Question

in a 1999 experiment at harvard university, psychologists daniel simons and christopher chabris instructed participants to count basketball passes in a video. while observers focused on this task, a person in a gorilla suit strolled through the scene. remarkably, nearly half of the subjects failed to notice the intruder entirely. this phenomenon, which the researchers termed \inattentional blindness,\ suggests that visual perception is not a passive recording of reality but a selective process heavily constrained by the observers mental focus.
6 mark for review
which choice best describes the function of the underlined sentence in the text as a whole?
a it presents a specific experimental result that undermines the theoretical conclusion drawn in the final sentence.
b it reports a surprising finding that provides the empirical basis for the concept introduced in the following sentence.
c it details the instructional methods used to ensure the participants prioritized the counting task over other stimuli.
d it argues that the participants failure to identify the figure was due to a physiological deficit rather than a psychological one.

Explanation:

• Option A: The final sentence is the conclusion (inattentional blindness and its implication), and the underlined sentence is the experimental result that supports, not undermines, this conclusion. So A is wrong.
• Option B: The underlined sentence reports the finding (nearly half missed the gorilla) which is surprising. The following sentence introduces the concept of "inattentional blindness" based on this empirical finding. This matches the function.
• Option C: The underlined sentence is about the result of the experiment, not the instructional methods. So C is wrong.
• Option D: The passage later says perception is a selective process due to mental focus, not a physiological deficit. The underlined sentence doesn't argue for physiological deficit. So D is wrong.

Answer:

B. It reports a surprising finding that provides the empirical basis for the concept introduced in the following sentence.