The seemingly simple question of “what defines a sport?

” has been the fodder for

argument and conversation for years, among professional and armchair athletes alike. There
seems to be no doubt that vigorous and highly competitive activities such as baseball, football,
and soccer are truly “sports,” but when the subject of other activities such as darts, chess, and
shuffleboard is broached we find ourselves at the heart of a controversy.

If say, billiards, is not a sport, then what exactly is it? Those who would dispute it to be a
sport would respond that it is a simple leisure activity. They would go on to claim a true sport
first and foremost requires some form of physical exertion. More to the point, if a player does not
break a sweat, what he or she plays is not a sport. Beyond that, more important criteria would be
the need for decent hand-eye coordination, and the ever-present possibility of sustaining injury.
Billiards only fits one of those specifications (hand-eye coordination), so according to the
doubters, it is not a real sport.

To help resolve this dispute, the first text to consult would have to be the dictionary.
According to one dictionary, a sport is defined as “a diversion” or a “recreation.” Assuming one
strictly adheres to the simple guidelines laid out in that definition, it would seem that almost any
activity that provides enjoyment could be classified as a sport. And if, according to the
dictionary, watching a sport on television is a sport itself, I guess that would make a couch potato
an athlete. Play ball!

Annunziata, M. A. & Team. (2004). 501 Critical Reading Questions. New York:
LearningExpress.

1. According to the criteria given in paragraph 2, all of the following would be considered a
“true” sport, EXCEPT…
A. Cheerleading
B. Skiing
C. Race car driving
D. Horse shoes
E. Gymnastics

Traditional body signage seems largely to have disappeared. Well, many of the old
symbols and names are still around, of course, but they are part of the commercial range of
options. Seeing someone in a Harvard or Oxford sweatshirt or a kilt or a military tie now
communicates nothing at all significant about that person’s life other than the personal choice of
a particular consumer. Religious signs are still evocative, to be sure, but are far less common
than they used to be. Why should this be? I suspect one reason may be that we have lost a sense
of significant connection to the various things indicated by such signs. Proclaiming our high
school or university or our athletic team or our community has a much lower priority nowadays,
in part because we live such rapidly changing lives in a society marked by constant motion that
the stability essential to confer significance on such signs has largely gone.
 But we still must attach ourselves to something. Lacking the conviction that the
traditional things matter, we turn to the last resort of the modern world: the market. Here there is
a vast array of options, all equally meaningless in terms of traditional values, all equally
important in identifying the one thing left to us for declaring our identity publicly, our fashion
sense and disposable income. The market naturally manipulates the labels, making sure we keep
purchasing what will most quickly declare us excellent consumers. If this year a Chicago Bulls
jacket or Air Jordan shoes are so popular that we are prepared to spend our way into a trendy
identity, then next year there will be something else

Annunziata, M. A. & Team. (2004). 501 Critical Reading Questions. New York:
LearningExpress.

2. The author would agree with all the following statements EXCEPT…
A. In today’s society, being trendy is more important than keeping tradition.
B. A person wearing a New York Yankees baseball hat is not necessarily a fan of the
team or a resident of New York.
C. Pride in our school or community is not as strong today as it was years ago.
D. You can tell a lot about somebody by what they are wearing.
E. The last resort of the modern world is the marketplace.

Local legends say that Borneo’s few thousand wild elephants are descendants from those
brought to an Island from India or Malaysia as a gift to a sultan in the eighteenth century.
Biologists from Columbia University’s Centre for Environmental Research and Conservation
compared DNA samples from Borneo elephants with Asian elephants in Sumatra, India and
elsewhere. Findings confirmed their (1)_______: Borneo’s elephants are genetically different. In
fact, the DNA (2)_______ are so great between them and their closest relatives (elephants in
Peninsular Malaysia) that the populations may have separated up to 300,000 years ago, say the
scientists. The animals become isolated when the island became totally cut off from the mainland
due to a rise in sea level. Borneo’s elephants are, therefore, an important, separate population.

