How the mind ages

The way mental function changes is largely determined by three factors-mental lifestyle, the
impact of chronic disease and flexibility of the mind.

Experiments have shown that younger monkeys consistently outperform their older colleagues
on memory tests. Formerly, psychologists concluded that memory and other mental functions in
humans deteriorate over time because of changes in the brain. Thus mental decline after young
adulthood appeared inevitable. The truth, however, is not quite so simple.

Stanley Rapoport at the National Institute of Health in the United States measured the flow of
blood in the brains of old and young people as they completed different tasks. Since blood flow
reflects neural activity. Rapoport could compare which networks of neurons were the same, the
neural networks they used were significantly different. The older subjects used different internal
strategies to accomplish comparable results at the same time,'Rapoport says. At the Georgia
Institute of Technology, psychologist Timothy Salthouse compared a group of fast and accurate
typists of college age with another group in their 60s. Both groups typed 60 words a minute. The
older typists, it turned out, achieved their speed with cunning little strategies that made them
more efficient than their younger counterparts. They made fewer finger shifts, gaining a fraction
of a second here and there. They also read ahead in the test. The neural networks involved in
typing appear to have been reshaped to compensate for losses in motor skills or other age
changes.

In fact, there's evidence that deterioration in mental functions can actually be reversed.
Neuropsychologist Marion Diamond at the University of California has shown that mental
activity maks neurons sprout new dendrites* which establish connections with other neurons.
The dendrites shrink when the mind is idle. For example,'when a rat is kept in isolation, the
animal's brain shrinks, but if we put that rat with other rats in a large cage and give them an
assortment of toys, we can show, after four days, significant differences in its brain.'says
Diamond. After a month in the enriched surroundings, the whole cerebral cortex has expanded,
as has its blood supply.'But even in the enriched surroundings, rats get bored unless the toys are
varied. Animals are just like we are. They need stimulation,'says Diamond. A busy mental
lifestyle keeps the human mind fit, says Warner Schaie of Penn State University. ‘People who
regularly participate in challenging tasks retain their intellectual abilities better than mental
couch potatoes.'

In his studies, Schaie detected a decline in mental function among individuals who underwent
lengthy stays in hospital for chronic illness. He postulated it might be due to the mental passivity
encouraged by hospital routine.

One of the most profoundly important mental functions is memory. Memory exists in more than
one form, what we call knowledge- facts- is what psychologists such as Harry Bahrick of Ohio
Wesleyan University call semantic memory. Events, conversations and occurrences in time and
space, on the other hand, make up episodic memory. It's true that episodic memory begins to
decline when most people are in their 50s, but it's never perfect at any age.
Probing the longevity of knowledge, Bahrick tested 1,000 high school graduates to see how well
they remembered the school subject algebra. Some had completed the course a month before,
other 50 years earlier. Surprisingly, he found that a person's grasp of algebra did not depend on
how long ago he'd taken the course. The determining factor was the duration of instruction.
Those who had spent only a few months learning algebra forgot most of it within two or three
years while others who had been instructed for longer remembered better. According to
Bahrick,'the long-term residue of knowledge remains stable over the decades, independent of the
age of the person and the memory.'

Perhaps even more important than the ability to remember is the ability to manage memory- a
mental function known as metamemory.'You could say metamemory is a byproduct of going to
school,'says psychologist Robert Kail of Purdue University,'The question-and-answer
process,especially exam taking, helps children learn and teaches them how their memory
functions.This may be one reason why the better educated a person is, the more likely they are to
perform well in many aspects of life and in psychological assessments: A group of adult novice
chess players were compared with a group of child experts at the game. But when asked to
remember the patterns of chess pieces arranged on a board, the children won.' Because they'd
played a lot of chess, their knowledge of chess was better organized than that of the adults, and
their existing knowledge of chess served as a framework for new memory,'explains Kail.
Cognitive style, another factor in maintaining mental function, is what Schaie calls the ability to
adapt and roll with life's punches.'He measured mental flexibility with questions and tests
requiring people to carry out in an offbeat way an everyday activity they had done millions of
times. One example was asking people to copy a paragraph substituting uppercase letters for
lowercase ones. These tests seem silly, but flexible-minded people manage to complete
them,'says Schaie. The rigid person responds with tension instead and performs poorly. Those
who score highly on tests of cognition at an advanced age are those who tested high in mental
flexibility at middle age'.

On a more optimistic note, one mental resource that only improves with time is specialized
knowledge. Crystallised intelligence about one's occupation apparently does not decline at all
until at least age 75. Vocabulary is another such specialized form of knowledge. Research clearly
shows that vocabulary develops with time. Retired teachers and journalists consistently score
higher on tests of vocabulary and general information than college students.

Questions 1-3
Choose the correct letter A, B, C or D.

Write the correct letter in boxes 1-3 on your answer sheet

1. What does the writer say about the performance of older typists on the test?

A They used different motor skills from younger typists.

