SE Question Help

[zrome]

Can someone help explain this question to me? Thanks.

5. Not only love affects the eye of the beholder; other emotions also ____ the interpretation of the events that we witness.

A. cloud

B. trigger

C. devalue

D. color

E. objectify

F. impact

Correct Answer:

DF

 

 

I would think the following choices would make sense:

B (Trigger) and F (Impact).

Can someone explain why

B (Trigger)

is wrong?

[GRE_Kickboxer]

D and F are definitely the best choices. The reason is that the sentence requires a word that is similar to "affects" which means "to influence" or to "have an impact on." Trigger means to set in motion, or "to start" as if it had never happened before. "Affect" doesn't mean that it is just starting to happen. That is why trigger is wrong.

 

To "color" in this context means "to influence."This is quite similar to "affect." "Impact" is a good answer because this also means to have an influence on.

 

Let me know if you need more of an explanation.

[GRE_Kickboxer]

One more thing. Maybe the reason you thought "trigger" and "impact" go together is because "impact" can mean "collision" or crash. This makes the word sound similar to "trigger." This can cause you to select the wrong answer.

 

In the sentence above, however, the meaning of "impact" is to have an INFLUENCE on. The sentence is implying that there will be an INFLUENCE on interpretation.

 

If you use the word "trigger" it makes it sound like someone will "start interpreting" for the first time, which is clearly not what is meant.

[Mehjabeen]

Why isn't the answer Cloud and objectify? plz explain

[momomo]

Why isn't the answer Cloud and objectify? plz explain

 

Because in the first half of the question "Not only love affects the eye of the beholder"

You can tell that the blank is a synonym to "AFFECTS", which is a neutral word (also happens to be used neutrally here). You can affect something negatively OR positively, but it does not say + or - here, so, neutral.

 

Hence:

A: cloud, means to make ambiguous, obscure. Negative. not what we want.

B: trigger, to start something. not even close to a synonym.

C: devalue, to make something loose value. Definitely Negative, not what we want.

D: color, to affect, to influence. Neutral. Closest to what we want.

E: objectify, to degrade the statute to an object. Negative. Mehh.

F. impact, to affect, usually used as "strongly affect"

 

Sometimes in the answer choices, there exists multiple synonyms to the key word. Then, we should look at the polarity of the key word, positive, negative or neutral.