영어 모의고사 (자동 편성)

In the late nineteenth century, the psychologist Hermann Ebbinghaus undertook a rigorous investigation of forgetting ①by serve as his own experimental subject. He memorized thousands of meaningless three-letter syllables ②so that prior knowledge could not skew his results. After learning each list to perfection, he tested his retention at intervals ③ranging from twenty minutes to a month later. He recorded how many repetitions were required to relearn the material each time. The resulting curve revealed a consistent pattern. Forgetting proceeds rapidly during the initial hours following learning, then gradually ④decelerates until the rate of loss becomes almost imperceptible. Roughly half of the acquired information vanished within the first hour alone. Yet whatever survived that initial plunge tended to persist for much longer periods. Ebbinghaus further found that ⑤distributing study sessions across several days produced better retention than cramming the same repetition into one sitting.

Behavioral economists have long observed that people tend to feel the pain of losing something more intensely than the pleasure of gaining an equivalent amount, a tendency ①known as loss aversion. This asymmetry, which ②was first documented through a series of carefully designed experiments, suggests that the psychological weight of a loss can be roughly twice that of a comparable gain. Consider an investor who refuses to sell a declining stock, ③clings to the hope that its price will eventually recover, even when all available evidence indicates that selling and reinvesting elsewhere would be more rational. Such behavior, though it ④appears irrational from a purely economic standpoint, becomes understandable once we recognize that the investor is trying to avoid the sharp discomfort associated with realizing a loss. Similarly, consumers often demand a much higher price to give up an item they already own than they would be ⑤willing to pay to acquire the same item in the first place.

People routinely seek out information that confirms what they already believe while overlooking or dismissing evidence that ①contradicts those beliefs, a pattern known as confirmation bias. This tendency operates not because individuals are deliberately dishonest, but because the mind finds it cognitively less taxing ②to absorb information that fits an existing framework than to reconstruct that framework from scratch. Investors who believe a particular company will succeed, for instance, tend to interpret ambiguous news about that company favorably, while investors who ③are skeptical of the same company interpret identical news unfavorably, even though both groups are examining the same underlying facts. Social media platforms can intensify this effect by algorithmically presenting users with content similar to what they have previously engaged with, thereby ④narrowing the range of perspectives an individual regularly encounters. Over time, such selective exposure can harden initial impressions into convictions that ⑤feels objectively verified, even though they rest on a systematically filtered sample of evidence.

The discovery of CRISPR gene-editing technology gave scientists a tool ①precise enough to correct a single mistaken letter in the human genome, raising hope for curing inherited diseases that have resisted treatment for generations. Yet the same precision that makes CRISPR so promising also makes it ②dangerous in the wrong hands. Editing a gene in a sperm, egg, or early embryo does not simply change one patient; it alters the genetic code passed down to every future generation, a decision no single person should be allowed to make ③alone. Scientific organizations around the world have therefore drawn a careful line, ⑤permitting gene editing to treat disease in existing patients while ④permitting any edit that would be inherited by their descendants. Critics worry, however, that as the technology becomes cheaper and more widely available, this line will become harder to enforce than it is to draw.

When workers receive a five percent raise in a year when prices have climbed five percent as well, their real purchasing power has not changed at all, yet many still report feeling ①noticeably better off. This tendency to judge economic well-being by ②nominal figures printed on a paycheck, rather than by what that money can actually purchase, is known among economists as money illusion. Employers exploit this pattern by favoring modest nominal raises over deeper structural adjustments, since a visible increase on a payslip ③disappoints employees more effectively than an explanation about inflation could. The illusion persists even among people who claim to understand inflation well, which suggests that the bias operates at an ④intuitive level that formal knowledge does not easily override. Some economists argue that policymakers should exploit this illusion strategically, since workers resist nominal wage cuts far more ⑤fiercely than they resist the equivalent erosion of real wages.

A hamburger patty need not come from a slaughtered animal if a small sample of muscle cells can be persuaded to multiply inside a steel tank. Cultured meat begins with a biopsy of animal muscle tissue, from which scientists isolate cells capable of dividing repeatedly, then feed those cells a nutrient broth that supplies the sugars, proteins, and minerals an animal's bloodstream would normally provide. Inside a bioreactor, the cells multiply across scaffolding designed to encourage them to align into fibers, gradually thickening into something that begins to resemble muscle tissue. Supporters argue that because the process never requires raising and slaughtering a whole animal, _______________. Skeptics counter that producing the specialized broth at a large enough scale remains prohibitively expensive, meaning cultured meat is unlikely to compete with conventional meat in price until the technology matures considerably further.

When people estimate the value of an unfamiliar product, they rarely rely on objective calculation alone; instead, they anchor their judgment to whatever numerical reference happens to be presented first, however arbitrary that number may be. A shopper who first sees a jacket listed at $300 before it is marked down to $150 will likely judge the discounted price as an excellent bargain. Such evidence indicates that rational deliberation alone cannot fully explain how value is perceived, since the ___________ ultimately shapes what buyers are willing to pay.

Identical information can provoke strikingly different reactions depending on how it is worded, a phenomenon economists call the framing effect. Patients told that a surgical procedure carries a ninety percent survival rate tend to consent to it far more readily than patients told that the same procedure carries a ten percent mortality rate, even though the two descriptions convey exactly the same statistical reality. Recognizing how deeply framing shapes judgment is therefore essential, not because the underlying facts change, but because the very same facts, dressed in different language, can lead reasonable people toward ___________ conclusions.

Imagine two travelers preparing for the same trip: one refuses to fly after watching news coverage of a recent plane crash, while the other books a flight without hesitation. (A) This tendency, in which people estimate how likely an event is based on how easily examples come to mind rather than on actual data, quietly shapes countless everyday decisions. (B) Statistically, air travel remains far safer than driving the same distance by car, yet vivid, emotionally charged images tend to dominate human judgment more powerfully than dry statistics ever could. (C) News broadcasts that repeatedly feature rare disasters can leave viewers convinced that such events are common, even though official records clearly show the opposite. Advertisers and politicians alike exploit this pattern, knowing that a single striking anecdote often persuades audiences more effectively than pages of careful statistics ever manage to. Recognizing why memorable examples overshadow objective probability therefore matters, both for making sound personal choices and for noticing when public fear has drifted far from measurable reality.

This admission, however, is precisely what the sunk cost fallacy makes so difficult to accept. Consider a construction firm that has spent several years and a substantial budget building a bridge, only to discover partway through that a cheaper and safer alternative route has since become available. ( ① ) A purely forward-looking analysis would compare the remaining cost of finishing the original bridge against the total cost of switching to the new route, ignoring whatever has already been spent. ( ② ) If the new route is genuinely cheaper going forward, the rational choice is to abandon the original project regardless of how much money it has already consumed. ( ③ ) Abandoning the project, however, requires the firm's leadership to publicly acknowledge that a significant portion of the original investment produced no lasting value. ( ④ ) As a result, firms often continue projects long after the numbers clearly favor stopping, simply to avoid confronting this uncomfortable truth. ( ⑤ ) The bridge, in such cases, becomes less a matter of engineering than a monument to the difficulty of admitting a costly mistake.