IELTS Recent Actual Test

With Answers (Vol 5)

Reading Practice Test 6

READING PASSAGE 1
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1-13, which are based on
Reading Passage 1 below.

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

B Recent research offers insight into why many people end up unhappy rather than
pleased when their options expand. We began by making a distinction between
"maximizers” (those who always aim to make the best possible choice) and "satisficers”
(those who aim for "good enough,” whether or not better selections might be out there).
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C In particular, we composed a set of statements—the Maximization Scale—to
diagnose people’s propensity to maximize. Then we had several thousand people
rate themselves from 1 to 7 (from “completely disagree” to "completely agree”) on such
statements as “I never settle for second best.” We also evaluated their sense of
satisfaction with their decisions. We did not define a sharp cutoff to separate maximizers
from satisficers, but in general, we think of individuals whose average scores are higher
than 4 (the scale’s midpoint) as maxi- misers and those whose scores are lower than the
midpoint as satisficers. People who score highest on the test—the greatest maximizers—
engage in more product comparisons than the lowest scorers, both before and after they
make purchasing decisions, and they take longer to decide what to buy. When satisficers
find an item that meets their standards, they stop looking. But maximizers exert enormous
effort reading labels, checking out consumer magazines and trying new products. They
also spend more time comparing their purchas​ing decisions with those of others.

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

E Does it follow that maximizers are less happy in general than satisficers? We tested this
by having people fill out a variety of questionnaires known to be reliable indicators of well‐
being. As might be expected, individuals with high maximization scores experienced less
satisfaction with life and were less happy, less optimistic and more depressed than people
with low maximization scores. Indeed, those with extreme maximization ratings had
depression scores that placed them in the borderline of clinical range.

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

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

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

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

Questions 1-4
Look at the following descriptions or deeds (Questions 1-4) and the list of
catego​ries below.

Match each description or deed with the correct category, A-D.

Write the correct letter, A-D, in boxes 1-4 on your answer sheet.

A maximizers

B satisficers

C neither “maximizers” nor “satisficers”

D both “maximizers” and “satisficers”

1 rated to the Maximization Scale of making choice

2 don’t take much time before making a decision

3 are likely to regret about the choice in the future

4 choose the highest price in the range of purchase

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Questions 5-8
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading
Passage 1?

In boxes 5-8 on you answer sheet, write

TRUE if the statement is true

FALSE if the statement is false

NOT GIVEN if the information is not given in the passage

5 In today’s world, since the society is becoming

wealthier, people are happier.

6 In society, there are more maximisers than satisficers.

7 People tend to react more to loses than gains.

8 Females and males acted differently in the study of

choice making.

Questions 9-13
Choose the correct letter. A, B, C or D.

Write the correct letter in boxes 9-13 on your answer sheet.

9 The Maximization Scale is aimed to

A know the happiness when they have more choices.

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

C help people make better choices.

D reduce the time of purchasing.

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

A People can make choices more easily

B Maximizers are happier to make choices.

C Satisficers are quicker to make wise choices.

D People have more tendency to experience regret.

11 The example of theatre ticket is to suggest that

A they prefer to use more money when buying tickets.

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

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

properly

D full-price payers are real theatre lovers.

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

A use less time

B make more comparisons

C buy more expensive products

D limit the number of choices in certain situations

13 What is the best title for Reading Passage 1?

A Reasoning of Worse Choice Making

B Making Choices in Today’s World

C The Influence of More Choices

D Complexity in Choice Making

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READING PASSAGE 2
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 14-26,which are based on
Reading Passage 2 on the following pages.

Implication of False Belief Experiments

A

A considerable amount of research since the mid 1980s has been concerned
with what has been termed children’s theory of mind. This involves children’s
ability to understand that people can have different beliefs and representations
of the world– a capacity that is shown by four years of age. Furthermore, this
ability appears to be absent in children with autism. The ability to work out
that another person is thinking is clearly an important aspect of both cognitive
and social development. Furthermore, one important explanation for autism is
that children suffering from this condition do not have a theory of mind(TOM).
Consequently, the development of children’s TOM has attracted considerable
attention.