3. Judging from the information provided in the paragraph, which of the following
statements is accurate?
A. It was believed that people gave elephants from Borneo Island to a sultan in the 18th
century.
B. Borneo elephants are unique.
C. The DNA of Borneo's elephants is very similar with the elephants in Peninsular
Malaysia.
D. The research by Biologists from Columbia University’s Centre was unproven.
E. Legends say that Borneo’s elephant came from Borneo Island itself.
 Recently, vegetarian diets have experienced an increase in popularity. A vegetarian diet is
associated with many health benefits because of its higher content of fiber, folic acid, vitamins C
and E, potassium, magnesium, and many phytochemicals and a fat content that is more
unsaturated. Compared with other vegetarian diets, vegan diets tend to contain less saturated fat
and cholesterol and more dietary fiber. Vegans tend to be thinner, have lower serum cholesterol,
and lower blood pressure, reducing their risk of heart disease.

However, eliminating all animal products from the diet increases the risk of certain
nutritional ______. Micronutrients of special concern for the vegan include vitamins B-12 and D,
calcium, and log-chain n-3 (omega-3) fatty acids. Unless vegans regularly consume foods that
are fortified with these nutrients, appropriate supplements should be consumed. In some cases,
iron and zinc status of vegans may also be of concern because of the limited bioavailability of
these minerals.

The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, Volume 89, Issue 5,

May 2009, Pages 1627S–1633S

4. According to the passage, vegan diets ....

A. contain a lot of iron and zinc
B. raise blood pressure
C. lack of folic acid
D. include vitamins B-12 and D
E. have more unsaturated fats

Planting a garden is a lot like having a family. A plant becomes dependent on the
gardener and begs for water on a hot summer day. Gardeners also have to clean up the space
around their plants as they shed spent petals, as they require pruning, and as they become choked
with weeds. Gardeners also provide for the health of their plants through insecticide and fertilizer
applications. A gardener’s responsibility for his or her plants lessens as they die at the end of the
season or they go into winter dormancy. Like gardeners, parents find their children dependent
upon them for food and nourishment. Like gardeners, parents are constantly picking up after
their children, as toys and clothes are scattered throughout the house. Like gardeners, parents
provide for the nourishment and well-being of their Accuplacer Reading Review children with
vitamin supplements, food, and medicines. However, unlike gardeners, parents will find that
their responsibility lessens as the child grows, but it does not come to an end.

5. According to the passage, the main difference between gardeners and parents is ….
A. Gardeners have to clean up spent petals, prune, and week unlike parents.
B. Plants become dependent on gardeners for water on hot summer days.
C. Gardeners have to apply insecticide and fertilizer unlike parents.
 D. Unlike gardeners, parents have to provide children with vitamin supplements,
food,and medicines.
E. Gardeners’ responsibilities never lessens year after year unlike parents who will
enjoy decreasing responsibility with advancing years.

From savoring a piece of cake to hugging a friend, many of life’s pleasures trigger a
similar reaction in the brain–a surge of dopamine, the “feel-good” chemical. Recent research
suggests this reward circuit may do much more than make us smile.

Researchers implanted skin and lung cancer cells in mice, then stimulated the dopamine-
releasing neurons in the ventral tegmental area (VTA) of their brains. The rush of dopamine
disabled a group of cells that promote tumor growth. That allowed the immune system to
respond more effectively to the tumors, which were 40 to 52 percent smaller and lower in weight
in mice that received VTA stimulation than in those that didn’t. “By artificially activating the
VTA,” says the study’s co-author, Asya Rolls of Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, “we
can affect the nervous system and, in turn, the immune system.”

Moreover, the researchers explain, once the immune system is activated in this way, it
appears to create a “memory” of the foreign agents to which it has been exposed, allowing it to
respond more efficiently to them in the future.

Rolls doesn’t believe that positive thinking alone can cure cancer, but the study’s author
hope that cancer patients might someday receive brain stimulation as an add-on therapy that
could, in turn, reduce the need for traditional treatments such as chemotherapy and radiation.

Source: “Feeling Good Could Slow Tumor Growth”. Reader’s Digest. Aug. 2019: 34. Print.

