Question

review the claim and the two pieces of evidence. independent of their meanings, some words have a more pleasing sound than others. evidence a: a linguist analyzed lists of words that sound the most beautiful to english speakers. he noted sound - related trends among the \beautiful\ words, such as having three syllables, having the accent on the first syllable, and containing the sounds m and l. evidence b: the british council surveyed over forty thousand people worldwide about what the most beautiful word in the english language is. words with positive meanings dominated the list: mother, passion, smile, love, and eternity were the top five choices. why is evidence a stronger than evidence b? evidence b does not directly support the claim. it does not talk about how words sound independent of their meanings. evidence b is anecdotal. it is based on the opinions of a few people who arent experts.

Explanation:

The claim is about words' pleasing sounds independent of meaning. Evidence A analyzes sound - related trends (syllables, accent, sounds) of "beautiful - sounding" words, directly addressing the claim. Evidence B focuses on words with positive meanings (relating to meaning, not sound - independent qualities), so it doesn't directly support the claim. The second option is wrong because Evidence B surveyed 40,000 people (not anecdotal or from a few non - experts).

Answer:

Evidence B does not directly support the claim. It does not talk about how words sound independent of their meanings.