Wimmer and Perner devised a ‘false belief task’ to address this question. They
used some toys to act out the following story. Maxi left some chocolate in a
blue cupboard before he went out. When he was away his mother moved the
chocolate to a green cupboard. Children were asked to predict where Maxi
willlook for his chocolate when he returns. Most children under four years gave
the incorrect answer, that Maxi will look in the green cupboard. Those over four
years tended to give the correct answer, that Maxi will look in the blue

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cupboard. The incorrect answers indicated that the younger children did not
understand that Maxi’s beliefs and representations no longer matched the
actual state of the world, and they failed to appreciate that Maxi will act on the
basis of his beliefs rather than the way that the world is actually organised.

A simpler version of the Maxi task was devised by Baron-Cohen to take account
of criticisms that younger children may have been affected by the complexity
and too much information of the story in the task described above. For
example, the child is shown two dolls, Sally and Anne, who have a basket and a
box respectively. Sally also has a marble, which she places in her basket and
then leaves to take a walk. While she is out of the room, Anne takes the marble
from the basket, eventually putting it in the box. Sally returns and child is then
asked where Sally will look for the marble. The child passes the task if she
answers that Sally will look in the basket, where she put the marble; the child
fails the task if she answers that Sally will look in the box where the child
knows the marble is hidden even though Sally cannot know, since she did not
see it hidden there. In order to pass the task, the child must be able to
understand that another’s mental representation of the situation is different
from their own, and the child must be able to predict behavior based on that
understanding. The results of research using false-belief tasks have been fairly
consistent: most normally-developing children are unable to pass the tasks
until around age four.

Leslie argues that, before 18 months, children treat the world in a literal way
and rarely demonstrate pretence. He also argues that it is necessary for the
cognitive system to distinguish between what is pretend and what is real. If
children were not able to do this, they would not be able to distinguish between
imagination and reality. Leslie suggested that this pretend play becomes
possible because of the presence of a de-coupler that copies primary
representations to secondary representations. For example, children, when
pretending a banana is a telephone, would make a secondary representation of
a banana. They would manipulate this representation and they would use their
stored knowledge of ‘telephone’ to build on this pretence.

There is also evidence that social processes play a part in the development of
TOM. Meins and her colleagues have found that what they term mind
mindedness in maternal speech to six-month old infants is related to both
security of attachment and to TOM abilities. Mind Mindedness involves speech
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that discusses infants’ feelings and explains their behaviour in terms of mental
stages(e.g_ ‘you1 re feeling hungry’)

Lewis investigated older children living in extended families in Crete and

Cyprus. They found that children who socially interact with more adults who
have more friends. And who have more older siblings tend to pass TOM tasks at
a slightly earlier age than other children. Furthermore, because young children
are more likely to talk about their thoughts and feelings with peers than with
their mothers, peer interaction may provide a special impetus to the
development of a TOM. A similar point has been made by Dunn, who argues
that peer interaction is more likely to contain pretend play and that it is likely
to be more challenging because other children, unlike adults, do not make
large adaptations to the communicative needs of other children.

In addition, there has been concern that some aspects of the TOM approach
underestimate children’s understanding of other people. After all infants will
point to objects apparently in an effort to change a person’s direction of gaze
and interest; they can interact quite effectively with other people; they will
express their ideas in opposition to the wishes of others; and they will show
empathy for the feeling of others. Schatz studied the spontaneous speech of
three-year-olds and found that these children used mental terms and used
them in circumstances where there was a contrast between, for example, not
being sure where an object was located and finding it, or between pretending
and reality. Thus the social abilities of children indicate that they are aware of
the difference between mental states and external reality at ages younger than
four.

A different explanation has been put forward by Harris. He proposed that

children use ‘simulation’. This involves putting yourself in the other person’s
position, and then trying to predict what the other person would do. Thus
success on false belief tasks can be explained by children trying to imagine
what they would do if they were a character in the stories, rather than children
being able to appreciate the beliefs of other people. Such thinking about
situations that do not exist involves what is termed counterfactual reasoning.

A different explanation has been put forward by Harris. He proposed that

children use "simula​tion”. This involves putting yourself in the other person’s
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position, and then trying to predict what the other person would do. Thus,
success on false belief tasks can be explained by children trying to imagine
what they would do if they were a character in the stories, rather than children
being able to appreciate the beliefs of other people. Such thinking about
situations that do not exist involves what is termed counterfactual reasoning.

Questions 14-20
Look at the following statements (Questions 14-20) and the list of
researchers below.

Match each statement with the correct researcher, A-G.

Write the correct letter. A-G. in boxes 14-20 on your answer sheet.

