Conditioned Place Preference is a way of finding out what animals want. Researchers train them to associate one place with an experience such as food or a loud noise and another place with something completely ① [difficult / different], usually where ② [nothing / something] happens. The two places are made obviously different to make it as ③ [easy / hard] as possible for the animal to associate each place with what happened to it there. The animal's preference for being in one place or another is measured both before and after its experiences in the two places. If there is a ④ [stay / shift] in where the animal chooses to spend its time for the reward, this suggests that it liked the experience and is trying to repeat it. ⑤ [Conversely / Likewise], if it now ⑥ [confronts / avoids] the place the stimulus appeared and starts to ⑦ [prefer / reject] the place it did not experience it, then this suggests that it found the stimulus unpleasant. ⑧ [However / For example], mice with cancer show a preference for the place where they have been given morphine, a drug used to ⑨ [relieve / enforce] pain, ⑩ [in addition to / rather than] where they have received saline whereas healthy mice developed no such preference. This suggests that the mice with cancer wanted the morphine.
Near the equator, many species of bird breed all year round. ① [But / And] in temperate and polar regions, the breeding seasons of birds are often sharply defined. They are ② [removed / triggered] mainly by changes in day length. If all goes well, the ③ [outcome / income] is that birds ④ [lower / raise] their young when the food supply is at its ⑤ [base / peak]. Most birds are not simply ⑥ [eager / reluctant] to breed at other times but they are also physically ⑦ [incapable / capable] of doing so. ⑧ [This is why / This is because] their reproductive system ⑨ [shrinks / expands], which helps flying birds save weight. The main exception to this rule are nomadic desert species. These can initiate their breeding cycle ⑩ [within / outside] days of rain. It's for making the most of the sudden breeding opportunity. ⑪ [Also / But], ⑫ [different / difficult] species ⑬ [divide / unite] the breeding season up in different ways. Most seabirds raise a single brood. In warm regions, ⑭ [however / therefore], songbirds may raise several families in a few months. In an exceptionally good year, a pair of House Sparrows, a ⑮ [cruel / kind] of songbird, can raise successive broods through a marathon reproductive effort.
One factor that may ① [hinder / encourage] creativity is unawareness of the resources required in each activity in students' learning. Often students are ② [unable / able] to identify the resources they need to perform the task required of them. Different resources may be ③ [compulsory / voluntary] for specific learning tasks, and recognizing them may ④ [perplex / simplify] the activity's performance. ⑤ [However / For example], it may be that students desire to conduct some experiments in their projects. There must be a prior ⑥ [investigation / investment] of whether the students will have access to the laboratory, equipment, and chemicals required for the experiment. It means ⑦ [resolution / preparation] is ⑧ [vital / trivial] for the students to ⑨ [succeed / fail], and it may be about human and financial resources such as laboratory technicians, money to purchase chemicals, and equipment for their learning where applicable. Even if some of the resources required for a task may not be ⑩ [available / unavailable], identifying them in advance may help students' creativity. It may even lead to ⑪ [maintaining / changing] the topic, finding ⑫ [attractive / alternative] resources, and other means.
All translators feel some pressure from the community of readers for whom they are doing their work. And all translators arrive at their interpretations in dialogue with other people. The English poet Alexander Pope had pretty good Greek, but when he set about translating Homer's Iliad in the early 18th century he was not on his own. He had Greek commentaries to refer to, and translations that had already been done in English, Latin, and French ─ and of course he had dictionaries. Translators always draw on ① [less than / more than] one source text. Even when the scene of translation consists of just one person with a pen, paper, and the book that is being translated, or even when it is just one person translating orally for another, that person's linguistic knowledge ② [falls / arises] from lots of other texts and other conversations. And then his or her idea of the translation's purpose will be ③ [influencing / influenced by] the expectations of the person or people it is for. In both these senses every translation is a crowd translation.