B They had been more efficiently trained than younger typists.

C They used more time-saving techniques than younger typists.

D They had better concentration skills than younger typists.
2. The experiment with the rats showed that

A brain structure only changed when the rats were given a familiar toy

B the rats became anxious after a lengthy period of time alone

C the rats lived longer then they were part of a social group

D the rats'brains expanded or shrank depending on the level of mental activity

3. A comparison between adults and children who played chess showed that

A the children were as capable as the adults of remembering a series of numbers

B the children had better recall of the layout of pieces

C the adults stored memories of chess moves in a more logical manner

D the adults had clearer memories of chess games they had played

Questions 4-9
Complete the summary below.

Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage for each answer.

Write your answers in boxes 4-9 on your answer sheet.

Psychologists distinguish between two different types of memory: and

memory. A study was conducted into people's knowledge of to determine recall ability.
This aspect of memory was found to be a function not of age but rather of length of tuition.

School also helps with a brain function called . This is why a more highly educated

person is generally more successful and does better in tests.

Some of our mental functions remain unaffected by age or even improve. For example, as we get

older, our knowledge of increases.

Questions 10-13
Look at the following statements and the list of people below.

Match each statement with the correct person, A-E.

List of People

A. Stanley Rapoport

B. Marion Diamond

C. Warner Schaie

D. Harry Bahrick

E. Robert Kail

Write the correct letter, A-E, in boxes 10-13 on your answer sheet.

10. The educational system makes students aware of how their memory works.

11. Although older people may use a different mental approach when completing a
task, they can still achieve the same result as younger people

12. Being open to new ways of doing things can have a positive impact on your
mental condition as we get older

13. Both animals and humans need to exist in an environment full of interest.

PART2

Ensuring our future food supply

Climate change and new diseases threaten the limited varieties of seeds we depend on for food.
Luckily, we still have many of the seeds used in the past-but we must take steps to save them.

Six miles outside the town of Decorah, Iowa in the USA, an 890-acre stretch of rolling fields and
woods called Heritage Farm is letting its crops go to seed. Everything about Heritage Farm is in
stark contrast to the surrounding acres of intensively farmed fields of corn and soybean that are
typical of modern agriculture. Heritage Farm is devoted to collecting rather than growing seeds.
It is home to the Seed Savers Exchange, one of the largest non government-owned seed banks in
the United States.

In 1975 Diane Ott Whealy was given the seedlings of two plant varieties that her great
grandfather had brought to America from Bavaria in 1870: Grandpa Ott’s morning glory and his
German Pink tomato. Wanting to preserve similar traditional varieties, known as heirloom
plants, Diane and her husband, Kent, decided to establish a place where the seeds of the past
could be kept and traded. The exchange now has more than 13,000 members, and the many
thousands of heirloom varieties they have donated are kept in its walk-in coolers, freezers, and
root cellars the seeds of many thousands of heirloom varieties and, as you walk around an old red
barn that is covered in Grandpa Ott’s beautiful morning glory blossoms, you come across the
different vegetables, herbs, and flowers they have planted there.

"Each year our members list their seeds in this,"Diane Ott Whealy says, handing over a copy of
the Seed Savers Exchange 2010 Yearbook. It is as thick as a big-city telephone directory, with
page after page of exotic beans, garlic, potatoes, peppers, apples, pears, and plums-each with its
own name and personal history .For example, there’s an Estonian Yellow Cherry tomato, which
was brought to the seed bank by “an elderly Russian lady” who lived in Tallinn, and a Persian
Star garlic from “a bazaar in Samarkand.”There’s also a bean donated by archaeologists
searching for pygmy elephant fossils in New Mexico.

Heirloom vegetables have become fashionable in the United States and Europe over the past
decade, prized by a food movement that emphasizes eating locally and preserving the flavor and
uniqueness of heirloom varieties. Found mostly in farmers' markets and boutique groceries,
heirloom varieties have been squeezed out of supermarkets in favor of modern single-variety
fruits and vegetables bred to ship well and have a uniform appearance, not to enhance flavor. But
the movement to preserve heirloom varieties goes way beyond the current interest in North
America and Europe in tasty, locally grown food. It’s also a campaign to protect the world’s
future food supply.Most people in the well-fed world give little thought to where their food
comes from or how it’s grown. They wander through well-stocked supermarkets without
realizing that there may be problem ahead.We’ve been hearing for some time about the loss of
flora and fauna in our rainforests.Very little,by contrast,is being said or done about the parallel
decline in the diversity of the foods we eat.

Food variety extinction is happening all over the world - and it's happening fast. In the United
States an estimated 90 percent of historic fruit and vegetable varieties are no longer grown. Of
the 7,000 different apple varieties that were grown in the 1800s, fewer than a hundred remain. In
the Philippines thousands of varieties of rice once thrived; now only about a hundred are grown
there. In China 90 percent of the wheat varieties cultivated just a hundred years ago have
disappeared. Experts estimate that in total we have lost more than 50 percent of the world's food
varieties over the past century.