6. In which paragraph does the author discuss about immune reaction to the tumors?
A. 4
B. 3
C. 2
D. 1
E. none of the paragraphs above

Geothermal energy is natural heat from the interior of the Earth that is converted to heat
buildings and generate electricity. The idea of harnessing Earth’s internal heat is not new. As
early as 1904, geothermal power was used in Italy. Today, Earth’s natural internal heat is being
used to generate electricity in 121 countries, including Russia, Japan, New Zaeland, Iceland,
Mexico, Ethiopia, Guatemala, El Savador, the Phillipines, and the United States. Total
worldwide production is approaching 9,000 MW (equivalent to nine large modern coal-burning
or nuclear power plants)–double the amount in 1980. Some 40 million people today receive their
electricity from geothermal energy at a cost competitive with that of other energy sources. In El
Savador, geothermal energy is supplying 30% of the total energy used. However, at the global
level, geothermal energy supplies less than 0.15% of the total energy supply.

Geothermal energy may be considered a non-renewable energy source when rates of

extraction are greater than the rates of natural replenishment. However, geothermal energy has
its origin in the natural heat production within Earth, and only a small fraction of the vast total
resource base is being utilized today. Although most geothermal energy production involves the
tapping of high heat resources, people are also using the low-temperature geothermal energy of
groundwater in some applications.

7. What is true about geothermal energy production worldwide?

A. Only countries in the Southern Hemisphere are using geothermal energy on a large
scale.
B. As it is a new idea, very few countries are developing geothermal energy sources.
C. Geothermal energy is now used in a large scale in a global level.
D. Geothermal energy is already being used in a number of nations, but it is not yet a
major source of power.
E. Until the cost of geothermal energy becomes competitive, it will not be used
globally.

In fall 1994, Ford introduced the Ford Contour and Mercury Mystique in the United
States–the same basic mid-size car it introduced in Europe in 1993 under the name of Mondeo.
Intended to be Ford’s world car, it took six years to develop at a cost of $6 billion–twice what
Ford spent to develop its vastly successful Taurus and four times more than Chrysler spent on its
Dodge/Plymouth Neon. Ford insisted that by developing and producing a single basic car for
Europe and the United States, it saved about 25 percent of developing and producing a separate
car for each side of the Atlantic, as it had done in the past. Consumer tastes had converged
sufficiently, according to Ford, ...[15] a single car would find lots of buyers everywhere, just as
one menu is working around the world for McDonald’s. Building a world car is a most ambitious
undertaking; in the past, only Volkswagen’s classic Beetle and Toyota’s Corolla have come close
to succeeding.

For the exterior design, Ford commissioned clay models from its design studios in
California, Michigan, England, and Italy–from which it developed a consensus model. After
showing the model to consumer clinics in the United States, Ford chose to change the front and
rear styling and put a larger trunk and more chrome on the U.S. version of the car. Still, the
European and American versions have 75 percent of their parts in common. This was a far cry
from Ford’s previous unsuccessful attempt in 1981 to build a common car for Europe and the
United States (the Escort), which resulted in one of the grandest corporate foul-ups ever and led
to European and American models that shared only two insignificant parts. Indeed, many experts
still feel that a common car for the world market violated the basic marketing wisdom of the
1990s to get closer to customers. Ford, however, was confident that consumer tastes had
converged sufficiently during the previous decade as to ensure the success of its world car.

8. Which of the following statements is true based on the passage?

A. Chrysler spent four times longer than Ford’s Contour and Mercury to develop the
price of its car.
B. Ford chose to change the front and rear styling and put a larger trunk and less
chrome on the U.S. version of the car.
C. The European and American versions of the car diverse by 25 percent.
D. Ford succeeded in building a common car for Europe and the United States in 1981.
E. Ford was not sure about consumer tastes.

The most popular festival in Japan takes place from 1st-3rd January, and is called
Ganjitsu, which means ‘the beginning of the year’. People believe that good or bad luck in the
first few days of the year represents the luck you will have for the rest of the year. Ganjitsu is
celebrated by ceremonial house cleaning, feasting, and by the exchanging of visits and presents.
Most people put up special decorations at the entrance to their houses to keep out evil spirits. The
main decoration is a sacred rope decorated with ferns, oranges, and lobster. All of these things
are thought to bring good fortune, prosperity, and long life. Finally, no celebration is complete
without mochi cake and zoni soup. Both the cake and the soup are made from traditional recipes.