Some people argue that there is a single, logically ① [consistent / inconsistent] concept known as reading that can be neatly set ② [together / apart] from ③ [everything / nothing] else people do with books. Is reading really that simple? The most ④ [consumptive / productive] way to think about reading is as a loosely ⑤ [related / unrelated] set of behaviors that belong together owing to family resemblances, as Ludwig Wittgenstein used the phrase, ⑥ [without / with] having in common a single defining trait. ⑦ [Normally / Consequently], efforts to distinguish reading from nonreading are destined to fail because there is no ⑧ [disagreement / agreement] on what ⑨ [unqualifies / qualifies] as reading in the first place. The more one tries to figure out where the border lies between reading and not-reading, the more edge cases will be found to ⑩ [contract / stretch] the term's ⑪ [stiff / flexible] boundaries. ⑫ [Thus / Furthermore], it is worth attempting to collect together these exceptional forms of reading into a single forum, one highlighting the ⑬ [challenges / changes] faced by anyone wishing to establish the boundaries where reading begins and ends. The attempt moves toward an understanding of reading as a spectrum that is expansive enough to ⑭ [disoblige / accommodate] the ⑮ [ambiguous / distinct] reading activities.
Weber's law concerns the perception of difference between two stimuli. It suggests that we might not be able to detect a 1-mm difference when we are looking at lines 466 mm and 467 mm in length, but we may be able to detect a 1-mm difference when we are comparing a line 2 mm long with one 3 mm long. Another example of this principle is that we can detect 1 candle when it is lit in an otherwise dark room. ① [And / But] when 1 candle is lit in a room in which 100 candles are already burning, we may not notice the light from this candle. ② [Therefore / However], the Just-noticeable difference (JND) varies as a function of the ③ [weak / strength] of the signals. ④ [However / For example], the JND is greater for very loud noises than it is for much more ⑤ [quiet / noisy] sounds. When a sound is very ⑥ [strong / weak], we can tell that another sound is louder, ⑦ [unless / even if] it is barely louder. When a sound is very loud, to tell that another sound is even louder, it has to be much louder. ⑧ [Furthermore / Thus], Weber's law means that it is harder to distinguish between two samples when those samples are ⑨ [smaller / larger] or ⑩ [stronger / weaker] levels of the stimuli.
Any new resource (e.g., a new airport, a new mall) always ① [closeds / opens] with people ② [benefiting / harming] individually by sharing a common resource (e.g., the city or state budget). Soon, at some point, the amount of traffic grows too ③ [small / large] for the "commons" to support. Traffic jams, overcrowding, and overuse ④ [lessen / expand] the benefits of the common resource for everyone ─ the ⑤ [comedy / tragedy] of the commons! If the new resource cannot be expanded or provided with additional space, it becomes a problem, and you cannot solve the problem on your own, in ⑥ [harmony / isolation] from your fellow drivers or walkers or ⑦ [cooperating / competing] users. The total activity on this new resource keeps ⑧ [decreasing / increasing], and so does individual activity; but if the dynamic of common use and overuse continues too long, both begin to ⑨ [rise / fall] after a ⑩ [base / peak], leading to a crash. What makes the "tragedy of commons" tragic is the crash dynamic ─ the ⑪ [construction / destruction] or degeneration of the common resource's ability to regenerate itself.
Theoretically, our brain would have the capacity to store all experiences throughout life, reaching the quality of a DVD. ① [Moreover / However], this ② [theoretical / applied] capacity is ③ [end / offset] by the energy demand associated with the process of storing and ④ [forgeting / retrieving] information in memory. ⑤ [Furthermore / As a result], the brain develops ⑥ [inefficient / efficient] strategies, becoming ⑦ [dependent / independent] on shortcuts. When we observe a face, the visual image captured by the eyes is highly ⑧ [invariable / variable], depending on the point of view, lighting conditions and other contextual factors. ⑨ [Nevertheless / Therefore], we are able to recognize the face as the same, ⑩ [maintaining / abandoning] the underlying identity. The brain, ⑪ [in addition to / rather than] focusing on the details of ⑫ [visualization / abstraction], creates and stores general patterns that allow for ⑬ [inconsistent / consistent] recognition across diverse circumstances. This ability to match what we see with general visual memory patterns serves as an ⑭ [effective / improper] mechanism for optimizing brain performance and saving energy. The brain, being naturally ⑮ [for / against] ⑯ [necessary / unnecessary] effort, constantly seeks to simplify and ⑰ [generalize / specialize] information to facilitate the cognitive process.