Why is this a problem? Because if disease or future climate change affects one of the handful of
plants we've come to depend on to feed our growing planet, we might desperately need one of
those varieties we've let become extinct. The loss of the world's cereal diversity is a particular
cause for concern. A fungus called Ug99, which was first identified in Uganda in 1999, is
spreading across the world's wheat crops. From Uganda it moved to Kenya, Ethiopia, Sudan, and
Yemen. By 2007 it had jumped the Persian Gulf into Iran. Scientists predict that the fungus will
soon make its way into India and Pakistan, then spread to Russia and China, and eventually the
USA.

Roughly 90 percent of the world's wheat has no defense against this particular fungus. If it
reached the USA, an estimated one billion dollars' worth of crops would be at risk. Scientists
believe that in Asia and Africa alone, the portion currently in danger could leave one billion
people without their primary food source. A famine with significant humanitarian consequences
could follow, according to Rick Ward of Cornell University.

The population of the world is expected to reach nine billion by 2045. Some experts say we’ll
need to double our food production to keep up with this growth. Given the added challenge of
climate change and disease, it is becoming ever more urgent to find ways to increase food yield.
The world has become increasingly dependent upon a technology-driven, one-size-fits-all
approach to food supply. Yet the best hope for securing our food's future may depend on our
ability to preserve the locally cultivated foods of the past.

Questions 14-20
Do the following statements agree with the views of the writer in Reading Passage? In boxes 14-
20 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

14. Heritage Farm is different from most other nearby farms.

15. Most nongovernment-owned seed banks are bigger than Seed Savers
Exchange.
16. Diane Ott Whealy's grandfather taught her a lot about seed varieties.

17. The seeds people give to the Seed Savers Exchange are stored outdoors.

18. Diane and her husband choose which heirloom seeds to grow on Heritage
Farm.

19. The seeds are listed in alphabetical order in The Seed Savers Exchange
Yearbook.

20. The Seed Savers Exchange Yearbook describes how each seed was obtained.

Questions 21-26
Complete the notes below.

Choose ONE WORD AND/OR A NUMBER from the passage for each answer. Write your
answers in boxes 21-26 on your answer sheet.

The food we grow and eat

Supermarkets

 sell fruit and vegetables that transport well

 want fruit and vegetables to be standard in their

Public awareness

 while people know about plants disappearing from very few know about the decline in
fruit and vegetable varieties

Extinction of food varieties

  less than 100 of the types of once available in the USA are still grown

 over of food varieties around the world have disappeared in the last 100 years

Current problems in food production

 a particular fungus is attacking wheat in various countries

 Rick Ward believes the threat to food supplies in Asia and Africa might lead to a

Food production in the future

 climate change and disease may put pressure on food production

 twice the amount of food may be needed because of an increase in

Questions 14-20
Do the following statements agree with the views of the writer in Reading Passage? In boxes 14-
20 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

14. Heritage Farm is different from most other nearby farms.

15. Most nongovernment-owned seed banks are bigger than Seed Savers
Exchange.

16. Diane Ott Whealy's grandfather taught her a lot about seed varieties.
17. The seeds people give to the Seed Savers Exchange are stored outdoors.

18. Diane and her husband choose which heirloom seeds to grow on Heritage
Farm.

19. The seeds are listed in alphabetical order in The Seed Savers Exchange
Yearbook.

20. The Seed Savers Exchange Yearbook describes how each seed was obtained.

Questions 21-26
Complete the notes below.

Choose ONE WORD AND/OR A NUMBER from the passage for each answer. Write your
answers in boxes 21-26 on your answer sheet.

The food we grow and eat

Supermarkets

 sell fruit and vegetables that transport well

 want fruit and vegetables to be standard in their

Public awareness

 while people know about plants disappearing from very few know about the decline in
fruit and vegetable varieties

Extinction of food varieties

 less than 100 of the types of once available in the USA are still grown

 over of food varieties around the world have disappeared in the last 100 years
Current problems in food production

 a particular fungus is attacking wheat in various countries

 Rick Ward believes the threat to food supplies in Asia and Africa might lead to a

Food production in the future

 climate change and disease may put pressure on food production

 twice the amount of food may be needed because of an increase in

Part 3

The fluoridation controversy

The long-standing debate about whether to fluoridate our drinking water continues Fluoridation
is the addition of fluorine to public water supplies with the aim of reducing tooth decay. The
fluorine, when mixed with water, becomes fluoride and the desired concentration of fluoride in
public water is approximately one part per million, depending on the regional temperature and
hence the amount of water people are likely to drink. Many studies, such as those by McClure in
1970 through to Burt in 1983, have shown that when children drink fluoridated water, their
average rate of tooth decay seems greatly reduced. A typical figure claimed is 50 percent
reduction. This apparently enormous benefit for children's teeth is the major argument in favor of
fluoridation.

