TOEFL Listening Mock Test 10

NARRATOR: Listen to a conversation between a student and a professor. STUDENT: Hello, Professor Ingrid. Thank you for meeting with me during your office hours. PROFESSOR: Hello, Tomas. Come on in. You wanted to talk about your proposal for the environmental science paper, right? STUDENT: Yes. I submitted my initial topic draft online, but I got your email saying it was a bit too, uh, broad. I wanted to see how I can fix it. PROFESSOR: Right. Your proposal was on 'the global benefits of urban green spaces.' That is a wonderful topic for a whole textbook, but our assignment is a short research paper. Remember, the limit is strictly five pages. STUDENT: Ah, yes, five pages. I guess I got a little too excited about all the different examples. I wrote about parks in Europe, Asia, and South America. PROFESSOR: It is easy to do that! But for a five-page paper, you need a narrow focus. I suggest choosing just one local project. That way, you can analyze it in detail. STUDENT: Oh, that makes sense. Actually, I read that our university library just built a new rooftop garden. Could I write about that? PROFESSOR: Absolutely! That is a perfect case study. You can talk about the types of plants they used and how it helps insulate the building. It is local, and you can even go take photos yourself. STUDENT: That sounds much easier to manage. I can definitely write five pages on that. PROFESSOR: Excellent. Just make sure to submit the revised one-page proposal on our course website. The deadline for the revision is next Friday at five p.m. STUDENT: Next Friday at five. Got it. I will start working on the new proposal today. Thank you so much for your help! PROFESSOR: You are very welcome, Tomas. I look forward to reading it. [Q1] Why does the student go to see the professor?

(Shared with Q1.) [Q2] According to the professor, what was the problem with the student's initial proposal?

(Shared with Q1.) [Q3] What does the professor suggest the student do to improve his paper?

(Shared with Q1.) [Q4] What can be inferred about the student's new research paper?

(Shared with Q1.) [Replay: "Ah, yes, five pages. I guess I got a little too excited about all the different examples."] [Q5] Why does the student say this:

NARRATOR: Listen to part of a lecture in a biology class. PROFESSOR: Today we're going to talk about a fascinating aspect of plant ecology: plant-to-plant communication. Now, for a long time, people thought of plants as passive organisms, just sitting there getting eaten by insects. But we now know they have sophisticated defense systems. Specifically, we'll look at how plants use what we call volatile organic compounds, or VOCs. VOCs are airborne chemical signals that plants release into the atmosphere when they are damaged by herbivores—you know, plant-eating pests. PROFESSOR: When a caterpillar, say, starts chewing on a leaf, the plant doesn't just suffer in silence. It synthesizes and emits these VOCs. This triggers what biologists call an indirect defense. Instead of poisoning the herbivore directly, which would be a direct defense, the plant releases a specific chemical blend that acts like a distress signal. This signal attracts the natural enemies of that herbivore. For instance, when lima bean plants are attacked by spider mites, they release VOCs that specifically attract predatory mites, which then prey upon the spider mites. It's an elegant way of recruiting a bodyguard. STUDENT: So, the plant is basically calling for help? But does this signal also affect other plants nearby, or is it just meant for the predatory insects? PROFESSOR: That is the central question, Tomas. And the answer is yes, neighboring plants can 'eavesdrop' on these chemical signals. This leads to a phenomenon called priming. Priming is a physiological state in which a neighboring, undamaged plant detects the VOCs from a damaged neighbor and prepares its own defense systems, but without fully activating them right away. It's a way to get ready for an imminent attack without wasting precious energy on producing defensive toxins prematurely. PROFESSOR: Think of it like a home security system being set to 'high alert.' The alarm hasn't gone off, but the sensors are active. If a herbivore then attacks this primed plant, the plant can mount a defense much faster and much more strongly than an unprimed plant would. Now, why don't plants just keep these defenses turned on all the time? Well, synthesizing defensive chemicals requires a massive amount of metabolic energy—resources that would otherwise go toward growth, leaf development, or producing seeds. So priming is an elegant compromise: it saves energy while keeping the plant ready. PROFESSOR: To demonstrate this, researchers did a study with wild tobacco plants. They placed a damaged plant and a healthy plant in a controlled environment. The healthy neighbor exposed to the damaged plant's VOCs didn't immediately start producing nicotine—which is wild tobacco's primary defense toxin. Producing nicotine is incredibly energy-intensive. Instead, the neighbor simply primed its defense genes. But when researchers later introduced caterpillars to that primed neighbor, its nicotine production shot up... well, actually, it doubled within hours, much faster than in plants that hadn't been exposed to the VOCs. This confirmed that priming allows plants to conserve resources. PROFESSOR: Of course, this airborne communication isn't perfect. It can be heavily influenced by environmental factors. For example, strong winds can disperse VOCs too quickly, diluting the chemicals before neighboring plants can detect them. But under calm conditions, this chemical network can effectively protect entire plant communities. [Q6] What is the lecture mainly about?