9. People in Japan does NOT celebrate Ganjitsu Festival by….

A. exchanging presents
B. visiting others
C. eating mochi cake and zoni soup
D. throwing a feast
E. cooking international foods

In recent years, snails have gone from garden dweller and French appetizer to practically
a worldwide skin-care ingredient: Their mucin (the slime they trail in their wake) forms the
foundation for a recent wave of hyperpopular creams, masks, and serums.

Most of the snail mucin used for skin care involves the Cryptomphalus aspersa species,
a.k.a. the common garden snail. If you’ve ever tried snail-slime products and noticed your skin
looking extra supple and glowy, you are not imagining it.

Dermatologists state that snail mucin seals in moisture and allows active ingredients to
penetrate the skin very well. The mucous is rich in hyaluronic acid, and has been shown to
exhibit antioxidant activities, stimulate collagen production, and enhance wound healing.
 If the only thing holding you back from trying snail-slime beauty products (besides the
ick factor) is concern for snail welfare, don’t worry. Harvesting the slime involves having the
nocturnal snails crawl around a mesh net in a darkened room for 30 minutes at a time, then
transferred back to their natural habitat to rest. The snails are never harmed, and their
moisturizing slime is then collected and pasteurized for the bottle.

Source: Keong, Lori. “What Does Snail Slime Actually Do for Your Skin?” Aug. 21, 2018. New
York Magazine Web. Nov, 7. 2019.

10. The slime harvesting process does NOT include …

A. putting the snails into a darkened room
B. letting the snails crawl around for a couple hours
C. pasteurizing the slime
D. sending the snails back to their natural habitat
E. collecting the slime

Joker, a glimpse into the life of Batman’s psychotic arch-nemesis, has somehow become
one of the most-reviled and most-defended movies of the year, weeks before being released in
theaters. (It comes out on October 4.)

Starring Joaquin Phoenix and directed by Todd Phillips, the movie has already been
deemed dangerous by its vocal critics. To some of the movie’s fans, those critical reviews and
negative reactions are just another examples of social justice warrior overreach.

What’s most striking about this nascent debate is that the only people who have seen the
movie so far are select film critics and festivalgoers. But most of the conversation surrounding
Joker is among those who haven’t seen it.

It’s a testament to the iconic supervillain’s popularity that the movie’s two trailers have
ignited a full-blown fight about the movie. The character’s depravity and ghastliness are what
make him Batman’s greatest foe. Those same qualities instill fear and disgust among his most
vocal critics, especially when the evils of our reality have slowly shifted in that direction.

But the fight over Joker is not just about the film but about how we watch movies today,
how we discuss their value, and our tendency to think about movies in a way that is at odds with
the very existence of the art itself.

Source: Abad-Santos, Alex. “The fight over Joker and the new movie’s ‘dangerous’ message,
explained.”

Sep. 25, 2019. Vox Web. Oct. 21, 2019.

11. In which paragraph does the author mention Joker’s trait?

A. 5
 B. 4
C. 3
D. 2
E. 1

A new way of removing carbon dioxide from a stream of air could provide a significant
tool in the battle against climate change. The new system can work on the gas at virtually any
concentration level, even down to the roughly 400 parts per million currently found in the
atmosphere.

Most methods of removing carbon dioxide from a stream of gas require higher
concentrations, such as those found in the flue (1)____ from fossil fuel-based power plants. A
few variations have been developed that can work with the low concentrations found in air, but
the new method is significantly less energy-intensive and expensive, the researchers say.

The technique, based on passing air through a stack of charged electrochemical plates, is
described in a new paper in the journal Energy and Environmental Science, by MIT postdoc
Sahag Voskian, who developed the work during his PhD, and T. Alan Hatton, the Ralph Landau
Professor of Chemical Engineering.

The device is essentially a large, specialized battery that absorbs carbon dioxide from the
air (or other gas (2)____) passing over its electrodes as it is being charged up, and then releases
the gas as it is being discharged. In operation, the device would simply alternate between
(3)____, with fresh air or feed gas being blown through the system during the charging cycle,
and then the pure, concentrated carbon dioxide being blown out during the discharging.