Three main grounds for opposition to fluoridation have been expressed. First, opponents claim
the benefits are exaggerated or not established. Second, there are claims of health risks to pans of
the population, for example, allergic reactions. It is also accepted that high levels of fluoride can
cause discoloration of otherwise healthy teeth. Proponents do not consider this to be a problem in
such small concentrations, whereas opponents disagree - especially because some people drink
more water and obtain much more than the standard 1 milligram of fluoride per day. Third,
fluoridation is thought to be an infringement on individual rights because it is compulsory
medication of all members of a community.

An understanding of the fluoridation issue has important implications. If, according to the
experts, fluoridation is unquestionably a beneficial and non-hazardous measure, then the wisdom
of allowing the public to vote on, and reject it must be questioned.

Almost all studies that have been done have assumed that the scientific aspects of the
controversy are unproblematic, and they have excluded science from sociological examination.
The traditional view is that science is a special kind of knowledge, which is established through
scientific methods and objectively applied by members of a scientific community. However, in
recent years there has been a major challenge to this picture by a sociology of science that shows
how scientific knowledge is socially negotiated, and inevitably linked to the values of the
relevant parties, both scientists and nonscientists. These challengers do not see scientific
knowledge as exempt from social inquiry.

Kuhn (1970) argued that scientific knowledge does not always develop as an orderly process, but
is characterized by periodic revolutions. in which the methods of study and the assessment
criteria change in a fragmented way. According to Kuhn, the shift from one scientific way of
thinking to another is not made solely on the basis of clear rules of formal scientific practice, but
can include social factors, though Kuhn has never developed a full analysis of what these might
be. Collins (1975) took this concept further when he asserted that the outcome of experiments
was not something whose meaning could be immediately comprehended, but rather something
for interpretation, discussion between scientists, and reinterpretation in the light of other
experiments.

One interpretation of this analysis of science is that traditional distinctions between facts and
theories, and between scientific knowledge and values, can no longer be justified. Because social
processes are involved at all stages of the creation, evaluation, and establishing of scientific
knowledge, social values may also be involved.

In the same way as many scientists who study fluoridation have overlooked social values,
sociologists have also downplayed an important part of the debate by ignoring the number of
eminent scientists who have questioned aspects of fluoridation. An example is the study by
Sutton in 1960, which analyzed the classic North American studies of the effect of fluoridation
on tooth decay, and found that each showed significant methodological shortcomings. Sutton's
detailed study throws doubt as to the extent of reductions in tooth decay from fluoridation. Yet
Sutton's book is not cited in a single analysis of the fluoridation issue by any sociologist. In a
situation of some scientific uncertainty, differences in values are highlighted. A supporter of
fluoridation might argue. The evidence for the benefits of fluoridation is quite substantial, while
the evidence for harm is limited and dubious. I think the likely benefits outweigh the possible
dangers; hence I support fluoridation because it is the cheapest and easiest way to make sure
every child reaps the benefits. An opponent might argue, 'Though the evidence for the benefits of
fluoridation is substantial, there is some doubt about it. Since fluoridation is not necessary for
good teeth, we should forego the benefits if there is some slight chance of harm. Some scientists
claim that a small percentage of the population could be harmed by fluoride. Therefore I oppose
fluoridation of water supplies and favor the voluntary use of fluoride tablets by those who want
to take them.'

Both arguments consider the scientific evidence concerning fluoridation, but differ in their
assessments of the social benefits and costs. This difference is not between rationality and
irrationality but is a legitimate difference in values, for example, the positive value placed on
good teeth, the negative value placed on possible health risks, and the social benefits or costs of
compulsory or voluntary intake of fluorides.

From the sociological point of view, opposition to fluoridation is not necessarily irrational.
Rather, claims to rationality and to scientific authority are better seen as part of a strategy to
promote fluoridation than as incontrovertible statements of fact. Second, social values are likely
to be bound up in any decision about fluoridation, so this is not an issue on which declarations by
scientific experts ought to be considered the final word.

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. The optimum amount of fluorine in fluoridated water is calculated partly according to

A how hot the area is.

B how warm the water is.

C how many dental problems there are in the community.

D how much fluorine the community chooses to have in its water.

28. One reason given by the writer for opposing fluoridation is that

A it may contribute to tooth decay

B it will be unacceptably expensive for the public.

C obligatory fluoridation takes away personal freedom.

D excessive fluoride could be added to the water by mistake.

29. The writer mentions Kuhn in order to

A provide a contrast with the view of Collins.

B support the rational nature of scientific inquiry.

C demonstrate that Kuhn did not argue his case adequately.

D show that science can be influenced by non-scientific considerations

30. What did Sutton's research discover about earlier studies in North America?

A There were failings in the way they were carried out.

B The scientists involved had achieved unique results.