(Shared with Q6.) [Q7] According to the professor, what is an indirect defense?

(Shared with Q6.) [Q8] According to the professor, what happens during the process of priming? Choose 2 answers.

(Shared with Q6.) [Q9] Why does the professor mention a home security system?

(Shared with Q6.) [Q10] According to the professor, what did the study on wild tobacco plants demonstrate?

(Shared with Q6.) [Replay: "shot up... well, actually, it doubled within hours"] [Q11] Why does the professor say this:

NARRATOR: Listen to a conversation between a student and a registrar's office administrator. STAFF: Hi there. How can I help you today? STUDENT: Hi. Um, I'm hoping to graduate at the end of next semester, in the spring. But when I checked my online degree audit this morning, it says I'm still three credits short in my major electives. The thing is, I took a course last summer at another university—Global Environmental Policy— and I was under the impression that those credits had already transferred over. STAFF: Okay, let's take a look at your record... Sofia, right? Yes, I see your file here. I do see a note about the summer course, but the credits haven't been officially applied to your degree audit. Did you submit the Transfer Credit Pre-Approval Form before you took the class? STUDENT: Oh, uh, actually, no. I didn't know I needed to do that beforehand. I thought I could just send over the official transcript once the course was completed. Which I did, about a month... wait, actually, it was early August, so almost two months ago. STAFF: Ah, I see. That explains it. Ordinarily, students must file that pre-approval form so the academic department can verify that the external course matches our curriculum. Since you didn't do that, the system flagged it. But don't worry, it's not an uncommon mistake, and we can still resolve it. STUDENT: Oh, thank goodness. I was really worried I'd have to pay for another class next term or, worse, delay my graduation. What do I need to do to get it approved now? STAFF: You'll need to file a Retroactive Credit Petition. Basically, you'll fill out a form and attach the syllabus from the summer course you took. Then, you'll need to get a signature from the chair of your department—in your case, the Environmental Studies department—to confirm they accept the course content. Once they sign off, you bring the form back to us. STUDENT: Okay, that sounds manageable. I still have the syllabus saved on my computer. Is there a deadline for submitting this petition? STAFF: Yes, for spring graduation candidates, all transfer credit adjustments must be finalized by the end of October. Since we're already in mid-September, I'd suggest getting on this right away. Also, because this is a retroactive petition—meaning it's being filed after the course was completed without prior approval—there is a thirty-dollar administrative fee. STUDENT: A thirty-dollar fee? I guess that's fair, considering it was my oversight. Where do I pay that? Can I do it online? STAFF: You can pay it online through your student portal, or right downstairs at the bursar's window. If you do it online, just print out the receipt and attach it to your petition form when you submit it. Remember, we can't process the petition without that receipt. STUDENT: Got it. I'll download the petition form right now, email my department chair with the syllabus, and get this sorted out. Thanks so much for your help! STAFF: You're very welcome. Good luck with your final semesters! [Q12] Why does the student go to see the registrar's office administrator?

