PTE Drop Down Fill In The Blanks Question With Detailed Answer

Solve the following Drop-Down Fill In The Blanks –

Evidence for a genetic basis of anti-social behaviour stems from several different lines of research. First, behaviour genetic studies of twins and adoptees have demonstrated that ________ plays a role in antisocial behaviour, including various forms of aggression and criminality, by finding greater concordance for such behaviour in genetically ________ individuals, compare to non-relatives living in the same environment. Second, various correlates of antisocial behaviour, including personality factors such as impulsivity, sensation-seeking, risk-taking, and callous-unemotional traits, are known to be at least partly genetically ________. Third, psychiatric outcomes related to antisocial behaviour, including antisocial personality disorder, gambling, and substance use and abuse, have also been ________ in genetically informative designs, and each of these has demonstrated significant genetic links.

Paragraph hints which you must know:

Sentence 1 – Paragraphs is related to genetics
Blank 2 – It must be some word with the third form of verb, like genetically “modified” individuals, genetically are “related” individuals, genetically “unrelated” individuals, means the verb form must be third form. Genetically modified or related individuals compare to non-relatives living in the same environment.
Blank 3 – Again it must be related.
Blank 4 – Before blank, they have used words “have also been” this is a passage sentence, this is not an active sentence. So in this, there must be the third form.

Let’s look out for the options –

Blank 1 – a) parenting b) environment c) heredity d) culture
Blank 2 – a) identical b) related c) diverse d) idealized
Blank 3 – a) delivered b) managed c) directed d) influenced
Blank 4 – a) inferred b) investigated c) inspected d) integrated

Answers with Explanation –

Blank 1 – parenting, environment, heredity, culture
So technically and grammatically all of these are correct, so we’ll leave this as it is.

Blank 2 – identical, related, diverse, idealized
Genetically identical individuals – No, there is no such thing. Related – Yes. Diverse – Again no, Idealized – No. So if you know the meaning of diverse and idealized, they don’t fit in the second blank. So the word must be genetically “related” individuals compare to the non-relative. From word “non-relatives” in the sentence, you can take hint “compared to non-relatives” in the same environment. For word environment, they are saying that such behavior is present in genetically related individuals compared to non-relatives living in the same environment. So technically environment doesn’t pay any role in blank 1.

Blank 1 – So we’ll exclude word environment form option. Demonstrated that “this” plays a role in antisocial behavior. So we are left with three options.
Note – that’s why we have told that read carefully those sentences which don’t have blanks.

Blank 3 – delivered, managed, directed, influenced
Delivered – No, Manages – Again No, Directed – No, Influenced – Yes (Again you need to know the meaning of influenced and all of these delivered, managed, directed to pick the correct word.

Blank 4 – inferred, investigated, inspected, integrated
“have also been” so we need to pick the third form. Inferred – No, inferred means when we are writing a conclusion based on so many facts. Investigated – Yes. Next option – “Inspected” means direct inspection like skin color is inspected by the doctor, skin color isn’t investigated by the doctor. Integrated again you need to know the meaning of these integrated and inspected but the correct option must be investigated.

Have also been “investigated” in genetically informative designs.

We have one blank left –

Blank 1 – So here it must be “heredity” why? Did they talk anything about parents here – No, “environment” we have already excluded, “heredity” – Yes, this lecture is all about genetics and heredity, “culture” – no, there is nothing about culture in this so we’ll pick heredity.

So, this is how we’ll pick the drop down menus and there are two important things in this, one is Collocations and second is meaning (vocabulary), you need to know the meaning.

So after filling the blanks what you can do, not on the real test but here while practicing, you need to check the meaning of other words. What we do, we fill in the blank and then afterwords move to the next paragraph and this is the biggest mistake we do. So what we do, we’ll underline the words and we look for the meaning.

Such as words like – Adoptees, demonstrated, aggression, concordance, correlates, identical, etc. So in this paragraph, you can easily get 20 – 30 new words and you need to know the meanings of those words and write in your PTE notebook.