Phase 3: The most (39)______________, protracted and costly of all stages. Submissions made post-testing at this stage of all is agreeable.
Phase 4: Precautionary monitoring continues post-launch. Any serious issues uncovered can, on occasion, result in 40________________.

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