Source: sciencedaily

12. The passage explains the idea that removing carbon dioxide ….
A. requires small concentrations
B. occurs when the device is not charging
C. uses a battery-based device
D. requires fossil-fuel
E. is an ineffective way to fight climate change

Nobody will ever give you any grades for your level of self-discipline. There’s no finish
line and there’s no podium for the winners. The only purpose of building self-discipline is to
conquer yourself—your own urges, your own weaknesses, and your own self-sabotaging
behaviors.

It’s easy to forget this fact and assume that when you reach your goals, you’re done. In
fact, the moment you make your dreams come true isn’t the most important moment. It’s
important, no doubt, but without the process leading to it, in itself it means little.
 The most important moments are the moments of struggle, when you’re striving to fight
even when you can barely stand and the whole world is spinning around you. It’s this very act
that proves your mettle and showers you with life-encompassing benefits, not the act of winning
in itself.

Whenever you find yourself frustrated that you’re still a long way from the finish line,
remember that it’s right now, at this very moment, that you’re collecting the biggest rewards. It’s
the struggle in itself that improves you and makes you a more successful person.

Meadows, Martin. 365 Days with Self-Discipline. 2017.

p.s. I know you’re all working hard. Pull out all the stops for your dream university

13. In which paragraph does the author discuss about taking small steps to progress?
A. 1
B. 2
C. 3
D. 4
E. None of the paragraphs

The Moon has been worshipped by primitive people and has inspired humans to create
everything from lunar calendars to love sonnets, but what do we really know about it? The most
accepted theory about the origin of the Moon is that it was formed of the debris from a massive
collision with the young Earth about 4.6 billion years ago. A huge body, perhaps the size of
Mars, struck the Earth, throwing out an immense amount of debris that coalesced and cooled in
orbit around the Earth.

The development of Earth is inextricably linked to the moon; the Moon’s gravitational
influence upon the Earth is the primary cause of ocean tides. In fact, the Moon has more than
twice the effect upon the tides than does the Sun. The Moon makes one rotation and completes a
revolution around the Earth every 27 days, 7 hours, and 43 minutes. This synchronous rotation is
caused by an uneven distribution of mass in the Moon (essentially, it is heavier on one side than
the other) and has allowed the Earth’s gravity to keep one side of the Moon permanently facing
Earth. It is an average distance from Earth of 384,403 km.

The Moon has no atmosphere; without an atmosphere, the Moon has nothing to protect it
from meteorite impacts, and thus the surface of the Moon is covered with impact craters, both
large and small. The Moon also has no active tectonic or volcanic activity, so the erosive effects
of atmospheric weathering, tectonic shifts, and volcanic upheavals that tend to erase and reform
the Earth’s surface features are not at work on the Moon. In fact, even tiny surface features such
as the footprint left by an astronaut in the lunar soil are likely to last for millions of years, unless
obliterated by a chance meteorite strike. The surface gravity of the Moon is about one-sixth that
of the Earth’s. Therefore, a man weighing 82 kilograms on Earth would only weigh 14 kilograms
on the Moon

The geographical features of the Earth most like that of the Moon are, in fact, places such
as the Hawaiian volcanic craters and the huge meteor crater in Arizona. The climate of the Moon
is very unlike either Hawaii or Arizona, however; in fact the temperature on the Moon ranges
between 123 degrees C. to –233 degrees C.

14. According to the passage, the Moon is ….

A. older than the Earth
B. protected by a dense atmosphere
C. composed of a few active volcanoes
D. the primary cause of Earth’s ocean tides
E. smooth by surface

Music can bring us to tears or to our feet, drive us into battle or lull us to sleep. Music is
indeed remarkable in its power over all humankind, and perhaps for that very reason, no human
culture on earth has ever lived without it. From discoveries made in France and Slovenia even
Neanderthal man, as long as 53,000 years ago, had developed surprisingly sophisticated, sweet-
sounding flutes carved from animal bones. It is perhaps then, no accident that music should
strike such a chord with the limbic system – an ancient part of our brain, evolutionarily speaking,
and one that we share with much of the animal kingdom. Some researchers even propose that
music came into this world long before the human race ever did. For example, the fact that whale
and human music have so much in common, even though our evolutionary paths have not
intersected for nearly 60 million years suggests that music may predate humans. They assert that
rather than being the inventors of music, we are latecomers to the musical scene.

