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655-705 (Hard)|   Inference|      
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Sajjad1994
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In film and television, it’s possible to induce viewers to project the 13 Feb 2019, 02:01
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C
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65% (hard)

Question Stats:

53% (01:39) correct 47% (01:52) wrong based on 553 sessions

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Note: Another question with similar stimulus but different answer choices Click Here
In film and television, it’s possible to induce viewers to project their feelings onto characters on the screen. In one study, a camera shot of a woman’s face was preceded by images of a baby. The audience thought the woman’s face registered contentment. When the same woman’s face was preceded by images of a shark attack, the audience thought the woman’s face registered fear. Television news teams must be careful to avoid such manipulation of their viewers.

Which of the following is best supported by the information in the passage?

A. Television news teams have abused their position of trust in the past.
B. The expression on the woman’s face was, in actuality, blank.
C. Images of a baby engendered feelings of happiness in the audience.
D. Audiences should strive to be less gullible.
E. The technique for manipulating audiences described in the passage would also work in a radio program that played dramatic music.
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C
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In film and television, it’s possible to induce viewers to project the 19 Feb 2019, 00:46
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SajjadAhmad
Note: Another question with similar stimulus but different answer choices Click Here
In film and television, it’s possible to induce viewers to project their feelings onto characters on the screen. In one study, a camera shot of a woman’s face was preceded by images of a baby. The audience thought the woman’s face registered contentment. When the same woman’s face was preceded by images of a shark attack, the audience thought the woman’s face registered fear. Television news teams must be careful to avoid such manipulation of their viewers.

Which of the following is best supported by the information in the passage?

A. Television news teams have abused their position of trust in the past.
B. The expression on the woman’s face was, in actuality, blank.
C. Images of a baby engendered feelings of happiness in the audience.
D. Audiences should strive to be less gullible.
E. The technique for manipulating audiences described in the passage would also work in a radio program that played dramatic music.
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its an inference based CR question ; so we need to select option which is on same lines as given in the premises;
breaking the question
Argument : In film and television, it’s possible to induce viewers to project their feelings onto characters on the screen. In one study, a camera shot of a woman’s face was preceded by images of a baby;
Intermediate conclusion : The audience thought the woman’s face registered contentment
Premise : When the same woman’s face was preceded by images of a shark attack, IC : the audience thought the woman’s face registered fear

Conclusion of the argument : Television news teams must be careful to avoid such manipulation of their viewers.

question Which of the following is best supported by the information in the passage:
A. Television news teams have abused their position of trust in the past : irrelevant OFS
B. The expression on the woman’s face was, in actuality, blank. : OFS, not given in argument
C. Images of a baby engendered feelings of happiness in the audience. yes , on same lines as per argument
D. Audiences should strive to be less gullible. : OFS
E. The technique for manipulating audiences described in the passage would also work in a radio program that played dramatic music : OFS

IMO C
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In film and television, it’s possible to induce viewers to project the 17 Jun 2020, 21:18
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someone explain please. i think it is a very poor quality question????
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In film and television, it’s possible to induce viewers to project the 18 Jun 2020, 08:16
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someone explain please. i think it is a very poor quality question????
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Hello, AbhishekDhanraJ72. I think the question is fine. With a careful reading of the question stem, passage, and answer choices, you can see why each answer fails except for the correct one. The best supported by of the question stem tells us that we will likely need to infer something. (It is rare that CR questions ask about a detail that appears directly, but it does happen, more often in third-party questions.) The passage:

SajjadAhmad
In film and television, it’s possible to induce viewers to project their feelings onto characters on the screen. In one study, a camera shot of a woman’s face was preceded by images of a baby. The audience thought the woman’s face registered contentment. When the same woman’s face was preceded by images of a shark attack, the audience thought the woman’s face registered fear. Television news teams must be careful to avoid such manipulation of their viewers.
Show more

- Sentence 1 informs us that it is possible for viewers to project their inner feelings onto on-screen characters.

- Sentence 2 presents the design of one study. Straightened out, we understand that images of a baby were shown before an image of the face of a woman.

- Sentence 3 gives us the reaction of the test audience. The woman seemed content.

- Sentence 4 parallels Sentence 2 and adds the reaction of the audience to the end, only now, we get that images of a shark attack came first, and the audience perceived fear in the face of the woman.

- Sentence 5 presents the conclusion: TV news teams need to be careful, or else they can manipulate how viewers perceive the information presented.

To put a finger on the correct answer, we ourselves need to avoid making assumptions. Just stick to what the passage says, nothing more.

SajjadAhmad
A. Television news teams have abused their position of trust in the past.
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Remember, the passage presents the findings of a single study, giving us no insight into what news teams may have actually done in the past. This should be an easy answer to remove from contention.

SajjadAhmad
B. The expression on the woman’s face was, in actuality, blank.
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Is this what the passage tells us? Look again. All we see in the way of a description is, perhaps disappointingly, woman's face—we know we are not dealing with a man. But beyond that, we have no idea what image the audience took in. This is a good trap answer, the kind that snares a test-taker in a hurry. Check those details to avoid becoming the next victim.

SajjadAhmad
C. Images of a baby engendered feelings of happiness in the audience.
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We are told that the audience thought the woman’s face registered contentment. We have to infer that, within the context of the passage, such a feeling of contentment or happiness was a projection by the audience members of their own feelings, based on the first sentence of the passage. There is nothing to argue against here, so this must be our answer.

