SAT OwlQuestion bank / Rhetorical Synthesis
While researching a topic, a student has taken the following notes:
• In 2006, researchers at the University of Washington wore a distinctive mask while trapping and banding wild crows.
• Afterward, crows scolded and mobbed people who wore that mask on campus.
• People wearing a different, neutral mask were largely ignored.
• In later years, crows that had never been trapped also began scolding the mask.
• The researchers concluded that crows can learn which human faces are dangerous from other crows.
The student wants to emphasize that the crows' reaction spread beyond the birds that were originally trapped. Which choice most effectively uses relevant information from the notes to accomplish this goal?
After researchers wore a distinctive mask while trapping crows, the crows scolded people in that mask but largely ignored people in a neutral mask.
Even crows that had never been trapped came to scold the mask worn during trapping, suggesting that crows learn about dangerous faces from one another.
In 2006, University of Washington researchers wore a distinctive mask while trapping and banding wild crows.
Crows scolded and mobbed people wearing a mask that researchers had worn while trapping them.
Show answer and explanation
Answer: B
The key detail is that the reaction reached crows that were never trapped. Choice B states that directly and adds the researchers' conclusion that crows learn about dangerous faces from each other. Choices A and D describe how the trapped crows reacted, which doesn't show the behavior spreading. Choice C describes only how the study was set up.
Choice A accurately reports the mask experiment, but it only describes the reaction of the crows that were trapped.
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