Question

reading is often accompanied by a cacophony or background speech, such as from the television or the conversations of friends or colleagues. when trying to concentrate on a task, people often report that the presence of nearby speech is annoying. however, they are usually not very good at accurately estimating how distracted they will be by such sounds. when measured in the lab, peoples ability to carry out study - related tasks is usually made worse by irrelevant speech in the background. for example, a recent study recorded participants eye movements as they read texts and listened to irrelevant background speech. the results showed reading needed more effort because participants more often had to go back to previously read words and re - examine them. this distraction occurred because readers were inadvertently trying to listen to the irrelevant speech and process its meaning, even though it had nothing to do with what they were reading. listening to music is another common distraction that many students choose. a recent survey found that 62% of university students were listening to music while studying or doing homework. but again, recent eye - tracking evidence suggests that listening to music also reduces reading efficiency in a similar way to irrelevant speech. this may occur because much music contains language in the form of lyrics that readers try to process. in fact, a recent summary of a large number of studies on the topic, or metastudy, has suggested that listening to lyrical music may be just as detrimental to text comprehension as listening to speech. assessment questions 15 out of 35 answered question 16 what conclusion does the article form about lyrical and instrumental music? a. both positively affect reading efficiency and thus studying performance. b. both negatively affect reading efficiency and thus studying performance. c. listening to instrumental music while studying improves reading comprehension. d. listening to lyrical music while studying can negatively affect reading comprehension.

Explanation:

The article discusses how listening to music (both lyrical and instrumental) while studying affects reading efficiency and performance. It mentions that listening to music can be a distraction. For example, listening to irrelevant speech (which can be compared to music with lyrics) reduces reading efficiency. Also, listening to instrumental music while studying may have little to no detrimental effect on text comprehension, but overall, listening to music while studying generally has a negative impact on reading - related tasks.

Answer:

B. Both negatively affect reading efficiency and thus studying performance.