Listening 2026-09 Test 6

PART 1 Section one. You will hear two friends called John and Anna talking about a holiday Anna has just had on Jackson Island. First, you have some time to look at questions one to seven on page two. You will see that there is an example that has been done for you. On this occasion only, the conversation relating to this will be played first. Hi, Anna. How was your holiday to Jackson Island? It was good. There's quite a lot to see. It's quite a big island, really. Yeah. I was thinking of going in the summer. So where would you recommend going on the island? Well, the capital, of course, Camford. I stayed there with my cousin. Anna stayed with her cousin, so cousin has been written in the space. Now we shall begin. You should answer the questions as you listen because you will not hear the recording a second time. Listen carefully and answer questions one to seven. Hi, Anna. How was your holiday to Jackson Island? It was good. There's quite a lot to see. It's quite a big island, really. Yeah. I was thinking of going in the summer. So where would you recommend going on the island? Well, the capital, of course, Camford. I stayed there with my cousin. What did you do there? Well, actually, I spent most of my time there shopping. So has it got good shopping centers? Yes, but they're the same as at home, really. So I did all my shopping in the market, which is great. Hmm. What kinds of things are good to buy there? Everything, but bags and shoes, especially. [chuckles] Just make sure you've got cash with you, as most of the stalls don't take credit cards. Okay, that's good to know. Where else did you go? Well, my cousin and I went to Newtown. Mm. She said it was famous for its modern architecture. We only had half a day there, so we took a bus tour around the town. But if I were you, I'd give the bus tour a miss. Hmm. Unless you know a lot about architecture, the buildings all look the same. There's a museum, though. That's supposed to be good. You might like that. Okay, I'll give it a go. Then after that, we headed for Golden Beach because we were going to meet up with an old friend that I hadn't seen for years. But we had to stay in a caravan as the hotels were all booked up. [chuckles] Is it as pretty as it looks in the brochures? Yes, it's very picturesque. We did some sailing on the most beautiful blue sea. It was so clear that you could see the bottom, even quite far out to sea. That part of the trip was great, and I'd have liked to have stayed even longer. I'd suggest staying there for a minimum of four days if I were you. Mm-hmm. We had two days there, and it wasn't nearly enough. Sounds great. I'll put that on my must-do list. Mm. Was that the end of your trip? No. After Golden Beach, we drove into the center of the island to White Mountain. White as in the color? Yes. The island's great because you can go from the beaches up to the snowy mountain in a couple of hours. Hmm. We took a tent because we were going to camp, but the weather was so cold. In fact, it was snowing when I was there, that we stopped in a motel instead. Did you go skiing then? No, but we tried snowboarding, [chuckles] and it was harder than it looked. Hmm. It looks so easy when you see other people doing it, but it took me ages to get the hang of it. I wish I'd had some lessons, but you had to make your bookings in advance. Okay, I'll look into that. Thanks. Before you hear the rest of the conversation, you have some time to look at questions eight to ten on page two. Now listen and answer questions eight to ten. So are there any other tips or advice you could give me? I don't know. Let me think. Oh, one place you should try to visit is this very quaint cafe, which is at the foot of the mountain. It has the best cakes ever. It's worth going there just for them. [chuckles] Mm. I'll have to try those. [chuckles] So what other advice would you give? Ooh, let me think. Uh, we didn't really have any problems. Well, how did you get around when you were there? We wanted to get a motorbike at first. They're very cheap to hire and great fun to ride as the roads are very good. But it turned out not to be a good idea because the weather is so changeable. Hmm. You'd be much better off in a car. There are plenty of places where you can hire them, and the roads are well signposted, so you won't get lost. And presumably, I can get a map when I get there. Well, you can, but they are expensive. It'd be better to get one here before you go. Great. That's been really useful. Thank you. That is the end of part one. You now have one minute to check your answers to part one. PART 2 Part two. You will hear a woman introducing different sites to a group of tourists. First, you have some time to look at questions eleven to sixteen. Now listen carefully and answer questions eleven to sixteen. Good morning, tourists. I am Jane, and welcome to Hampshire. I am very happy to see you all here, and I can promise you a very nice time here. We would be visiting six different places which are renowned for different activities of their own. We would begin from Jackson Town, which is known for its buggy ride. Rather than sit in a train, you will sit in a small lightweight carriage pulled by a single horse. It was named after Thania Jackson, who was famous for her generosity in the region. The locals even built a museum for her. Belleville would be our next stop. We'll get there by helicopter. Oh. Oh, I almost forgot that this mode of transportation has been suspended because of the variable weather. We will get there by taking a jolly train ride, which is a highlight in this area. The people here are very friendly and would always try to make you feel as comfortable as possible. They entertain their guests with local delicacies like cakes and pastries, which are quite famous in this area. Albany is a very lively and playful place, so get ready for some good and hearty laughs. It is usually fun to watch some people screaming during a balloon trip, which is quite popular there. Albany also features cool relaxation spots where you can just take time to cool off and enjoy yourself. Fort Scott is where we have Jackson's Biscuits, which