List of Researchers

A Baron-Cohen

B Meins

C Wimmer and Pemer

D Lewis E Dunn F Schatz G Harris

E Dunn

F Schatz

G Harris

14
gave an alternative explanation that children may not be
understanding other’s belief

15
found that children under certain age can tell difference
between reality and mentality

16
conducted a well-known experiment and drew
conclusion that young children were unable to comprehend the real state
of the world

17
found that children who get along with adults often
comparatively got through the test more easily

18
revised an easier experiment to rule out the possibility
that children might be influenced by sophisticated reasoning

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19
related social factor such as mother-child
communication to capability act in TOM

20
explained children are less likely to tell something
interactive to their mother than to their friends

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.

In 1980s, research studies were designed to test the subject called Theory
of Mind that if children have the ability to represent the reality. First
experiments were carried out on this subject on a boy. And questions had
been made on where the boy can find the location of the 21 . But
it was accused that it had excessive 22 . So second modified
experiment was can​ ducted involving two dolls, and most children passed
the test at the age of 23 . Then Lewis and Dunn researched
24 children in a certain place, and found children who have more
interaction such as more con​versation with 25 have better
performance in the test, and peer interaction is 26 because of
consisting pretending elements.

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

What is Meaning
—Why do we respond to words and symbols in the waves we do?

The end, product of education, yours and mine and everybody's, is the total
pattern of reactions and possible reactions we have inside ourselves. If you did
not have within you at this moment the pattern of reactions that we call "the
ability to read.” you would see here only meaningless black marks on paper.
Because of the trained patterns of response, you are (or are not) stirred to
patriotism by martial music, your feelings of reverence are aroused by symbols
of your religion, you listen more respectfully to the health advice of someone
who has “MD" after his name than to that of someone who hasn’t. What I call
here a “pattern of reactions”, then, is the sum total of the ways we act in
response to events, to words, and to symbols.

Our reaction patterns or our semantic habits, are the internal and most
important residue of whatever years of education or miseducation we may
have received from our parents’ conduct toward us in childhood as well as their
teachings, from the formal education we may have had, from all the lectures
we have listened to, from the radio programs and the movies and television
shows we have experienced, from all the books and newspapers and comic
strips we have read, from the conversations we have had with friends and
associates, and from all our experiences. If, as the result of all these influences
that make us what we are, our semantic habits are reasonably similar to those
of most people around us, we are regarded as "normal,” or perhaps “dull.” If
our semantic habits are noticeably different from those of others, we are
regarded as “individualistic" or “original.” or, if the differences are disapproved
of or viewed with alarm, as “crazy.”

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Semantics is sometimes defined in dictionaries as “the science of the meaning
of words”— which would not be a bad definition if people didn’t assume that
the search for the meanings of words begins and ends with looking them up in
a dictionary. If one stops to think for a moment, it is clear that to define a word,
as a dictionary does, is simply to explain the word with more words. To be
thorough about defining, we should next have to define the words used in the
definition, then define the words used in defining the words used in the
definition and so on. Defining words with more words, in short, gets us at once
into what mathematicians call an “infinite regress”. Alternatively, it can get us
into the kind of run-around we sometimes encounter when we look up
“impertinence” and find it defined as “impudence," so we look up “impudence”
and find it defined as “impertinence." Yet—and here we come to another
common reaction pattern—people often act as if words can be explained fully
with more words. To a person who asked for a definition of jazz, Louis
Armstrong is said to have replied, "Man. when you got to ask what it is, you’ll
never get to know,” proving himself to be an intuitive semanticist as well as a
great trumpet player.

Semantics, then, does not deal with the “meaning of words” as that expression
is commonly understood. P. W. Bridgman, the Nobel Prize winner and physicist,
once wrote, “The true meaning of a term is to be found by observing what a
man does with it, not by what he says about it.” He made an enormous
contribution to science by showing that the meaning of a scientific term lies in
the operations, the things done, that establish its validity, rather than in verbal
definitions.

Here is a simple, everyday kind of example of “operational” definition. If you

say, “This table measures six feet in length,” you could prove it by taking a
foot rule, performing the operation of laying it end to end while counting,
“One...two...three...four...” But if you say—and revolutionists have started
uprisings with just this statement “Man is born free, but everywhere he is in
chains!”—what operations could you perform to demonstrate its accuracy or
inaccuracy?

