TOEFL Speaking Task 3 Practice #018 -… | English Rhino

TOEFL Speaking Task 3 Practice 018Science

TOEFL Speaking Task 3 Practice #018 - Science

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Reading passage

Primacy Effect When forming judgments about a person or situation, people often base their opinions primarily on the first impression or initial assessment. In other words, the first information we learn about someone or something tends to have a greater influence on our opinions than later information. This tendency is known as the primacy effect. Researchers suggest that this occurs because, once an initial judgment is made, individuals are more likely to focus on evidence that confirms their view, while overlooking or ignoring evidence that contradicts it.

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Listening transcript

Narrator:Now listen to part of a lecture on this topic in a Psychology class.

Professor:Here's an example from my own life. Before I started teaching, I worked as a research assistant in a laboratory for a year. Well, during my very first week on the job, I made a suggestion to my boss on how we could improve the way we were running an experiment. My suggestion was a good one. The experiment was successful, and we got great results. Anyway, that first week, because of that one experiment, my boss decided, perhaps without even realizing it, he decided I was a great research assistant, and he never changed his mind. After that first week, I was, I was okay, you know, average. I was a good worker, but I also made mistakes, everyone does. But whenever my boss introduced me to someone, he'd say, this is John, our star research assistant. But a coworker of mine, she wasn't as fortunate. Her first week at the lab, she made a big mistake, and the lab lost some important data. We recovered the data, but it cost the lab time and money. Well, our boss concluded that week that my coworker was unreliable, incompetent, and he continued to think that. But actually, after that week, she turned out to be a good research assistant, probably better than me. She made some other small mistakes, like I said everyone does. But our boss thought of her as unreliable... 'cause he only noticed her mistakes.

Your speaking task

Explain Primacy Effect and how the example from the lecture illustrates the concept.

Record up to 60 seconds. Nothing is uploaded until you submit it.