Until recently, many biologists believed that invertebrate "schools" were actually transient assemblages, brought together by wind, currents, waves, or common food sources. █████████ ██████████ ███ ████████ ██████ ██ █████████ ██ ██████████████████ ██████ █████ █████ ███████ ███ ██████ ██████ ███ ████ ███ ████ ████ ███
Biologists' old perspective ·"Schools" of invertebrates are are not really schools
Example: groups of jelly fish are not cohesive social units that are evenly spaced from each other and face the same way. (Seems like we get a definition of "schools" here.)
Support for new perspective ·Groups of invertebrates can position themselves in a way that meets the definition of "school"
The way each member swims is consistent relative to other members, and they don't swim directly above or below a neighbor. (This sounds similar to the "evenly spaced" requirement.)
Benefits of schooling ·Reduces chance of being eaten
School is harder to find, can scare away predators, and an individual member is more likely to get away, since there are a lot of other school members to eat.
These are more active defenses, whereas the last paragraph described passive benefits. Schools have different approaches based on the size of predators and whether they are attacking.
Too many members may hurt ability to get food and mates. If school's too big, some members will join another school.
Passage Style
Phenomenon-hypothesis
Single position
4.
Which one of the following ████ █████████ ███ █████ █████████ ██ ███ ████████
Question Type
Describe organization
Structure
What happens in P4? Think about your low-res summary. The author tells us about a benefit of schooling (finding food), but also some of the drawbacks, as well as some factors that can influence the size of a school.
There are no “arguments” presented in P4. The author doesn’t advocate for anything and doesn’t present any other perspective that advocates for something.
b
The disadvantages of ███████ █████ ██ ███████ ███ ████████ ███ ███████████ ███████ ███ █████████
Although you could say that the author presents disadvantages of schooling when a school is too large, he doesn’t propose “alternative choices.” The fact that he describes how certain animals may behave when a school is too large is not a “proposal” of an alternative choice.
c
Two different interpretations ██ █ ██████████ ███ █████████ ███ ███ ██ ████████ ██ ███ ████ ██████████
The author doesn’t endorse one of two competing interpretations. P4 doesn’t present any competing interpretations; it presents certain advantages and disadvantages associated with schooling.
d
The disadvantages of ██ ██████ ███ ██████████ ███ ███ ████████ ██ ████ ██████ ██ ██████ ████ █████████
The author doesn’t call into question the “validity” of an action. The author simply describes certain effects of schooling and how animals might behave.
This best captures what happens in P4. The author discusses some advantages and disadvantages of schooling. The author also discusses certain actions for avoiding adverse consequences of schooling — some invertebrates might circle to the back of a school or join another school.
Difficulty
89% of people who answer get this correct
This is a low-difficulty question.
It is similar in difficulty to other questions in this passage.
CURVE
Score of students with a 50% chance of getting this right
25%120
133
75%149
Analysis
Describe organization
Structure
Phenomenon-hypothesis
Science
Single position
Answer Popularity
PopularityAvg. score
a
4%
162
b
4%
160
c
0%
155
d
2%
158
e
89%
166
Question history
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