Directions: In the passage given below, each blank is followed by a word given…
2024
Directions: In the passage given below, each blank is followed by a word given in brackets. For the blank asked about, four alternative words are offered along with the choice ‘No correction/change required’. Choose the word that best suits the blank; if the word given in brackets already suits the blank, choose ‘No correction/change required’.
The cyber attack on Britain’s healthcare services network was almost like an Alfred Hitchcock movie where the opening scene establishes the tone for the rest of the film. As researchers warn against malware ‘Judy’ that targets your smartphone, it becomes the third major global cyber attack this month after ‘Ransomware’ that ______(1)______ (entered) international systems. Foreign media reported how Ransomware caused operations to be cancelled at hospitals, ambulances to be diverted and medical records to be held at ransom. And while this threat was tackled, the incident gives us a ______(2)______ (sneak) in the dangers that ______(3)______ (stay) in the dark corners of the net and its potential to cause life-threatening damage. Earlier this year, the United States Food and Drug Administration had warned of this sort of attack being unleashed through medical devices. A medical device is as vulnerable to security breaches as any other, it ______(4)______ (exclaimed). The vulnerability increases as medical devices are increasingly connected to the internet, hospital networks, and to other medical devices, the US regulator had said. Think of a situation where your blood sugar readings are linked directly to your doctor or the medical records are all uploaded on to the internet. And, what if the readings are altered? The ______(5)______ (ramifications) this can have on automated medication, interpretation of medical readings, etc, can be life-threatening.
Find the appropriate word for blank (5).
- A.
complications
- B.
manifestations
- C.
reflections
- D.
influences
- E.
No correction/change required
Attempted by 3 students.
Show answer & explanation
Correct answer: E
Concept: In a word-replacement (‘no-change’) cloze, the word printed in brackets is only a candidate — it is not automatically an error. A replacement is justified only when an offered word beats the bracketed word on BOTH tests that govern word choice: SENSE (does it carry the exact meaning the sentence’s logic demands?) and COLLOCATION (does it combine idiomatically with the words around it?). If no alternative wins on both, the bracketed word stands.
Application — what does blank (5) demand?
Read the logic. The sentences just before the blank build a cause: medical records are uploaded to the internet, and then ‘what if the readings are altered?’ The blank must name the far-reaching, harmful outcomes that FOLLOW from that tampering.
Read the frame. The sentence runs ‘The ______ this can have on automated medication, interpretation of medical readings, etc, can be life-threatening.’ So the noun must fit the pattern ‘the X this can have ON something’ — an effect-type noun — and must be strong enough to be called life-threatening.
Test the bracketed word. ‘Ramification’ = a consequence or implication of an action, especially one which complicates a situation. It passes the sense test (a harmful downstream outcome) and the collocation test (‘the ramifications this can have on …’ is standard English).
Test every alternative against those same two tests before deciding whether any of them beats it.
Contrast — why each offered word fails:
complications — difficulties or complicating factors that arise WITHIN a situation (a complication in a plan; post-operative complications). It names the tangle itself, not the outcomes an event produces on other systems, and English takes ‘complications in/for’, never ‘complications … on’.
manifestations — outward signs or displays through which something hidden shows itself (a symptom is a manifestation of a disease). Automated medication is what gets damaged by tampered readings, not the visible evidence of them; and a display in itself is not ‘life-threatening’.
reflections — mirrored images, periods of careful thought, or (in ‘a reflection on someone’) an implied censure. None of those senses is a harmful outcome, and ‘the reflections this can have on automated medication’ is not idiomatic.
influences — neutral, gradual effects that shape character, behaviour or development (a teacher’s influence; the influence of climate on crops). Far too weak and too diffuse for something the passage calls life-threatening, and it carries none of the unwelcome-consequence force the context builds.
Cross-check: substitute each alternative back into the frame and read it aloud — ‘the complications / manifestations / reflections / influences this can have on automated medication … can be life-threatening.’ Each is either unidiomatic or too weak, while the bracketed word reads naturally and carries the full weight of the sentence.
Result: no alternative beats ‘ramifications’ on either sense or collocation, so the bracketed word is left exactly as it is — the correct choice is ‘No correction/change required’.