ASVAB Paragraph Comprehension Practice Test 353267 Results

Your Results Global Average
Questions 5 5
Correct 0 2.96
Score 0% 59%

Review

1
On Monday, after a long quarter-century, West Virginians said goodbye to their state's 6 percent food tax. Now to see what, if any, business we've been missing. In 1989, retailers warned that sales in West Virginia would go down if legislators imposed a 6 percent tax on food. "Whatever they put on would be passed on to the consumer," Charles Forth, who owned supermarkets in both West Virginia and Ohio, told the newspaper in February 1989. "Six percent is $6 on $100. That will make a difference when people are already hurting and trying to make ends meet." It's a lot easier to drive customers away than to win them back, a fact legislators should bear in mind when it comes to taxation.
The author is _______________ that eliminating the 6 percent food tax will bring customers back to West Virginia stores.
45% Answer Correctly
denying
hopeful
skeptical
confident

Solution
The author cites a local retailer who predicted that sales in West Virginia would go down if the food tax was implemented and, although no facts are given to indicate that sales did in fact go down, the tone of the paragraph implies that the perception is that they have. The author is skeptical that eliminating the food tax will bring customers back claiming "It's a lot easier to drive customers away than to win them back".

2
The Republican Party, also commonly called the GOP (for "Grand Old Party"), is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, the other being the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery activists in 1854, it dominated politics nationally for most of the period from 1860 to 1932. There have been 18 Republican presidents, the first being Abraham Lincoln, serving from 1861 to 1865, and the most recent being Donald Trump who began serving in 2017.
Based on this passage, which of the following statements is not true?
67% Answer Correctly
Abraham Lincoln was the first Republican president.
The Democratic Party is a major political party in the United States.
The Republican Party lost national political influence after the Civil War.
The Republican Party was formed by people opposed to slavery.

Solution
The passage states that the Republican Party dominated politics nationally from 1860 to 1932 which includes the period after the Civil War.

3
A rule change was enacted before the 1974 National Football League (NFL) season to add one sudden death overtime period (15 minutes) to all preseason and regular season games. If no team scored in this period, the game would result in a tie. This rule was enacted to decrease the number of tie games. The first ever regular season overtime, a September 22 game between the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Denver Broncos, ended in a 35-35 draw. It was not until November 10, when the New York Jets defeated the New York Giants, 26-20, that an overtime game would produce a winner.
Based on this information, which of the following statements is accurate?
50% Answer Correctly
The number of ties have been reduced after this rule change.
The number of ties have increased after this rule change.
The number of ties have stayed the same after this rule change.
There's not enough information to determine if this rule change impacted the number of ties.

Solution
Without knowing how many ties occurred in pre-1974 NFL seasons we can't determine if the number of ties in 1974 was more than, less than, or the same as in past years.

4
"Democracy's real test lies in its respect for minority opinions." - Ellery Sedgwick
Showing respect for a minority opinion _______________ democracy.
67% Answer Correctly
challenges
invalidates
validates
undermines

Solution
If democracy's test is whether or not it respects minority opinions then showing respect for a minority opinion is positive and validates democracy. Each of the other answers paints showing respect for minority opinion negatively.

5
In linguistics, the comparative method is a technique for studying the development of languages by performing a feature-by-feature comparison of two or more languages with common descent from a shared ancestor, as opposed to the method of internal reconstruction, which analyzes the internal development of a single language over time.
Which of the following would be the most useful for someone using the comparative method in linguistics when studying a particular language?
66% Answer Correctly
The same text written in two different dialects of the language.
Two editions of the same text written one-hundred years apart.
An ancient text written in the language.
Old folk songs that have been passed down among generations of speakers of the language.

Solution
The wrong answers all provide insight into how a single language has changed over time while the text written in two different dialects offers an opportunity to compare languages that share a common ancestor.