Cambridge 14 Reading Test 4 - Answers With Explanation

1. "Giraldo focused on ants at four age ranges."

2. "Giraldo watched how well the ants took care of the young of the colony."

3. She compared how ants "followed the telltale scent that the insects usually leave to mark a trail to food."

4. "She tested how ants responded to light."

5. "The older ants attacked the poor fruit fly just as aggressively as the young ones did."

6. "Nor was there any difference in the location of the dying cells" between young and old ants.

7. Synaptic complexes are "regions where neurons come together."

8. Serotonin and dopamine are "brain chemicals whose decline often coincides with ageing."

9. Naked mole rats also "stay fit for nearly their entire lives" — P. dentata isn't the only species that ages well — FALSE.

10. "Unlike all previous studies, which only estimated how old the ants were, her work tracked the ants... so she knew their exact ages" — TRUE.

11. "Giraldo expected the older ants to perform poorly in all these tasks" — but they performed just as well, contradicting her prediction — FALSE.

12. The passage says bee studies gave "mixed" results but never compares the methods used to measure decline — NOT GIVEN.

13. Lab ants "typically live for around 140 days," while wild ants "probably don't live for a full 140 days thanks to predators, disease" and harsher conditions — TRUE.

14. Section B: some species collapses "have been sudden, dramatic and unexpected, or were simply discovered very late in the day."

15. Section E: zoo research works because "there is less risk and fewer variables," letting scientists learn things that help wild populations.

16. Section C mentions "television documentaries" and "natural history specimens... on display in museums" as alternatives to visiting zoos.

17. Section A: zoo animals get "a varied and high-quality diet," treatment for illness, and are "spared bullying," predators and parasites.

18. "The average captive animal will have a greater life expectancy compared with its wild counterpart" — TRUE.

19. "A good number of species only exist in captivity, with many of these living in zoos" — TRUE.

20. The passage discusses documentaries as an educational tool but never links them to zoo visitor numbers — NOT GIVEN.

21. "This was an area where zoos used to be lacking, but they are now increasingly sophisticated" — not always excellent — FALSE.

22. Section E gives reasons zoo research is useful for scientists, but doesn't compare stress levels for the animals themselves — NOT GIVEN.

23–24. Zoos "send their animal keepers abroad to contribute their knowledge and skills" (option B) and "work directly to educate conservation workers in other countries" (option D).

25–26. Zoos help "educating and informing the general population" about environmental issues (option B), and captive-bred animals are used for "reintroduced from zoos" programmes (option E).

27. "Plenty of studies have sounded alarm bells about the state of marine debris" before Rochman's group set out to test those claims — she wasn't first — FALSE.

28. Seabirds are given only as an example of a speculative claim, not identified as the group most at risk overall — NOT GIVEN.

29. "Nobody had yet tested those perceived threats," including claims about bird extinction — not yet proven — FALSE.

30. Rochman's group "asked what threats scientists had studied — 366 perceived threats in all" — TRUE.

31. "In 83 percent of cases, the perceived dangers of ocean trash were proven true," implying most studies were sound, not badly designed — FALSE.

32. The mussel study "failed to find the effect it was looking for" — meaning researchers expected to find harm from ingested plastic — TRUE.

33. The plastic moved into the mussels' bloodstream but "didn't seem to stress out the shellfish" — nothing suggests mussels prefer plastic to their normal diet — FALSE.

34. "Most of the dangers also involved large pieces of debris — animals getting entangled in trash, for example."

35. "Compared to the number of studies investigating large-scale debris, Rochman's group found little research" on microplastic, including fibres "shed by synthetic clothing in the wash."

36. "Many studies have looked at how plastic affects an individual animal... rather than whole populations."

37. "Scientists often use higher concentrations of plastic than what's really in the ocean."

38. Studies don't reveal "how deaths in one species could affect that animal's predators."

39. Rochman wants better answers before disasters like "a tanker accidentally spilling its whole cargo of oil."

40. The whole passage is about weighing which fears over ocean trash are proven and which aren't — an assessment of the threat, matching the given title exactly.