(Shared with Q12.) [Q13] According to the administrator, why were the student's summer credits not automatically applied to her degree audit?

(Shared with Q12.) [Q14] What can be inferred about the student's attitude regarding the thirty-dollar administrative fee?

(Shared with Q12.) [Q15] Why does the administrator mention the end of October?

(Shared with Q12.) [Replay: "Ah, I see. That explains it. Ordinarily, students must file that pre-approval form so the academic department can verify that the external course matches our curriculum."] [Q16] Why does the speaker say this:

NARRATOR: Listen to part of a lecture in an environmental science class. PROFESSOR: Welcome back, everyone. Today, we're going to dive into a phenomenon that occurs right above our heads but is often completely invisible to the naked eye: atmospheric gravity waves. Now, before we proceed, let's make a critical distinction. Do not confuse atmospheric gravity waves with gravitational waves. The latter are ripples in spacetime from massive cosmic events like colliding black holes—that's astrophysics. Atmospheric gravity waves, on the other hand, are physical oscillations in our atmosphere. They are generated when a parcel of air is forced upward—say, by a mountain range—and gravity, or rather buoyancy, acts as a restoring force, pulling it back down, causing it to oscillate. PROFESSOR: For these waves to exist, we need stable stratification. This is an atmospheric condition where warmer, less dense air sits on top of colder, denser air. If a wind pushes cold air up into the warm layer, it's denser than its surroundings, so gravity pulls it back down. As it sinks, it overshoots, gets too warm, and buoyancy pushes it back up. This back-and-forth motion propagates horizontally as a wave. STUDENT: So, is it like throwing a pebble into a pond, but in the air? PROFESSOR: Exactly, Yuki. The mountain acts as the pebble, and the air acts as the water surface. In meteorology, we call these mountain-induced disturbances 'orographic gravity waves.' Now, these waves are not just local curiosities. They play a massive role in global climate systems. When these waves propagate upward into the mesosphere—that's about fifty to eighty-five kilometers up—they eventually 'break,' much like ocean waves crashing on a beach. When they break, they transfer momentum to the background flow. This momentum deposition acts as a drag, slowing down the powerful jet streams or even driving the global atmospheric circulation from the equator to the poles. PROFESSOR: Here's the catch: because these waves are relatively small, often just a few kilometers in horizontal scale, they are what we call 'sub-grid scale.' This means they are too small to be directly resolved by our global climate models, which divide the Earth into a grid of squares that are typically tens of kilometers wide. So, if a climate model can't 'see' these waves, it will miscalculate wind speeds and temperature distributions globally. To fix this, meteorologists must use 'parameterization'—which is a method of representing the simplified, average effects of these small-scale processes based on larger, resolvable variables. PROFESSOR: Let's look at a specific consequence when we fail to parameterize them correctly. In the winter, the polar vortex—the cold ring of winds around the poles—is highly sensitive to wave drag. Without proper parameterization of gravity waves generated by the Rocky Mountains or the Himalayas, models would predict an unrealistically strong polar vortex, leading to completely inaccurate winter weather forecasts for mid-latitudes. PROFESSOR: Another fascinating aspect is 'wave ducting.' This happens when a gravity wave gets trapped in a stable layer of the atmosphere, sandwiched between the ground and a higher layer of unstable air. Instead of propagating upward and dispersing its energy into the upper atmosphere, the wave is channeled horizontally, travel—uh, travelling thousands of kilometers without losing much intensity. This can lead to unexpected, severe windstorms far away from the mountains that originally generated the wave. We've seen this happen in the lee of the Rocky Mountains, where ducted waves suddenly surface as destructive wind gusts in the plains. [Q17] What is the lecture mainly about?

(Shared with Q17.) [Q18] According to the professor, what is required for atmospheric gravity waves to form?

(Shared with Q17.) [Q19] Why does the professor mention the polar vortex?

(Shared with Q17.) [Q20] Based on the discussion of wave ducting, what is a primary danger associated with this phenomenon?