C Proponents of fluoridation had not understood its long-term effects.

D Fluoridation had a greater effect on tooth decay than previously believed.

31. In the last paragraph, what does the writer say about scientists?
A They should reveal their true motivations.

B They should not decide the fluoridation policy.

C They are solely concerned with scientific truths.

D They cannot reach agreement on the fluoridation issue.

Questions 32-35
Do the following statements agree with the views of the writer in Reading Passage?

In boxes 32-35 on your answer sheet, write

YES. if the statement agrees with the views of the writer

NO. if the statement contradicts the views of the writer

NOT GIVEN. if it is impossible to say what the writer thinks about this

32. Scientific knowledge should be kept separate from social values.

33. Many sociologists have disregarded the doubts that some scientists have
concerning fluoridation.

34. Sutton's findings have been given insufficient attention by scientists outside
of North America.

35. There are valid arguments on both sides of the fluoridation debate.

Questions 36-40
Complete each sentence with the correct ending. A-G.

Write the correct letter. A-G, in boxes 36-40 on your answer sheet.
The traditional view of science is that 36.

A sociological view of science argues that 37.

Collins is of the opinion that 38.

The writer suggests that a supporter of fluoridation may conclude that 39.

The writer suggests that an opponent of fluoridation may conclude that 40.

A. the results of scientific research are not always understood at first

B. if it is impossible to say what the writer thinks about this

C. people should be able to choose whether they want fluoride.

D. there is insufficient proof to support a cautious approach.

E. the serious damage fluoride causes far outweighs any positive effects.

F. children are not the only ones who benefit from fluoridation.

G scientific knowledge is affected by the beliefs of everyone concerned.

.

TEST 2

Learning to Walk
These days the feet of a typical city dweller rarely encounter terrain any more uneven than a
crack in the pavement. While that may not seem like a problem, it turns out that by flattening our
urban environment we have put ourselves at risk of a surprising number of chronic illnesses and
disabilities. Fortunately, the commercial market has come to the rescue with a choice of
products. Research into the idea that flat floors could be detrimental to our health was pioneered
back in the late 1960s in Long Beach, California. Podiatrist Charles Brantingham and
physiologist Bruce Beekman were concerned with the growing epidemic of high blood pressure,
varicose veins and deep-vein thromboses and reckoned they might be linked to the uniformity of
the surfaces that we tend to stand and walk on.

The trouble, they believed, was that walking continuously on flat floors, sidewalks and streets
concentrates forces on just a few areas of the foot. As a result, these surfaces are likely to be far
more conducive to chronic stress syndromes than natural surfaces, where the foot meets the
ground in a wide variety of orientations. They understood that the anatomy of the foot parallels
that of the human hand - each having 26 bones, 33 joints and more than 100 muscles, tendons
and ligaments - and that modern lifestyles waste all this potential flexibility.

Brantingham and Beekman became convinced that the damage could be rectified by making
people wobble. To test their ideas, they got 65 factory workers to try standing on a variable
terrain floor - spongy mats with varying degrees of resistance across the surface. This modest
irregularity allowed the soles of the volunteers' feet to deviate slightly from the horizontal each
time they shifted position. As the researchers hoped, this simple intervention made a huge
difference, within a few weeks. Even if people were wobbling slightly, it activated a host of
muscles in their legs, which in turn helped pump blood back to their hearts. The muscle action
prevented the pooling of blood in their feet and legs, reducing the stress on the heart and
circulation. Yet decades later, the flooring of the world's largest workplaces remains relentlessly
smooth. Earlier this year, however, the idea was revived when other researchers in the US
announced findings from a similar experiment with people over 60. John Fisher and colleagues
at the Oregon Research Institute in Eugene designed a mat intended to replicate the effect of
walking on cobblestones*.

In tests funded by the National Institute of Aging, they got some 50 adults to walk on the toots in
their bare feet for less than an hour, three times a week. After 16 weeks, these people showed
marked improvements in mobility, and even a significant reduction in blood pressure. People in a
control group who walked on ordinary floors also improved but not as dramatically. The mats are
now available for purchase and production is being scaled up. Even so, demand could exceed
supply if this footstimulating activity really is a 'useful nonpharmacological approach for
preventing or controlling hypertension of older adults, as the researchers believe. They are not
alone in recognising the benefits of cobblestones. Reflexologists have long advocated walking on
textured surfaces to stimulate so-called 'acupoints' on the soles of the feet. They believe that
pressure applied to particular spots on the foot connects directly to particular organs of the body
and somehow enhances their function. In China, spas, apartment blocks and even factories
promote their cobblestone paths as healthful amenities. Fisher admits he got the concept from
regular visits to the country. Here, city dwellers take daily walks along cobbled paths for five or
ten minutes, perhaps several times a day, to improve their health. The idea is now taking off in
Europe too.
People in Germany, Austria and Switzerland can now visit 'barefoot parks' and walk along 'paths
of the senses - with mud, logs, stone and moss underfoot. And it is not difficult to construct your
own path with simple everyday objects such as stones or bamboo poles. But if none of these
solutions appeal, there is another option. A new shoe on the market claims to transform flat,
hard, artificial surfaces into something like uneven ground. 'These shoes have an unbelievable
effect,' says Benno Nigg, an exercise scientist at Calgary University in Canada.

