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June 2007, Passage 2, Question 10

Transcript

Question 10. Each of the two passages mentions the relation of music to? So when a question asks you what the passages mention, that means it's a detail question. The correct answer is going to be a direct quote or a rephrasing of something that is in the passages, or here, because its comparative, in both passages.

We just have to track it down. So answer choice A, bonding between humans, well, that is something that passage B brings up, but not something that passage A brings up. We're looking for something that's in both passages. So it's not A. Go to answer choice B.

Answer choice B, human emotion. Now, this is our answer because both passages mention it. The first passage mentions it in the second sentence. It says that both systems use intonation and rhythm to communicate emotions. And when they say both systems, they mean music and human language. So music communicates emotions.

The second passage also brings it up in its second sentence. It says that it is in the emotional bonds created by the interaction of mother and child that we can discover the evolutionary origins of human music. So music comes from emotions. Both of those passages mentions human emotion's relationship to music, so that's what we're looking for, answer choice B.

When you can point to what's in the passage, you know you have the correct answer. Now, let's see why the others are wrong. C says neurological research. That's something passage A mentions but passage B doesn't. D says the increasing helplessness of hominid infants.

That's something that passage B mentions but passage A doesn't. And then, E, the use of tools produce sounds. That something that passage A mentions, but B doesn't. So only answer choice B is mentioned by both of the passages, so it is our answer.

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