SajjadAhmad
D. Audiences should strive to be less gullible.
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The passage wraps up with an admonition to news teams, not with a recommendation for audiences. Furthermore, although we might think that audiences should be less gullible, that is a pure judgment call, with no anchor in the passage. This answer altogether misses the mark.

SajjadAhmad
E. The technique for manipulating audiences described in the passage would also work in a radio program that played dramatic music.
Show more
The passage does not concern itself with any additional application for the findings of the study. All we can tell is that, within the exact constraints of the one study mentioned in the passage, audiences seem susceptible to manipulation of their emotions from images they see on the screen. Case closed.

In the end, there is really no grounding in the passage for any answer but (C). All the other answers rely on speculation more than inference.

- Andrew
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In film and television, it’s possible to induce viewers to project the 18 Jun 2020, 18:29
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AbhishekDhanraJ72
someone explain please. i think it is a very poor quality question????
Hello, AbhishekDhanraJ72. I think the question is fine. With a careful reading of the question stem, passage, and answer choices, you can see why each answer fails except for the correct one. The best supported by of the question stem tells us that we will likely need to infer something. (It is rare that CR questions ask about a detail that appears directly, but it does happen, more often in third-party questions.) The passage:

SajjadAhmad
In film and television, it’s possible to induce viewers to project their feelings onto characters on the screen. In one study, a camera shot of a woman’s face was preceded by images of a baby. The audience thought the woman’s face registered contentment. When the same woman’s face was preceded by images of a shark attack, the audience thought the woman’s face registered fear. Television news teams must be careful to avoid such manipulation of their viewers.

- Sentence 1 informs us that it is possible for viewers to project their inner feelings onto on-screen characters.

- Sentence 2 presents the design of one study. Straightened out, we understand that images of a baby were shown before an image of the face of a woman.

- Sentence 3 gives us the reaction of the test audience. The woman seemed content.

- Sentence 4 parallels Sentence 2 and adds the reaction of the audience to the end, only now, we get that images of a shark attack came first, and the audience perceived fear in the face of the woman.

- Sentence 5 presents the conclusion: TV news teams need to be careful, or else they can manipulate how viewers perceive the information presented.

To put a finger on the correct answer, we ourselves need to avoid making assumptions. Just stick to what the passage says, nothing more.

SajjadAhmad
A. Television news teams have abused their position of trust in the past.
Remember, the passage presents the findings of a single study, giving us no insight into what news teams may have actually done in the past. This should be an easy answer to remove from contention.

SajjadAhmad
B. The expression on the woman’s face was, in actuality, blank.
Is this what the passage tells us? Look again. All we see in the way of a description is, perhaps disappointingly, woman's face—we know we are not dealing with a man. But beyond that, we have no idea what image the audience took in. This is a good trap answer, the kind that snares a test-taker in a hurry. Check those details to avoid becoming the next victim.

SajjadAhmad
C. Images of a baby engendered feelings of happiness in the audience.
We are told that the audience thought the woman’s face registered contentment. We have to infer that, within the context of the passage, such a feeling of contentment or happiness was a projection by the audience members of their own feelings, based on the first sentence of the passage. There is nothing to argue against here, so this must be our answer.

SajjadAhmad
D. Audiences should strive to be less gullible.
The passage wraps up with an admonition to news teams, not with a recommendation for audiences. Furthermore, although we might think that audiences should be less gullible, that is a pure judgment call, with no anchor in the passage. This answer altogether misses the mark.

SajjadAhmad
E. The technique for manipulating audiences described in the passage would also work in a radio program that played dramatic music.
The passage does not concern itself with any additional application for the findings of the study. All we can tell is that, within the exact constraints of the one study mentioned in the passage, audiences seem susceptible to manipulation of their emotions from images they see on the screen. Case closed.

In the end, there is really no grounding in the passage for any answer but (C). All the other answers rely on speculation more than inference.

- Andrew
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you could say "We have to infer that, within the context of the passage, such a feeling of contentment or happiness was a projection by the audience members of their own feelings, based on the first sentence of the passage". why can not i say "We have to infer that, within the context of the passage, it’s possible to induce viewers to project their feelings onto characters on the screen. that women face were blank????
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In film and television, it’s possible to induce viewers to project the 19 Jun 2020, 03:55
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AbhishekDhanraJ72

you could say "We have to infer that, within the context of the passage, such a feeling of contentment or happiness was a projection by the audience members of their own feelings, based on the first sentence of the passage". why can not i say "We have to infer that, within the context of the passage, it’s possible to induce viewers to project their feelings onto characters on the screen. that women face were blank????
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The difference between the two, AbhishekDhanraJ72, is that one interpretation relies on the passage, the idea that people project their own feelings onto characters they see onscreen, while the other interpretation is not based on the passage. Simply put, we have no idea what the expression may have been on the face of the woman. How can you justify blank when it could have shown surprise, shock, excitement, or anything else?

Although I agree with you that in real life, it might make more sense for the researchers to design such an experiment in which a woman expressed some sort of ambiguous, perhaps even neutral, expression, we have to be careful not to take license on inference questions to fill in the blanks as we please. There is a linear logic to CR questions, a reason to fully justify whichever answer choice is correct and discard each of the others, and here, choice (B) simply does not follow from the text. You are welcome to disagree, but again, your goal is always to lean on the passage to provide evidence for support. I cannot see how you would take anything from the passage in an attempt to justify (B). (If you want, I can expand my explanation of (C) above and better illustrate how it aligns with the passage.)

- Andrew
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