Where scientific research is concerned, explanatory tales are expected to adhere closely to experimental data and to illuminate the ① [irregular / regular] and ② [predictable / unpredictable] features of experience. ③ [Moreover / However], this paradigm sometimes ④ [conceals / shows] the fact that theories are deeply ⑤ [unloaded / loaded] with ⑥ [creative / uncreative] elements that shape the construction of research projects and the interpretations of evidence. Scientific explanations do not just relate a chronology of facts. They construct frameworks for systematically chosen data in order to provide a ⑦ [consistent / inconsistent] and ⑧ [meaningless / meaningful] explanation of what is observed. Such constructions lead us to imagine ⑨ [general / specific] ⑩ [cruels / kinds] of subject matter in particular sorts of relations, and the storylines they inspire will prove more ⑪ [improper / effective] for analyzing some features of experience over others. When we neglect the creative ⑫ [distributions / contributions] of such scientific imagination and treat models and interpretive explanations as straightforward facts ─ even worse, as facts including all of reality ─ we can blind ourselves to the limitations of a given model and fail to note its potential for misunderstanding a situation to which it ill applies.
We encounter contrary claims about the relation of literature to action. Theorists have maintained that literature ① [discourages / encourages] solitary reading and reflection as the way to engage with the world and ② [thus / furthermore] counters the social and political activities that might produce social ③ [change / maintain]. At best it encourages ④ [detachment / involvement] or ⑤ [criticism / appreciation] of ⑥ [complexity / simplicity], and at worst passivity and ⑦ [rejection / acceptance] of what is. But ⑧ [in addition / on the other hand], literature has historically been seen as ⑨ [dangerous / harmless]: it ⑩ [promotes / prompts] the questioning of authority and social arrangements. Plato banned poets from his ideal republic because they could only do ⑪ [mend / harm], and novels have long been credited with making people ⑫ [dissatisfied / satisfied] with their lives and ⑬ [reluctant / eager] for something new. By promoting identification across ⑭ [divisions / unities] of class, gender, and race, books may promote a fellowship that ⑮ [discourages / encourages] struggle; but they may also produce a keen sense of injustice that makes ⑯ [progressive / conservative] ⑰ [succeeds / struggles] possible. Historically, works of literature are credited with producing change: Uncle Tom's Cabin, a best-seller in its day, helped create a revulsion ⑱ [for / against] slavery that made ⑲ [possible / impossible] the American Civil War.
According to Hobbes, man is not a being who can act morally ① [though / in spite of] his instinct to ② [prevent / protect] his existence in the state of nature. ③ [Hence / However], the only place where morality and ④ [immoral / moral] liberty will begin to find an application begins in a place where a sovereign power, namely the state, ⑤ [disappears / emerges]. Hobbes ⑥ [thus / furthermore] describes the state of nature as a circumstance in which man's life is "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short". It means when people live ⑦ [with / without] a general power to control them all, they are indeed in a state of war. ⑧ [On the contrary / In other words], Hobbes, who ⑨ [accepted / rejected] that human beings are not social and political beings in the state of nature, believes that without the power human beings in the state of nature are "antisocial and ⑩ [irrational / rational] based on their selfishness". ⑪ [Moreover / However], since society is not a ⑫ [natural / nurtured] phenomenon and there is no natural force bringing people together, what will bring them together as a society is not ⑬ [individual / mutual] affection according to Hobbes. It is, rather, mutual fear of men's present and future that ⑭ [disassembles / assembles] them, since the ⑮ [cause / prevent] of fear is a common drive among people in the state of nature.