is famous for its teddy bear shapes. There you can get to see how they're pieced together. The location also has a small refreshment section where you can grab a bite. The chiffon cakes there are just palatable. Rawlins has many factories there. Among these factories, the ones that make cakes are gaining more fame than others. Their cakes are made from pure cream, cheese, eggs and sugar. No food additive. I always advise our tourists to get some for themselves and their families, as their products will never disappoint you. Rawlins Council has decided to combine their products with the native culture in the future, which will be a strong selling point. Greensville boasts about its Native American culture, which is widely known. A lot of artifacts have been collected around here and now kept in the local art museum for studies and tourists' sake. A lot of people who had been looking for their roots have been able to make a sort of connection by coming to this place. The museum has been around for decades, and it was recently renovated. However, the story has not changed. Before you hear the rest of the talk, you have some time to look at questions seventeen to twenty. Now listen and answer questions seventeen to twenty. Now, let me briefly talk about other buildings and sites in Greensville. Please take a look at the map, which I gave you earlier. Greensville has a good kindergarten for younger children, and it is situated just to the north of Monument Street. It has well-trained teachers and a conducive environment for learning. As it's receiving an increasing number of children, the city council has decided to move it to a larger site on Oak Road this November. The new spot is uncertain, though. We also have a craft shop which is at the end of Ash Road. The craft shop is for displaying all types of art and drawings, paintings and the likes. It is a key feature of Greensville due to its art exhibitions, which run three times a year. Wixon's School used to be situated at the intersection of Oak Road and George Avenue, but the site wasn't big enough as the number of students kept growing. So the larger piece of land right beside the old location has become the new site for the school since last year. It is important to note that the school has been around for a while, so there are well experienced teachers to help students develop at their own pace. The cake factory that we spoke about is actually between Monument Street and Maple Street, just by the roadside. The people of Greensville are very hospitable. That is the end of part two. You now have forty-five seconds to check your answers to part two. PART 3 Section three. You will hear two law students called Eleanor and Jamie discussing their work on whether the evidence given by people who witness crimes is reliable. First, you have some time to look at questions twenty-one to twenty-six on page five. Now listen carefully and answer questions twenty-one to twenty-six. Hi, Jamie. I've just been reading this book about eyewitness testimonies. It really goes into how much we can actually rely on what the people who witness crimes actually say and what things influence eyewitness reliability. Oh, I've read a couple of case studies on that too. Can we compare notes? Good idea. It's fascinating to learn that eyewitness identification is such compelling evidence in both civil and criminal trials. You mean if a witness says something, generally they're believed? And reading between the lines, I'd say that when a witness gives evidence in a very self-assured way, everyone takes them at their word, whether they're a doctor who speaks with an assumed authority or the average person in the street. It doesn't seem to matter as much as their manner. Right. So is that textbook worth reading? Yes, it's a good book, divided into user-friendly sections. It refers to case studies, and the conclusions are clearly underlined. But actually, some of the cases are more than ten years old now. Well, it's the same problem with the survey reports our tutor gave us. But at least they draw on a representative sample. That's good. All the books point out that eyewitness statements are very often unreliable. But there can be good reasons for that, like an incident may happen at night in the dark. Or it happens some way away. But it's the fact that it can happen in just a split second that makes the witness's account so unreliable. That point's made very strongly in what I've read, too. Yeah. Have you read anything about photo identifications? Yes, about the procedure and the reliability of witnesses looking at photos of different people and picking out the suspect. The case studies all clearly show how easy it is to sway a witness's choice of photo, even just by the flicker of an eye. But steps have been taken now to avoid this happening. And are the witnesses told exactly what they have to do? Mostly. But the trouble is, most people focus on the photos and choose the most likely suspect from the bunch and forget about the actual incident and who they saw at the time. And I read something about a naive observer. Do you know what that is? Is it a witness who's never been in a court before? Oh, I understood it to mean someone who's had nothing to do with the event, and they're asked to look at the photos and pick out the potential suspect. That figures. Then they can see if the photos are a good set and make sure one person doesn't stand out. Another thing I read was that witnesses don't like to change their minds once they've made a particular statement. I thought people might worry about the fact that they told a lie in court and think they might be punished in some way. But it's simply that they're afraid of seeming unintelligent or lightweight. Yeah. People are reluctant to lose face. Imagine if a case had been going on for weeks and you suddenly realized you'd got something wrong right at the beginning. Before you hear the rest of the discussion, you have some time to look at questions twenty-seven to thirty on page six. Now listen and answer questions twenty-seven to thirty. Changing the topic slightly, can I just check with you what you've understood about the