Question

[Dương Minh]

Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the questions.

Many of us worry about the effects of television on family life. We think that we spend too much time watching television and that it takes us away from more important activities, such as reading, exercising and talking to family and friends. But is this really true?

Studies have shown that people in the United States do spend a lot of time in front of their television sets. About 98% of American homes have at least one TV set, and in the average home the TV is on more than six hours a day. But how much attention do people actually pay to the programs? And do people who watch TV really spend less time on other free-time activities? Recently some researchers in New York City tried to find the answers to these questions by conducting a telephone survey. They phoned more than a thousand people all over the United States and asked them questions about how they spend their free time.

No one was surprised to find out that watching TV is the most popular free-time activity in the United States. More than 70% of those asked said that they watch TV every day or almost every day. The second most popular activity that they mentioned was reading the newspaper. Listening to music at home was third, talking on the phone to friends and relatives was fourth and doing some form of exercise was fifth.

But the researchers discovered an interesting fact about Americans' TV habits. According to this survey, although most people turn the TV on every day, they do not actually watch it very much. Six out of ten people said that when the TV is on, they seldom pay attention to it. During a typical television program, they may eat dinner, do housework, read a newspaper or magazine, talk to their children or even read to them. The TV may be on, but it is just background music.

The researchers therefore concluded that television does not take Americans away from more important activities. It doesn't keep them from doing other free-time activities. In fact, when they compared people who frequently watch TV and those who seldom watch TV, they found that there were no great differences in their other activities. The frequent watchers read to their children and talk to their families just as much as the others.

(Adapted from “Reading Academic English” by Judy Rapoport, Ronit Broder and Sarah Feingold)

What does the word “they” in the last paragraph refer to?

A. free-time activities 

B. Americans

C. the researchers

D. frequent watchers

Answer 1

[Nguyen Hoang Hai]

Đáp án C

Từ “they” trong đoạn cuối đề cập đến từ gì?

A.các hoạt động giải trí

B.người Mỹ

C.các nhà nghiên cứu

D.những người xem TV thường xuyên

Căn cứ vào thông tin đoạn cuối:

The researchers therefore concluded that television does not take Americans away from more important activities. It doesn't keep them from doing other free-time activities. In fact, when they compared people who frequently watch TV and those who seldom watch TV, they found that there were no great differences in their other activities.

(Vì vậy, các nhà nghiên cứu kết luận rằng TV không tách người Mỹ ra khỏi các hoạt động quan trọng hơn. Nó cũng không ngăn cản mọi người khỏi các hoạt động giải trí khác. Thật sự, khi họ so sánh những người thường xuyên xem TV và những người ít xem TV, họ thấy rằng không có quá nhiều sự khác biệt giữa những người này trong các hoạt động khác).