Known as the Masai Barefoot Technology, the shoes have rounded soles that cause you to rock
slightly when you stand still, exercising the small muscles around the ankle that are responsible
for stability. Forces in the joint are reduced, putting less strain on the system, Nigg claims.

Some of these options may not appeal to all consumers and there is a far simpler alternative.

If the urban environment is detrimental to our health, then it is obvious where we should turn. A
weekend or even a few hours spent in the countryside could help alleviate a sufferer's aches and
pains, and would require only the spending of time.

However, for many modern citizens, the countryside is not as accessible as it once was and is in
fact a dwindling resource. Our concrete cities are growing at a terrifying rate - perhaps at the
same rate as our health problems.

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

In boxes 1-5 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

1. Brantingham and Beekman were the first researchers to investigate the

relationship between health problems and flat floors.

2. The subjects in Fisher's control group experienced a decline in their physical

condition.
3. The manufacturers are increasing the number of cobblestone mats they are
making.

4. Fisher based his ideas on what he saw during an overseas trip.

5. The Masai Barefoot Technology shoes are made to fit people of all ages.

Questions 6-8
Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D.

Write the correct letter in boxes 6-8 on your answer sheet.

6. The writer suggests that Brantingham and Beekman's findings were

A ignored by big companies.

B doubted by other researchers.

C applicable to a narrow range of people.

D surprising to them.
7. What claim is made by the designers of the cobblestone mats"?

A They need to be used continuously in order to have a lasting effect.

B They would be as beneficial to younger people as to older peopl

C They could be an effective alternative to medical intervention.

D Their effects may vary depending on individual users.

Questions 9-14
Complete the summary below.

Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage for each answer.

Write your answers in boxes 9-14 on your answer sheet.

In their research, Brantingham and Beekman looked at the complex physical of the foot
and noted that the surfaces of modem environments restrict its movement. They invented a mat
which they tried out on factory workers. Whenever the workers walked on it, the different levels

of in the mat would encourage greater muscle action. In turn, this lessened the effect

of on the cardiovascular system.

Similar research was undertaken by John Fisher and colleagues in Oregon. As a result of their
findings, they decided to market cobblestone mats to the elderly as a means of dealing

with . Reflexologists claim that by manipulating specific parts of the feet, the

performance of certain will also improve. Finally, Benno Nigg at Calgary University

believes that specially shaped on shoes should give health benefits.

PART2

Australian artist Margaret Preston

Margaret Preston's vibrant paintings and prints of Australian flowers, animals and landscapes
have delighted the Australian public since the early 1920s.

Margaret Preston was born Margaret Rose McPherson in Port Adelaide, South Australia in 1875,
the daughter of David McPherson, a Scottish marine engineer and his wife Prudence Lyle. She
and her sister were sent at first to a private school, but when family circumstances changed, her
mother took the girls to Sydney where Margaret attended a public high school. She decided early
in life to become an artist and took private art lessons. In 1888, she trained for several months
with Sydney landscape painter William Lister, and in 1893 enrolled at the National Gallery of
Victoria Art School, where she studied for just over four years.

In 1898, after her father died, Margaret returned to Adelaide to study and then teach at the
Adelaide School of Design. Her early artwork was influenced by the German aesthetic tradition,
in which subjects of the natural world were depicted in a true to life manner.

Margaret's first visit to Europe in 1904, and her studies in Paris, France had little impact on this
naturalism that dominated her work from this early period. However some eight years later, after
returning to Paris, she began to recognise the decorative possibilities of art.
With the outbreak of the First World War, Margaret traveled to England, where she had
exhibitions and continued her studies of art. She was a student of pottery, but at some time
developed her interest in various techniques of printmaking and design. In England's West
Country, she taught basket weaving at a rehabilitation unit for servicemen. It was on board a boat
returning to Australia that she met wealthy businessman William Preston, whom she married in
1919. Together Margaret and William settled in the Sydney harbourside suburb of Mosman. The
most characteristic prints from her early years in Sydney are views of boats floating on Sydney
Harbour and of houses clustered on foreshore hills. Although Sydney was their home, the couple
traveled regularly, both overseas and within Australia.

Her first major showing in Australia was with her friend Thea Proctor, in exhibitions in
Melbourne and Sydney in 1925. Many of Preston's prints were hand-coloured in rich scarlet reds,
blues and greens, and all of them were set in Chinese red lacquer frames. Harbour views were
again prominent, but in comparison with earlier artworks, they were compact and busy. using
striking contrasts of black and white combined with elaborate patterns and repetitions. Other
prints from this period featured native flora. It was with these still-life subjects that she
convinced the public that Australian native flowers were equal in beauty to any exotic species.