problems of interviewing child witnesses when they've witnessed, for example, a robbery? Yes. Did you get the handout about the stages that should be followed when children are interviewed? Yes. The rapport stage, when a relationship between the child and the interviewer is built up, seems to be crucial. But many children fail to say anything that provides any real information. It must be hard for them not to feel a bit scared about being in a formal setting like a court building. Still, it's a good lead-in to open-ended questions where the interviewer carefully sticks to their prepared questions in order to remain neutral. I can see the point of that, but the handout discusses the issue of children simply not understanding the specialist language used, so the whole interview just gets more puzzling for them. I think the stage called closed questions is easier for children to handle. They just have to answer yes or no. But everything's not so clear cut in a child's world, and abstract concepts such as honesty haven't been fully grasped by young children. You mean they make things up? Apparently. And in the final stage, closure, where the interviewer has to check anything that hasn't been made clear to them by repeating previous questions, children often become suspicious of the questioner. It must require lots of training to be able to interview children successfully. Yes, I think... That is the end of section three. You now have half a minute to check your answers. PART 4 Section four. You will hear part of a lecture about oxytocin and trust. First, you have some time to look at questions thirty-one to forty. Now listen carefully and answer questions thirty-one to forty. The development of trust is an essential social tool, allowing people to form productive and meaningful relationships, both at a professional and personal level. Trust is indispensable in friendship, love, families, and organizations, and plays a key role in economic exchange and politics. Much recent evidence indicates that trust contributes to economic, political, and social success. When we make contacts with strangers, such as doing business with the clients who we meet for the first time, our trust in them can only rely on their kindness. So from our own judgment or the comments from other people, we can have a rough idea if the stranger is trustworthy. Trust is important because it is the basis around which all human relationships evolve. Without trust, there can be no relationship. Trust can come naturally, or it can be manifested. If you find trust of this magnitude in life, then you are lucky. Also, you can always count on them to protect through all, if not most, of life's perils. Trust is important because if you don't trust someone, then they are not available. Believe it or not, reducing the chance of suffering from poverty is to understand trust, because when you trust other people, you can have more support and resources. However, our ability to trust others varies from individual to individual, just like different people's ability of recognizing a person's face is not the same. Bonds of trust are also extremely fragile. A single act of betrayal, such as a marital affair, can instantly erase years of trustworthy behavior. The consequences of such breaches in confidence can be disastrous, and not only for a relationship. The study demonstrates how oxytocin can facilitate social interactions after trust has been violated by potentially lowering defense mechanisms associated with social risks and by overcoming negative feedback that is important for adapting behavior in the future. Luckily, oxytocin in our body has the ability to inspire trust in and among people. This chemical is released whenever interaction happens between people. To study social interactions, economists and more recently neuroscientists take advantage of a simple experiment. Two participants play the so-called trust game. The first participant is faced with the decision to keep a sum of money or share it with the second participant, who has no obligation to give the money back. He would get more money if the second person returns it. In this game, the first person is left with an important social dilemma: to trust or not to trust. Although it is more profitable to trust, doing so leaves the investor at risk of betrayal. Trust is not something that naturally occurs when two people meet for the first time. It involves a process. One person has to show the quality of being trustworthy to the other person. This can be achieved by certain behaviors and communication. Therefore, trust is conditional. People should not take it for granted. Oxytocin does not only exist in human beings. Animals also have this gift, and it can be seen when they have cooperation with each other. Oxytocin in monkeys, for example, allow them to work together to find food and to fight against enemies. The Nash equilibrium's game theory, the first participant will make the best decision he can, with no expectations that the second participant would change his decision. The second participant will do the same. So the outcome depends on the decision of the other person. This game is similar to the one we just talked about. The oxytocin level doesn't stay the same in a person's body. Studies have found that people who are under a lot of stress would have higher levels of oxytocin. Oxytocin causes a substantial increase in trust among humans, thereby greatly increasing the benefits from social interactions. It's also noted that the effect of oxytocin on trust is not due to a general increase in the readiness to bear risks. On the contrary, oxytocin specifically affects an individual's willingness to accept social risks arising through interpersonal interactions. To sum up, oxytocin is like a kind of social glue that is helpful in social bonding. Further research is needed to explore oxytocin and trust, and how this hormone can be used to strengthen our trust in others and even treat mental disorders that specifically relate to deficiencies in social behavior. Next, we're going to talk about... That is the end of section four. You now have half a minute to check your answers.