PT116.S1.P2.Q11 > Analytics

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In many bilingual communities of Puerto Rican Americans living in the mainland United States, people use both English and Spanish in a single conversation, alternating between them smoothly and frequently even within the same sentence. ████ █████████████████ ███████████████████ ██████ ██ █████████ ████████████ ███

Phenomenon · Code-switching

Puerto Rican Americans use both English and Spanish in a single conversation, smoothly alternating between them.

Explanation · Most instances of code-switching can be explained by situational or rhetorical factors

Some exceptional cases of code-switching cannot be explained.

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Explanation · Domains or social context determine whether code-switching occurs

Main factors are setting, participants, and topic which combine into five domains: family; friendship; religion; education; and employment.

Experimental Setup · To test effects of domains on code-switching

Researchers create hypothetical situations with 2 congruent factors or 2 incongruent factors. Then, researchers ask students to determine the third factor and which mixture of language they would use.

Results · 2 congruent factors

Prompted with participants: parent and child and topic: how to be a good son or daughter. Students chose setting as home and language was Spanish only.

Results · 2 incongruent factors

Prompted with participants: priest and parishioner and setting: beach, students disagreed on third factor and mix of language.

Exceptions · Unexplained code-switching

Sometimes the domain predictions about code-switching are wrong.

Example · One family at home

Family thought they spoke only English but they code-switched to Spanish (even when situational factors didn't change) to express certain attitudes like intimacy or humor more emphatically.

Passage Style

Phenomenon-hypothesis (RC)

Single position

11.

It can be inferred from ███ ███████ ████ ███ ██████ █████ ████ ██████ █████ ████ █████ ███ ██ ███ █████████ ███████████

Question Type

Author’s perspective

Implied

It’s difficult to predict the correct answer merely from the question stem, so let’s use process of elimination.

Research revealing that ████████ ███ █████████ ███████ ██ ██████████████ █████ █████ ██ ███ ███████ ██ █ █████ █████ █████████ ████ ██████ █████████

Not supported. The study involving high school students, described in P2, never suggested that speakers are always aware of the reasons they code-switch. So a study showing that speakers are sometimes unaware of their code-switching wouldn’t cast doubt on the study in P2.

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Not supported. We have no reason to think the results of the study described in P2 are unexpected. The only mention of expectations is in connection with code-switching due to rhetorical factors in P3.

Research conducted prior ██ ███ █████ ██ █ ██████ ██ ██████ █████ █████████ ███ ███████ ██ ████ ███████████ ██ ███████ ██████████████ ██ ███ ██████ ███ ████ ███████ ██ ███████████ █████████

The study of a family of Puerto Rican Americans is discussed in P3. There’s no evidence that research conducted before this was ever thought by “most” researchers to explain code-switching in “all except the most unusual or nonstandard context.” Although P3 shows that situational factors aren’t the only reason people code-switch, there’s no indication that over half of researchers ever thought that situational factors explained all code-switching with only a few exceptions.

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Although P3 shows that people can be unaware of their code-switching, and P2 shows that sometimes, people have conflicting views about what topic or language mix fits with various situational factors, there’s no evidence that people who code-switch are “usually unaware” of which situational factors might influence their language choice.

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Supported. The family was asked about why they occasionally used Spanish at home, as heard in recorded conversations. They said it was used to express certain attitudes more emphatically. That’s an example of code-switching for rhetorical effect. The family didn’t point to any other reason for speaking Spanish at home. In addition, the author introduces the discussion of the family by noting that code-switching sometimes occurs “only sparingly to achieve certain rhetorical effects.” The study of the family is mentioned to support this claim. The author doesn’t suggest the potential for any other reason the family would code-switch at home.

PrepTest 116 - Section 1 - Passage 2 - Question 11

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