There is research that supports the idea that cognitive factors ① [waste / influence] the phenomenology of the perceived world. Delk and Fillenbaum asked participants to match the color of figures with the color of their background. Some of the figures depicted objects associated with a particular color. These included typically red objects such as an apple, lips, and a symbolic heart. Other objects were presented that are not usually associated with red, such as a mushroom or a bell. ② [However / Moreover], all the figures were made out of the same red-orange cardboard. Participants then had to match the figure to a background ③ [staying / varying] from dark to light red. They had to make the background color match the color of the figures. The researchers found that red-associated objects required more red in the background to be judged a match than did the objects that are not associated with the color red. This implies that the cognitive association of objects to color ④ [influences / wastes] how we perceive that color.
One of the best pieces of advice I got when my son was really little was from his nursery school teacher, who told parents to pretend that we liked bugs and worms. The reason: my son's class was doing an earth science unit, and she had found that almost all kids love to dig and play with the dirt. ① [However, / That is,] until, at pickup time, their parents scream, "Ewwwww, worms are gross! "- which often squashes their interest in biology. Kids get many of their early ideas and prejudices from us. So how you feel about your own work - and how you talk about it ② [in front of / behind] your kid - affects how she views work in general. If you enjoy your job, say so. Even if you don't love your job, you can probably say that you love having one. It's important to relay the idea that a job is something to take pride in.
Though there may be no perfect design, we can still speak of good design. We can admire the brilliant solution, ① [criticize / appreciate] the ingenious device, and enjoy the clever gadget. Imperfect as they may be, they represent the triumph of the human mind over the world of things, and the achievements of accomplished designers ② [lessen / uplift] the spirit of us all. The pole-vaulter who sets a new record is no ③ [more / less] of a champion because he does not clear the next bar height. He had ④ [conceived / preconceived] and executed his run, the planting of his pole, and the arc of his body in the best way that he could for that meet, and for the time being, ⑤ [at best / at least], his best is the best. We applaud what he did achieve, with the expectation that someday he or some other athlete may design a ⑥ [better / worse] pole or vaulting technique and so set a new record. That is the nature of design.
Instant and early conclusions, solutions, suggestions, and statements about "how we solved that in the past" are the enemies of good problem solving. The good is, most often, the enemy of the ① [worse / better]. Defining the problem and taking action occur almost simultaneously for most people. The ② [mentally / physically] agile survivor paradoxically puts more energy into playing with the problem mentally - defining more creatively. Voluminous research on problem solving shows conclusively that the more effort one puts into the front end of the problem-solving process, ③ [the easier / the harder] it is to come up with a good solution. This doesn't mean being ④ [active / inactive]. It means being highly cognitively ⑤ [passive / active] in defining the problem more rigorously.
Many of the technological innovations with the most ① [superficial / profound] impact on human society originated in settlements along trade routes, where a rich mix of ② [difficult / different] cultures ignited new ideas. ③ [For example / However], the printing press, which helped spread knowledge to all social classes, was invented by the German Johannes Gutenberg around 1440. This invention relied on several innovations from China, including paper and ink. Paper traveled along trade routes from China to Baghdad, where technology was developed for its mass production. This technology then migrated to Europe, as did water-based ink from China, which was ④ [unmodified / modified] by Gutenberg to become oil-based ink. We have the cross-fertilization of ⑤ [similar / diverse] cultures to thank for the printing press, and the same can be said for other important inventions.