Humpback whale composers employ many of the same tricks that human songwriters do.
In addition to using similar rhythms, humpbacks keep musical phrases to a few seconds, creating
themes out of several phrases before singing the next one. Whale songs in general are no longer
than symphony movements, perhaps because they have a similar attention span. Even though
they can sing over a range of seven octaves, the whales typically sing in key, spreading adjacent
notes no farther apart than a scale. They mix percussive and pure tones in pretty much the same
ratios as human composers–and follow their ABA form, in which a theme is presented,
elaborated on and then revisited in a slightly modified form. Perhaps most amazing, humpback
whale songs include repeating refrains that rhyme. It has been suggested that whales might use
rhymes for exactly the same reasons that we do: as devices to help them remember. Whale songs
can also be rather catchy. When a few humpbacks from the Indian Ocean strayed into the Pacific,
some of the whales they met there quickly changed their tunes – singing the new whales’ songs
within three short years. Some scientists are even tempted to speculate that a universal music
awaits discovery.
 15. According to the passage, which of the following is true about humpback whales?
A. Their tunes are distinctively different from human tunes.
B. Whale songs are longer than symphony movements.
C. They do not use rhyme, unlike humans.
D. They can sing over a range of seven octaves.
E. Whale songs of a particular group cannot be learned by other whales.

A new owl is the first endemic bird species discovered on the island of Lombok,
Indonesia, according to research published February 13 in the open access journal PLOS ONE
by an international team headed by George Sangster of the Swedish Museum of Natural History
and colleagues from other institutions.

The new species has long been confused with a more widespread Indonesian owl species
because of its similar plumage. However, in September 2003, two members of the team
independently discovered that the vocalizations of the owls on Lombok were unique and
different from all other Indonesian owls.

Because owls are mostly nocturnal, they use songs to communicate and recognize their
own species. Thus, when owls have consistently different vocalizations this is generally taken to
mean that they are different species. The new owl's song is a whistled note completely unlike
that of other owls. Locals on the island recognize the bird and refer to it as "burung pok," an
onomatopoeic name reflecting the song note of the bird, which sounds like "pok" or "poook," say
the authors

Based on their field work, comparisons to museum specimens and previous studies, the
researchers suggest that the new owl species is unique to this one island. When surveyed, locals
on the neighboring island of Sumbawa were unfamiliar with the bird. The researchers say, "With
one exception, none of the locals recognized the songs from playback of recordings made on
Lombok except for one man, but he was an immigrant from Lombok who knew the song only
from Lombok and had never heard it on Sumbawa."

The new species of owl is named Otus jolandae, after the wife of one of the researchers
who co-discovered the species in 2003. The authors suggest using the common name Rinjani
Scops Owl, after Gunung Rinjani, a volcano on Lombok that is the second highest volcano in
Indonesia.

Source: Public Library of Science. "New owl species discovered in Indonesia is unique to one
island.". ScienceDaily, 13 February 2013

16. Judging from the information provided in the text, which of the following statements is
accurate?
A. The new species of owl is named after the highest volcano in Indonesia.
B. Nobody had recognized the new owl’s song.
 C. The researchers didn’t recognize the owl as a new species straightaway.
D. The new species of owl hasn’t been compared with specimens from museums.
E. There had been a discovery of endemic bird species on Lombok before Rinjani
Scops Owl.

According to a research abstract that will be presented at the 23rd Annual Meeting of the
Associated Professional Sleep Societies, students who consider themselves to be evening types
(that is someone who feels more alert and does their best work later in the day) have poorer sleep
hygiene scores than morning and intermediate types. Sleep hygiene is the group of behaviors
linked to good sleep and alertness. Examples include having a regular bedtime routine, a regular
wake time, a regular bedtime, and sleeping in a comfortable bed.

The researchers found that this poor sleep hygiene was related to poorer academic
performance and a decline in grade point average (GPA) during the transition from high school
to college.

Results indicate that evening types had significantly lower first year college GPA (2.84)
than morning and intermediate types (3.18). These evening-type students showed a greater
decrease in their GPA during the transition from high school to college than their peers; their
grades dropped by .98 GPA points, while others only dropped by .69 GPA points. These evening
types also slept on average 41 minutes less than other students on school nights.