But let us carry this suggestion of “operationalism" outside the physical

sciences where Bridgman applied it, and observe what “operations” people
perform as the result of both the language they use and the language other
people use in communicating to them. Here is a personnel manager studying
an application blank. He comes to the words “Education: Harvard University,”
and drops the application blank in the wastebasket (that’s the “operation”)
because, as he would say if you asked him, “I don’t like Harvard men.” This is
an instance of "meaning” at work—but it is not a meaning that can be found in
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dictionaries.

If I seem to be taking a long time to explain what semantics is about, it is

because I am trying, in the course of explanation, to introduce the reader to a
certain way of looking at human behavior. I say human responses because, so
far as we know, human beings are the only creatures that have, over and
above that biological equipment which we have in common with other
creatures, the additional capacity for manufacturing symbols and systems of
symbols. When we react to a flag, we are not reacting simply to a piece of
cloth, but to the meaning with which it has been symbolically endowed. When
we react to a word, we are not reacting to a set of sounds, but to the meaning
with which that set of sounds has been symbolically endowed.

A basic idea in general semantics, therefore, is that the meaning of words (or
other symbols) is not in the words, but in our own semantic reactions. If I were
to tell a shockingly obscene story in Arabic or Hindustani or Swahili before an
audience that understood only English, no one would blush or be angry; the
story would be neither shocking nor obscene-induced, it would not even be a
story. Likewise, the value of a dollar bill is not in the bill, but in our social
agreement to accept it as a symbol of value. If that agreement were to break
down through the collapse of our government, the dollar bill would become
only a scrap of paper. We do not understand a dollar bill by staring at it long
and hard. We understand it by observing how people act with respect to it. We
understand it by understanding the social mechanisms and the loyalties that
keep it meaningful. Semantics is therefore a social study, basic to all other
social studies.

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

Write the correct letter in boxes 27-31 on your answer sheet.

27 What point is made in the first paragraph?

A The aim of education is to teach people to read

B Everybody has a different pattern of reactions.

C Print only carries meaning to those who have received

appropriate ways to respond.

D The writers should make sure their works satisfy a variety of

readers.

28 According to the second paragraph, people are judged by

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 A the level of education.

B the variety of experience.

C how conventional their responses are.

D complex situations.

29 What point is made in the third paragraph?

A Standard ways are incapable of defining words precisely.

B A dictionary is most scientific in defining words.

C A dictionary should define words in as few words as possible.

D Mathematicians could define words accurately.

30 What does the writer suggest by referring to Louis Armstrong?

A He is an expert of language.

B Music and language are similar.

C He provides insights to how words are defined.

D Playing trumpet is easier than defining words.

31 What does the writer intend to show about the example of “personnel
manager”?

A Harvard men are not necessarily competitive in the job market.

B Meaning cannot always be shared by others.

C The idea of operationalism does not make much sense outside

the physical science.

D Job applicants should take care when filling out application

forms.

Questions 32-35
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading
Passage 3?

In boxes 32-35 on you answer sheet, write

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 TRUE if the statement is true

FALSE if the statement is false

NOT GIVEN if the information is not given in the passage

32
Some statements are incapable of being proved or
disproved.

33
Meaning that is personal to individuals is less worthy
to study than shared meanings.

34
Flags and words are eliciting responses of the same
reason.

35
A story can be entertaining without being understood.

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

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

36
A comic strip

37
A dictionary

38
Bridgman

39
A story in a language the audience cannot understand

40
A dollar bill

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 A is meaningless.

B has lasting effects on human behaviors.

C is a symbol that has lost its meaning.

D can be understood only in its social context.

E can provide inadequate explanation of meaning.

F reflects the variability of human behaviors.

G emphasizes the importance of analyzing how words were used.

H suggests that certain types of behaviors carry more meanings than others.

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 Solution:

1 D 2 B

3 A 4 C

5 FALSE 6 NOT GIVEN

7 TRUE 8 NOT GIVEN

9 B 10 D

11 C 12 D

13 C 14 G

15 F 16 C

17 D 18 A

19 B 20 E

21 chocolate 22 information

23 four/4 24 older

25 adults 26 challenging

27 C 28 C

29 A 30 C

31 B 32 TRUE

33 NOT GIVEN 34 TRUE

35 FALSE 36 B

37 E 38 G

39 A 40 D
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