Epigenetics

The author's purpose in writing this article is most likely ...

• To show that if someone has suffered a traumatic event, then their children will definitely be affected by it.

• To motivate members of the audience and scientists in this important field of study.

• To convince the audience that trauma can have a consequences beyond the lifetime of the person who experiences it.

• To persuade they audience that they should quit smoking.

• o compel the audience to believe that only weak-minded individuals complain of trauma.

The word "epigenetic," used repeatedly throughout the article, most closely relates to the idea of...

• Social influences from parents.

• Traumatic events and how people survive them

• The human capacity for fear

• Inherited changes in genes

• Consistent genetic makeup

Which sentence best sums up the main idea of this article?

• For example, girls born to Dutch women who were pregnant during a severe famine at the end of the second world war had an above-average risk of developing schizophrenia.

• Recent studies suggest that some of these genetic tags might somehow be passed through generations, meaning our environment could have an impact on our children's health.

• Through further genetic analysis, the team ruled out the possibility that the epigenetic changes were a result of trauma that the children had experienced themselves.

• Despite never having encountered the smell of cherry blossom, the offspring of these mice had the same fearful response to the smell - shuddering when they came in contact with it.

• The idea is controversial, as scientific convention states that genes contained in DNA are the only way to transmit biological information between generations.

Which implication (or inference) can be correctly drawn from this article?

• The idea of epigenetic inheritance is only true of Holocaust survivors and their descendants.

• Survivors of trauma might pass down genetic changes related to what they experienced to their offspring.

• Since it is impossible to determine whether or not trauma can affect survivors' offspring, it is not an important question to consider.

• The scientific evidence behind epigenetics is dubious and not based on real data.

• People who suffer traumatic events are doomed to pass on this suffering to their children.

The author's tone can best be described as...

• Foreboding and/or Fearful.

• Sincere and/or hopeful.

• Falsely cheerful.

• Objective and/or straightforward.

• Skeptical and/or cynical.