Lead author Jennifer Peszka, PhD, psychology department chair at Hendrix College in
Conway, Ark., said that many students experience deterioration in sleep hygiene during their
transition from high school to college.

The study was based on datba from 89 students (between 17 and 20 years old) preparing
to begin their freshman year and 34 of those students as they completed their freshman year at a
liberal arts college.

Authors of the study state educating high school and college students about the possible
negative effects of poor sleep ehaviors on academic performance may result in improvement in
academic performance, especially in adolescents who are at risk due to poor sleep hygiene and
evening-type status.

Source: ScienceDaily, 11 June 2009.

17. According to the text, evening type students ….

A. tend to have lower GPA on their beginning of college life
B. sleep much more often than the morning types
C. have a higher risk of developing diabetes
D. have greater GPA during the transition from high school to college than their peers
 E. are likely to faint at night.

Passage 1

There are several kinds of stories, but only one difficult kind—the humorous. The
humorous story is American; the comic story, English; the witty story, French, The humorous
story depends for its effect upon the manner of the telling; the comic story and the witty story
upon the matter. The humorous story may be spun out to great length, and may wander around as
much as it pleases, and arrive nowhere in particular; but the comic and witty stories must be brief
and end with a point. The humorous story bubbles gently along; the others burst.

Passage 2

American humor, neither transfiguringly lucid and appropriate like the French nor sharp
and sensible like the Scotch, is simply the humor of imagination. It consists in piling towers on
towers and mountains on mountains; of heaping a joke up to the stars and extending it to the end
of the world. With this distinctively American humor Bret Harte had little or nothing in common.
The wild, sky-breaking humor of America has its fine qualities, but it must in the nature of things
be deficient in two qualities, not only supremely important to life and letters, but also supremely
important to humor—reverence and sympathy. And these two qualities were knit into the closest
texture of Bret Harte’s humor.

18. Which generalization about American humor is supported by both passages?

A. It is witty and to the point.
B. It demonstrates greater sophistication than French humor.
C. It depends on a lengthy buildup.
D. It is by definition self-contradictory.
E. It depends on the subject matter for its effect.

The Florida panther, known for its distinctive characteristics, including a kinked tail and
cowlicks, is nearing extinction with the help of scientists and government officials. Though once
abundant in Florida, by the end of the twentieth century, only approximately 30 Florida panthers
remained. Efforts to preserve the panthers had focused on shielding them from human
encroachment with the hope that they could develop sustainable numbers to survive as a species.
However, pressure from development caused officials to grow impatient and shift their strategy
and goals.

In 1995, new breeds of female panthers were brought to Florida from Texas to bolster the
population. The change has been dramatic. In 1990, 88% of the panthers in Florida had the
distinct kinked tail. By 2000, five years after the introduction of the Texas panthers, not a single
kitten born to the Texas females had a kinked tail. The breed known as the Florida panther is
now on an expedited, ineluctable road to extinction—with the assistance of wildlife protection
agencies.

If the goal was to have any kind of panther in Florida, it has been realized. Since the
introduction of the Texas panthers, the panther population in Florida has risen to approximately
80 mixed-breed panthers. However, this “success” could portend a tragic trend in wildlife
management in the United States. We cannot and should not create genetically mixed species as
a means of achieving a compromise between the needs of development and a species’ survival.
This type of species tampering is a perversion of the ideal of wildlife management and will
irrevocably transform our national landscape.

19. The author suggests that blame for the extinction of Florida panthers rests chiefly upon
….
A. government officials who bowed to pressure from developers
B. developers who encroached upon protected areas
C. scientists who suggested interbreeding as a solution
D. advocates of species preservation
E. wildlife agencies that did not act sooner to protect the panther population
20. The passage suggests that the author ….
A. is a former member of the Wildlife Protection Agency
B. is willing to compromise if it means the survival of a speciesis
C. is afraid that species tampering will become the norm in wildlife preservation
management
D. believes the government has encouraged species tampering as a means of
conducting genetic experiments
E. believes that “sustainable numbers” statistics are not realistic and lead to the
expedited extinction of species