CAE Reading and Use of English Part 2

For questions 9-16, read the text below and think of the word which best fits each gap. Use only one word in each gap. There is an example at the beginning (0).

Emotion in books

Something appears to 0 have happened to the emotional content of books published in the UK. Researchers from the University of Bristol analysed the frequency with 9 ‘mood’ words – those reflecting anger, disgust, fear, joy, sadness and surprise – were used in as 10 as 5 million books between 1900 and 2000. 11 to one of the researchers, Dr Alberto Acerbi, ‘the average book published in 1900 has 14% more emotional content than the average book in 2000’. In 12 words, ‘a book with 1,000 emotional words in 1900 would have 877 in 2000’.

In 13 to this decline in emotional content, the research team found that some interesting differences between British books and those published in the USA have developed since the 1960s. 14 having more emotional content than their British counterparts, American books now contain more content-free words. These are words that carry 15 or no meaning on their 16 , such as ‘and’ or ‘but’, and articles like ‘the’.

What is the significance of these changes? The researchers say that further work is needed to deal with this question adequately.

For this task: Answers with explanations :: Vocabulary