From 1932 to 1939, Preston moved away from Sydney and lived with her husband at Berowra,
on the upper reaches of the Hawkesbury River. The area was one of rugged natural beauty, and
for the first time Preston found herself living in a home surrounded bush. Prior to this, the native
flowers that featured in her paintings and prints had been purchased from local florists; they now
grew in abundance around her home. Preston's prints became larger, less complex and less reliant
on the use of bright colours. Flowers were no longer arranged in vases, and Preston began to
concentrate instead on flowers that were growing wild.

While living at Berowra, and undoubtedly prompted by the Aboriginal' rock engravings found
near her property, Preston also developed what was to he a lifelong interest in Aboriginal art. On
returning to Sydney in 1939, she became a member of the Anthropological Society of New South
Wales, and later visited many important Aboriginal sites throughout Australia. Preston believed
that Aboriginal art provided the key to establishing a national body of art that reflected the vast
and ancient continent of Australia.

During the 1940s, symbols used by Aboriginal people, together with dried, burnt colours found
in traditional Aboriginal paintings, became increasingly prominent in her prints. The artist's titles
from this period frequently acknowledge her sources, and reveal the extent to which she drew
inspiration from traditional Aboriginal art to create her own art.

It was in 1953, at the age of 78, that Preston produced her most significant prints. The exhibition
at Macquarie Galleries in Sydney included 29 prints made using the ancient technique known as
stenciling. Many of the artworks in the exhibition incorporated her fusion of Aboriginal and
Chinese concepts. Preston had admired Chinese art since 1915, when she acquired the first of her
many books on the subject, and she had visited China on two occasions. Chinese elements may
be found in several of her earlier paintings.
However, in her prints of the 1950s, Preston combined Chinese ideas with her understanding of
the Dreamtime' creation stories of Aboriginal Australians. Preston did not let age alter her habit
of working hard. As she got older, her love of painting, printmaking and travel continued. By the
time of her death in 1963, when she was 88, she had produced over 400 paintings and prints. In a
career spanning almost 60 years, she created a body of work that demonstrates her extraordinary
originality and the intensity of her commitment to Australian art.

Questions 15-21
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage?

In boxes 15-21 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

15. Artists in the German aesthetic tradition portrayed nature realistically.

16. Margaret attended a famous art college in Paris.

17. Margaret met her husband William while teaching a craft at a rehabilitation
unit.

18. Margaret Preston and Thea Proctor explored similar themes in their art.

19. Margaret's 1925 artworks of Sydney Harbour were simpler than her previous
ones.

20. The colours in Margaret's Berowra prints were very bright.

21. When living in Berowra, Margaret painted flowers in their natural location.

Questions 22-27
Complete the notes below.

Choose ONE WORD AND/OR A NUMBER from the passage for each answer.

Write your answers in boxes 22-27 on your answer sheet.

Margaret Preston's later life

Aboriginal influence

 interest in Aboriginal art was inspired by seeing rock engravings close to her Berowra home

 incorporated and colours from Aboriginal art in her own work often referred to

Aboriginal sources in the she gave her artworks

1953 exhibition

 very old method of was used for some prints

 was inspired by about Chinese art that she had started collecting in 1915
 combination of Chinese and Aboriginal elements

Old age

 still interested in and art

 worked for nearly six decades making more than artworks

 dedicated n to Australian art and the originality of her work is seen in Preston's long career

TEST 3

Mind Music
Scientists investigate 'earworms', the music we can't get out of our head

A Ever had a song stuck in your head, playing on an endless loop? Scientists call them

'involuntary musical images', or 'earworms, and a wave of new research is shining light on why
they occur and what can be learned from them. Some neuroscientists and cognitive psychologists
are studying earworms to explore the mysteries of memory and the part of the brain that is
beyond our conscious control. The idea that we have full control over our thought processes is an
illusion,' says psychologist Lauren Stewart, who founded the master's program in music, mind
and brain at Goldsmiths, University of London, UK, where recent research has taken place.
Researchers haven't been able to watch what happens in the brain when earworms occur, because
they happen unpredictably. Much of what is known about them comes from surveys,
questionnaires, diaries and lab experiments.

B A Goldsmiths study published in the journal Memory and Cognition this year showed that the
singing we hear in our heads tends to be true to actual recordings. Researchers had 17 volunteers
tap to the beat of any earworm they heard during a four-day period while a device attached to
their wrist recorded their movements. The tapping tempos were within 10% of the tempos of the
original recordings. Another Goldsmiths study, published this year in Consciousness and
Cognition, found that people who report hearing earworms often, and find them most intrusive,
have slightly different brain structures, with more gray matter in areas associated with processing
emotions.