When you watch a movie first on a ① [small / large] screen in the theater and then on a small video screen, do you see giants on the large screen and Lilliputians on the small screen? Of course not. As with color constancy, which makes us see colors as uniform ② [because of / despite] variations, our perception is guided by size constancy, which means we perceive people and their environments as normal sized ③ [depending on / regardless of] whether they appear in a long shot or a ④ [distant / close]-up on a large movie screen or a small video screen, or whether we are relatively close to or far ⑤ [away from / in] the screen. So long as we know by experience how large or small an object should be, we perceive it as its normal size ⑥ [regardless of / because of] screen size, ⑦ [absolute / relative] image size, or perceived object distance.
Charles Sanders Peirce (pronounced "purse"), the founder of pragmatism, America's only ① [unique / common] philosophy, was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts. His father, Benjamin, was the leading mathematician of the day, and he took a special interest in his son's intellectual development. Under his direction Charles was reading college-level material, including logic, at age twelve, and Benjamin would ② [challenge / change] the boy with highly ③ [complex / simple] problems that Charles would solve on his own. ④ [Since / Although] his most ⑤ [significant / insignificant] education came from his father, Charles went on to ⑥ [attend / neglect] Harvard University, where he received a Bachelor of Science in chemistry in 1863. ⑦ [Yet / For example], he was not a ⑧ [unsuccessful / successful] student (he usually placed in the ⑨ [lower / elevate] quarter of his class), partly because he showed scorn for his professors as inadequately ⑩ [qualified / unqualified] to teach him. This arrogance is likely the main reason Peirce lived a ⑪ [easy / difficult] life. He died in poverty at age seventy-four in the then- ⑫ [integrated / isolated] town of Milford, Pennsylvania.
If 100 people are interviewed about, say, whether they like a particular brand of peanut butter and it is found that 38 do, we are told that 38 percent of people like that brand. Of course this does not mean that everyone in the world was asked, but the researcher assumes that if 38 percent of the sample liked that brand then it is likely to ① [reflect / conceal] the opinion of people generally. ② [Moreover / However], ③ [crucial / trivial] to this assumption is the size of the sample. If you asked just two people if they liked that brand of peanut butter and one did, that would be ④ [strong / weak] evidence that 50 percent of people liked it. You couldn't assume that the views of two people would match the whole population! ⑤ [Generally / Specifically] the ⑥ [smaller / larger] the sample the more ⑦ [uncertain / reliable] the survey is likely to be. If the study doesn't say how many people were ⑧ [unconcerned / involved], be suspicious.
Take a ① [close / distant] look at a computer chip sometime. You'll notice that it resembles a dense city in miniature, perhaps symbolizing our move toward an ever-more- ② [decompress / compact] and ③ [interactive / antagonistic] world. ④ [In the same way / However] that microchips are ⑤ [increasing / decreasing] in power by providing more communication pathways, we are seeing the power of direct people- to-people communication, and the ⑥ [collapse / corrupt] of traditional bureaucratic hierarchies. This frees us to communicate in far more, and more ⑦ [profound / superficial], ways. ⑧ [For example / However], a century ago, few people traveled ⑨ [outside / inside] their own county. Today, some kids have more friends around the world that they've "met" via the Internet than they do in their local neighborhoods and schools. ⑩ [That's why / That's because] they have grown up with technologies of interactive communication we never imagined.
Research from New York University and Tel Aviv University has shown that you're more ① [horizontal / inclined] to think creatively when you imagine yourself ② [appended / removed] from a problem or situation. Imagining yourself in the mind of somebody else, ③ [for example / however], is a simple way to trick your brain into seeing things in new ways. The act of people watching is one way to do just that. As you watch strangers, you can imagine how they might handle a situation. That thought process ④ [prohibits / allows] for ideas that would otherwise be ⑤ [realistic / unrealistic] or ⑥ [limited / limitless] by your personal way of thinking. ⑦ [After all / In addition], you might not act a certain way, but a stranger could. Imagining how a stranger might act makes it ⑧ [impossible / possible] for you to think of more ⑨ [moderate / radical] and imaginative ideas than you might be used to, simply because it's not you acting them out, but someone else you're watching.
For science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) classes, empathy has a ① [natural / nurtured] place. It is an ② [incidental / integral] part of teaching design thinking, which centers on applying creativity to realize and solve problems. ③ [In order not to / In order to] imagine or identify ④ [changes / challenges] to be addressed, students have to put themselves into the lives and circumstances of others. They have to ask themselves, "What is this person feeling?" "What is his situation like, and how can we make it ⑤ [better / worse] for him?" They use their insights from those reflections to address solution-based thinking. Through various processes (brainstorming, inquiry, etc. ), they identify a ⑥ [general / specific] way they can solve the problem. They design and test their prototype, still thinking about the ultimate user and making modifications with the user in mind.
Low-productivity firms are often located in industries where the demand is stagnant or ① [still / falling]. This is partly ② [despite / due to] the fact that new plants do not need to be built to meet new demands, but it is also ③ [despite / due to] a human problem. Dying industries simply cannot be ④ [managed / maintained] as efficiently as growing industries. Growing industries ⑤ [attract / scatter] bright ⑥ [aggressive / indifferent] managers who want to advance ⑦ [slowly / rapidly] with their companies. In dying industries ⑧ [promotions / demotions] are few and far between. Smart young managers know that they should be ⑨ [avoided / confronted]. Who wants a job where the basic problem is to decide who to fire each day and where new, exciting ⑩ [investigations / investments] are not happening? In a dying industry everyone is out to protect what they have ⑪ [rather than / in addition to] to build something ⑫ [better / worse].
There is an important reason to ① [attract / scatter] pollinators that has little to do with their pollination services and a lot to do with the fact that they are part of a food chain. In the ② [natural / nurtured] world ③ [everything / nothing] eats something else in order to survive. Those same insects that pollinate our flowers can also prey on a range of pest insects and help keep them under control. They are in turn prey for birds, frogs or lizards. The honeyeaters, ④ [however / for example], that pollinate our flowers while feeding on the nectar ⑤ [outside / within] them, also eat insects from under the bark of trees and might themselves become prey for larger birds. Lizards in the mulch eat a range of garden pests and might end up being eaten by magpies.
In an ideal world all arguments would be decided on their ① [merits / demerit] and not their presentation. ② [And / But] we aren't in an ideal world. There's no getting ③ [in / away from] the fact that presentation of an argument is ④ [crucial / trivial]. Advertising is all based on persuading you to buy a product that you would not otherwise buy, and most advertising is the triumph of spin over substance. Many people have won arguments, based on ⑤ [bad / good] grounds, because they've made their points well. And many people with good points have lost their argument because they failed to make their case attractively.
To illustrate both the advantages and ① [advantages / disadvantages] of an even partly iconographic writing, the Chinese script provides a good example. There is the ② [large / small] number of signs: 3,000 to 4,000 characters for everyday use, 50,000 for scholars studying the classical texts (as compared to the Latin alphabet which now uses some 26 signs). Why then has the Chinese script been so ③ [successful / unsuccessful], lasting, apart from comparatively few ④ [minor / major] remodelings, well over 4,000 years? Simply because as a concept script Chinese does not depend on the spoken language. This made it, throughout Chinese history, an ideal means of communication in an empire whose people spoke a large number of ⑤ [difficult / different] dialects yet were all ruled by the same centre.
There has been a lot of interest in the idea of ① [emotional / physical] intelligence. Many people are not in touch with their emotions and feel ② [capable / incapable] of expressing their feelings. The results everywhere are ③ [obvious / doubtful] and catastrophic. In part, this is the legacy of the academic illusion. Conventional education ④ [unites / separates] intelligence from feeling, and ⑤ [concentrates / distributes] only on particular aspects of the first. ⑥ [This is why / This is because] being highly ⑦ [innate / educated] is no guarantee of emotional intelligence. ⑧ [For example / Yet] there is an ⑨ [strange / intimate] relationship between knowing and feeling: how we feel is directly ⑩ [unrelated / related] to what we know and think. Creativity is not a purely intellectual process. It is enriched by other capacities and in particular by feelings, ⑪ [reason / intuition] and by a playful imagination.