(Shared with Q17.) [Q21] What can be inferred about global climate models that do not use parameterization for gravity waves?

(Shared with Q17.) [Replay: "Now, before we proceed, let's make a critical distinction. Do not confuse atmospheric gravity waves with gravitational waves."] [Q22] Why does the professor say this:

NARRATOR: Listen to part of a lecture in a linguistics class. PROFESSOR: Today, we’re going to challenge a long-held assumption in cognitive psychology and linguistics: the idea that human beings are, well, universally terrible at naming smells. For decades, researchers argued that our olfactory system has a weak connection to our language centers. If I ask you to describe the scent of, say, gasoline, you’ll probably say 'it smells like gasoline' or 'it's chemical-like'. This is what we call source-based naming—identifying an odor by referring directly to the object that produces it. Actually, wait, you might also say 'it's sharp,' which is a metaphor, but it's still not a dedicated smell word. In English, and indeed in most Western languages, we almost completely lack abstract odor terms. An abstract odor term, by definition, is a word that describes a smell itself, independent of any source object, in the same way 'blue' describes a color without referring to the sky or a blueberry. PROFESSOR: Now, is this limitation a biological truth of the human brain? Well, recent fieldwork suggests otherwise. Let's look at the Jahai people, a hunter-gatherer group living in the Malay Peninsula. Researchers tested Jahai speakers and English speakers on their ability to name both colors and smells. They measured what linguists call codability—that is, the ease and consistency with which speakers of a language can identify a stimulus. If ten people look at a red square, and they all immediately say 'red', that stimulus has high codability. PROFESSOR: For English speakers, color codability was extremely high, but odor codability was, well, quite poor—actually, abysmal is a more accurate term. They used long, hesitant descriptions, and rarely agreed on a label. But for the Jahai? Their agreement on odors was just as high and instantaneous as their agreement on colors. Why? Because the Jahai language has a rich set of about a dozen abstract, basic words for smells. For example, they have a word, ltpɨt, which refers to a pleasant, sweet smell associated with certain ripe fruits, flowers, and even some species of insects. It doesn't mean 'banana' or 'wasp'; it describes the quality of the scent itself. STUDENT: Excuse me, Professor. Could this linguistic difference just be because the Jahai live in a tropical rainforest with more, you know, rich botanical smells than a typical city? PROFESSOR: That's a very logical hypothesis, and indeed, environmental exposure does play a role. But it isn't the whole story. Even when English speakers are highly trained—like professional wine tasters or perfumers—they still rely heavily on source-based language, like 'notes of leather' or 'citrus'. They don't magically invent abstract, non-source-based terms. So, it's not just about expertise or the density of odors in the environment; it is a structural property of the language itself. This suggests that our cognitive architecture—the way our minds organize sensory data—is far more flexible than we once thought. It means our inability to name smells is a cultural and linguistic trait, not an evolutionary hardware limitation. PROFESSOR: This brings us to the broader implications for the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, or linguistic relativity. This hypothesis, as you might recall, suggests that the structure of a language influences its speakers' non-linguistic cognitive processes. In the case of the Jahai, having these dedicated smell words seems to make them much more adept at discriminating between subtle scent variations. They aren't just better at talking about smells; they actually process olfactory information differently, categorizing and remembering scents with a precision that English speakers struggle to match. [Q23] What is the lecture mainly about?

(Shared with Q23.) [Q24] According to the professor, what distinguishes an abstract odor term from source-based naming?

(Shared with Q23.) [Q25] According to the lecture, what did researchers discover when comparing English speakers and Jahai speakers? Choose 2 answers.

(Shared with Q23.) [Q26] Why does the professor mention professional wine tasters and perfumers?

(Shared with Q23.) [Q27] What does the professor imply about the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis?

(Shared with Q23.) [Replay: "For English speakers, color codability was extremely high, but odor codability was, well, quite poor—actually, abysmal is a more accurate term."] [Q28] Why does the professor say this: