# Music and the emotions: answers and explanations

Cambridge IELTS 12, Test 3, Reading Passage 3

Source: Passage, questions and answer key from Cambridge IELTS 12, Test 3, Reading Passage 3. © Cambridge University Press & Assessment. Used for educational practice. Explanations and evidence notes are written by Testmigo.

## Answer key

| Q | Answer | Proof |
| --- | --- | --- |
| 27 | dopamine | The first thing they discovered is that music triggers the production of dopamine |
| 28 | pleasure | As these two regions have long been linked with the experience of pleasure |
| 29 | caudate | the dopamine neurons in the caudate - a region of the brain involved in learning stimulus-response associations |
| 30 | anticipatory phase | The researchers call this the 'anticipatory phase' |
| 31 | food | and in anticipating food and other 'reward' stimuli |
| 32 | B | When listening to our favourite songs, our body betrays all the symptoms of emotional arousal. |
| 33 | C | they were able to obtain an impressively exact and detailed portrait of music in the brain. |
| 34 | A | were at their most active around 15 seconds before the participants' favourite moments in the music. |
| 35 | B | It is this uncertainty that triggers the surge of dopamine in the caudate |
| 36 | D | Meyer argued that the emotions we find in music come from the unfolding events of the music itself. |
| 37 | F | this cluster of cells is most active when the 'chills' have yet to arrive |
| 38 | B | Numerous studies, after all, have demonstrated that dopamine neurons quickly adapt to predictable rewards. |
| 39 | E | carefully holds off repeating it |
| 40 | C | While earlier theories of music focused on the way a sound can refer to the real world of images and experiences |

## Why these answers are right

**27. dopamine.** The summary asks what substance neurons released when participants heard their music. The second paragraph says the first discovery was that music triggers the production of dopamine by neurons in two brain regions. The substance is dopamine.

**28. pleasure.** Gap 28 asks what feeling the two brain regions are associated with. The writer says the dorsal and ventral regions have long been linked with the experience of pleasure. "Linked with" matches "associated with", so the word is pleasure.

**29. caudate.** The summary needs the name of the brain area whose neurons were active just before favorite moments. The third paragraph names the caudate, a region involved in learning and anticipating rewards. The area is the caudate.

The why and the trap for questions 30 onwards are free with an account on the [answers page](https://testmigo.com/ielts/reading/music-and-the-emotions/answers).

[Practice Music and the emotions](https://testmigo.com/ielts/reading/music-and-the-emotions)