Cambridge 7 Reading Test 4 - Answers With Explanation

1. The passage states "the conventional picture is that tens of thousands of slaves dragged stones on sledges" — this is the widely held view — TRUE.

2. Clemmons actually spotted the hieroglyph "while perusing a book on the monuments of Egypt", not on a monument itself — FALSE.

3. The passage never mentions Gharib doing any earlier research into bird flight — NOT GIVEN.

4. Before the real trial, the pair relied on "initial calculations and scale-model wind-tunnel experiments" to check their theory — TRUE.

5. The successful lift happened even though "the wind was blowing at a gentle 16 to 20 kilometres an hour, little more than half what they thought would be needed" — FALSE.

6. The passage describes a "huge initial force" when the kite opened, but says nothing about wind force increasing with height — NOT GIVEN.

7. Gharib concluded "even a 300-tonne column could have been lifted to the vertical with 40 or so men and four or five sails" — TRUE.

8. The Egyptians "are known to have used wooden pulleys, which could have been made strong enough to bear the weight of massive blocks of stone."

9. The same sentence notes the pulleys could "bear the weight of massive blocks of stone."

10. "Harnessing the wind would not have been a problem for accomplished sailors like the Egyptians."

11. "A wooden artefact found on the step pyramid at Saqqara looks uncannily like a modern glider."

12. The glider's sophistication "suggests the Egyptians might have been developing ideas of flight for a long time."

13. As early as 1250 BC "the Chinese were using them to deliver messages and dump flaming debris on their foes."

14. It was the mainland to the north, not the islands, that "native inhabitants called ... Aleyska, the 'Great Land'" — FALSE.

15. The passage says the fisheries "have developed into some of the largest in the world" but never mentions who owns them — NOT GIVEN.

16. Salmon "pump through Alaska like blood through a heart, bringing ... nourishment to land, animals and people" — TRUE.

17. The 90% figure refers to where salmon are caught, not to species breakdown: "90% of all Pacific salmon commercially caught in North America are produced there" — NOT GIVEN.

18. "Commercial catches of Pacific salmon in Alaska exceeded 320,000 tonnes" during 2000 — TRUE.

19. "Between 1940 and 1959, overfishing led to crashes in salmon populations so severe that in 1953 Alaska was declared a federal disaster area" — TRUE.

20. Harvests in the 1990s were "well in excess of 100 million", not averaging around that figure — FALSE.

21. Biologists are "constantly monitoring adult fish as they show up to spawn" — ending G, to ensure fish numbers are sufficient to permit fishing.

22. Field biologists can act because "even sport fishing can be brought to a halt" — ending E.

23. The management system "allowed Alaska salmon stocks ... to prosper" — ending B, to be successful.

24. The MSC "certifies fisheries that meet high environmental standards" — ending A.

25. After the 1999 collapse, "the state reacted quickly, closing down all fisheries, even those necessary for subsistence purposes" — ending K.

26. "Seven companies producing Alaska salmon were immediately granted permission to display the MSC logo on their products" — ending F.

27. The opening lines note people are "capable of adapting to a wide range of noise levels", implying city dwellers grow used to more noise than the countryside offers — D.

28. Loud bursts were disruptive "at first", but "after about four minutes the subjects were doing just as well on their tasks as control subjects" — C.

29. "Noise did not affect a subject's ability to track a moving line with a steering wheel" when it was the only task required — A.

30. The passage says predictability matters more than loudness, since it is harder to work "under circumstances with unexpected intrusions of noise" — B.

31. Both groups "heard the same amount of noise overall", differing only in whether the bursts were spaced regularly or at random — D.

32. "All subjects performed at about the same level during the noise portion of the experiment" regardless of predictability — F.

33. On the later proofreading task, "the unpredictable noise produced more errors ... than predictable noise" — I.

34. "Unpredictable noise produces more fatigue than predictable noise, but it takes a while for this fatigue to take its toll" — B, unexpected noise.

35. Glass and Singer's subjects found loud bursts "disruptive at first", showing initial difficulty concentrating — A.

36. Cohen et al.'s follow-up found children moved to quieter classrooms "still showed greater distractibility one year later" — D.

37. Glass and Singer also showed that if a person "knows that he or she can control the noise, this seems to eliminate both its negative effects" — A.

38. The studies compare loud versus soft and predictable versus unpredictable noise, but none examines pitch, so this statement matches no researcher — E.

39. Broadbent (1957) found noise "interfered with the performance of subjects who were required to monitor three dials at a time" — B.

40. Finkelman and Glass found noise "did interfere with the subject's ability to repeat numbers while tracking" — C.