The importance of experimental learning depends strongly on the nature of the activity: there are high-risk activities in which the agents have to ① [limit / expand] their experiments because they could ② [conflict / consent] with the " ③ [normal / abnormal] performance" that has to be achieved. Airline pilots or surgeons cannot learn in this way. ④ [Finally / Similarly], people managing a marshalling yard or regulating the flow of subway train traffic will ⑤ [avoid / confront] any type of experiment in the normal course of their work. The error element of their professional trial-and-error is rarely consequential ⑥ [at best / at least] insofar as ⑦ [incomes / outcomes] can be ⑧ [rapidly / slowly] assessed and methods ⑨ [adapted / adopted]. The fact of being able to carry out this type of learning depends on the nature of the risk and the immediacy (or ⑩ [delay / rush]) of the effect. ⑪ [By contrast / For example], a teacher can carry out educational experiments and a craftsman can look for new solutions to a particular problem during the production process. ⑫ [Thus / Furthermore], explicitly cognitive learning consists of a series of planned but weakly controlled experiments.
Blocking can occur in ① [diverse / similar] situations. Engaged in casual conversation, you block on a word in the middle of a sentence. Stage actors fear those relatively ② [rare / common] but embarrassing moments in a scene when they block on their lines. And students are ③ [afraid / fearless] of the awful realization that they have ④ [blocked / released] on an exam answer they studied diligently, and might even ⑤ [recall / remove] spontaneously after finishing the test. ⑥ [But / And] ⑦ [blocking / helping] occurs most often with people's names. In surveys that probe different types of memory failures in everyday life, blocking on the names of ⑧ [familiar / unfamiliar] people ⑨ [invariably / variably] emerges at or near the top of the list. Name blocking is especially troublesome for older adults: the single biggest complaint of cognitive difficulties by adults past age fifty - by far - involves problems remembering the names of familiar people.
A date or time by which the goal is to be ① [discouraged / accomplished] should be specified. The ② [absence / presence] or ③ [absence / presence] of a deadline is a critical attribute of any goal-setting exercise. Deadlines stimulate action, and the closer the deadline, the more motivation to act. The absence of a deadline makes the urgency of the goal ④ [indefinite / definite] and ⑤ [hence / however] ⑥ [more / less] motivating. ⑦ [However / For example], there are a disproportionately ⑧ [small / large] number of plays during the last few minutes of a football game because the team that is behind faces a deadline for scoring more points or ⑨ [gaining / losing] the game. Similar ⑩ [decreases / increases] in activity occur toward the end of the trading period each day on the New York Stock Exchange. Think of your own behavior when a test date is ⑪ [rapidly / slowly] approaching, and you begin to ⑫ [decrease / increase] your preparation activities.
When you are busy creating a new habit, there is a pitfall you should know about, because if you don't, you will fail again and again and again. Let me illustrate it with an example. Suppose you want to learn a new move in tennis. In the beginning, will you get ① [better / worse] or ② [better / worse] results with your new move? You will get worse results of course. So the result curve will go down and only after a certain amount of time will it become level and then your results may ③ [improve / worsen] beyond your old habit. Okay, Now back to the starting point: the new move, will it cost more or ④ [more / less] energy than the old move? It will cost more of course, it being a new move. After a ⑤ [since / while] you get used to it, it becomes a habit, and it will cost less energy. So now let's look at the area between the ⑥ [upward / downward] curve of the results and the upward curve of the energy. Suppose you are at point 'X'. You have been busy with the new habit for a while. The results are getting worse all the time. You have to put more energy into it than before. What is your conclusion?