C Studies also show that the music in our heads often starts playing during times of 'low
cognitive load', such as while showering, getting dressed, walking, or doing chores. Dr Stewart
likens earworms to 'sonic screen savers' that keep the mind entertained while it is otherwise
unoccupied. She and her colleagues tested that theory by having volunteers listen to songs and
giving them various tasks afterwards. The volunteers who sat idly for the next five minutes were
the most likely to report hearing the music m their heads. Dr Stewart observed that the more
challenging the activity, the less likely the volunteers were to hear the music. Diary studies also
show songs tend to match people's moods and therefore they are not random. If you are
energized and upbeat, an earworm that occurs is likely to be uptempo too.

D Songs the brain fixates on are usually those it has been exposed to recently, surveys show,
which is why tunes getting heavy radio play frequently top the earworm charts. Even tunes you
may have heard but didn't pay attention to can worm their way into your subconscious, says Ira
Hyman, a psychologist at Western Washington University in Bellingham, USA. In an
unpublished study there, participants who listened to music while doing other tasks were more
likely to report that the songs returned as earworms later on, compared with participants who
simply listened.

E Some earworms are just fragments of a song that repeat like a broken record. So, when the
mind hits a part of a song it can't remember, it loops back rather than moving on. That could
make an earworm even more entrenched, Dr Hyman says. According to a theory known as the
Zeigarik effect, named for a Soviet psychologist, Bluma Zeigarnik, unfinished thoughts and
activities weigh on the mind more heavily than those that are completed, although experiments
exposing students to interrupted songs have yielded mixed results.

F Researchers say they can't pinpoint a spot in the brain where earworms live. Imaging studies
by Andrea Halpern at Bucknell University, in Lewisburg, USA, have shown that deliberately
imagining music and actually listening to music activate many of the same neurological
networks. Dr Halpern's earlier studies showed that when subjects listened to the first few notes of
familiar music, areas in the right frontal and superior temporal portions of the brain became
activated, along with the supplementary motor area at the top, which is typically involved in
remembering sequences. When the same subjects listened to unfamiliar music and were asked to
recall it, there was activity in the left frontal portions of the brain instead.

G One factor that makes some songs stick might be repetition. 'Repetition leads to familiarity
which leads to anticipation, which is satisfied by hearing the song,' says John Seabrook, author
of The Song Machine: Inside the Hit Factory, about how producers pump pop songs full of aural
"hooks', the punchy melodic phrases designed to target the brain and leave it wanting more. The
researchers are comparing the melodic structure of 100 often-mentioned songs with 100 similarly
popular songs that weren't cited as earworms, to assess the difference. Songs with earworm
potential appear to share certain features: a repeating pattern of ups and downs in pitch, and an
irregular musical interval.

H The researchers plan next to test their results in reverse, and play ringtones from songs of both
the earworm and non earworm variety for volunteers several times a day to see which ones get
stuck. Drs Stewart and Halper are now working together to recruit survey participants for a study
looking at whether people at different stages of life experience earworms differently. 'You can
argue that older people might get them more often because they know more songs,' Dr Halpern
says. 'But the few responses we have so far indicate that they have earworms less often. It could
be that they don't play music as often as younger people do.

Questions 28-31
The reading Passage has eight paragraphs, A-H.

Which paragraph contains the following information?

Write the correct letter, A-H, in boxes 28-31 on your answer sheet.

A. A

B. B

C. C
 D. D

E. E

F. F

G G
.

H. H

28. a description of the characteristics common to songs with earworms

29. a justitication for research into earworms

30. a description of the brain's reaction to known and unknown songs

31. details of proposed research into the frequency with which earworms occur
indifferent age groups

Questions 32-35
Complete the summary below.

Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage for each answer.

Write your answers in boxes 32-35 on your answer sheet.

Researchers from Goldsmiths concluded that the music we imagine in our minds is quite similar
to recordings. They proved this by asking volunteers to record the rhythm of music using a

monitor on their . Further research has demonstrated that those who hear earworms more
frequently have brains that may deal with differently from other people, Dr Stewart also

believes that the brain is by earworms when it is not focused on a task. In fact, a

reduction in the occurrence of earworms was found to be directly related to how the task
was Interestingly, volunteers' diaries revealed that the songs they heard inside their head
reflected their moods, so the choice of music is not accidental.

Questions 36-40
Look at the following statements and the list of researcher below.

Match each statement with the correct person, A, B, C or D.

Write the correct letter. A, B, C or D, in boxes 36-40 on your answer sheet.

NB You may use any letter more than once.

36. Some musicians create music that is intentionally memorable.

37. People are unable to completely regulate how they think.

38. We can remember songs without knowing that we have heard them.

39. Thinking about music has a similar effect on the brain to hearing music.

40. Earworms are more persistent when only a short section of the song is constantly
replayed.

List of Researchers

A. Lauren Stewart
B. Ira Hyman

C. Andrea Haiper

D. John Seabrook