Here are Top 3 frequently asked Summarize Written Text questions in recent PTE Academic test (July 2021).

1.Sleep Time

If it seems like you’re not getting enough sleep, you’re not alone. People have evolved to sleep much less than chimps, baboons or any other primates studied so far, a new study finds. Charles Nunn and David Samson are evolutionary anthropologists. They study how humans have evolved to behave the way we do. Nunn works at Duke University in Durham, N.C. Samson works at the University of Toronto Mississauga in Canada. In their new study, the two compared sleep patterns in 30 different species of primates, including humans. Most species slept between nine and 15 hours daily. Humans averaged just seven hours of shut-eye. Based on lifestyle and biological factors, however, people should get 9.55 hours, Nunn and Samson calculate. Most other primates in the study typically sleep as much as the scientists predicted they should. Nunn and Samson shared their findings online February 14 in the American Journal of Physical Anthropology.

The researchers argue that two long-standing features of human life may play into our short sleep times. The first stems from when humans’ ancestors descended from the trees to sleep on the ground. At that point, people probably had to spend more time awake to guard against predators. The second may reflect the intense pressure humans face to learn and teach new skills and to make social connections. That has left less time for sleep.

As sleep declined, rapid-eye movement — or REM — sleep took on an outsize role in humans, Nunn and Samson propose. REM sleep is when we dream. And it has been linked to learning and memory.

“It’s pretty surprising that non-REM sleep time is so low in humans,” Nunn says. “But something had to give as we slept less.”

SWT – Sleep Time – Sample Answer:

People have evolved to sleep much less than other primates because human’s ancestors descended from the trees to sleep on the ground, and that the intense pressure humans face to learn and teach new skills and to make social connections, so rapid-eye movement sleep took on an outsize role in humans and it has been linked to learning and memory. (61 words)

2.Bank Overdraft

Banks provide short-term ﬁnance to companies in the form of an overdraft on a current account. The advantage of an overdraft is its flexibility. When the cash needs of the company increase with seasonal factors, the company can continue to write cheques and watch the overdraft increase. When the goods and services are sold and cash begins to ﬂow in, the company should be able to watch the overdraft decrease again. The most obvious example of a business which operates in this pattern is farming. The farmer uses the overdraft to ﬁnance the acquisition of seed for arable farming, or feed through the winter for stock farming and to cover the period when the crops or animals are growing and maturing. The overdraft is reduced when the crops or the animals are sold.

The main disadvantage of an overdraft is that it is repayable on demand. The farmer whose crop fails because of bad weather knows the problem of being unable to repay the overdraft. Having overdraft financing increases the worries of those who manage the company. The other disadvantage is that the interest payable on overdrafts is variable. When interest rates increase, the cost of the overdraft increases. Furthermore, for small companies there are often complaints that the rate of interest charged is high compared with that available to larger companies. The banks answer that the rates charged reﬂect relative risk and it is their experience that small companies are more risky.

SWT – Bank Overdraft- Sample Answer:

Although the advantage that banks provide short-term ﬁnance to companies in the form of an overdraft on a current account is its flexibility, the main disadvantage of an overdraft is that it is repayable on demand as well as the interest payable on overdrafts is variable. (47 words)

3.Sustainable Development

The Brundtland Report, Our Common Future (1987), defines sustainable development as “development which meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs’. Implicit in this definition is the idea that the old pattern of development could not be sustained. Is this true? Development in the past was driven by growth and innovation. It led to new technologies and huge improvements in living standards. To assume that we know what the circumstances or needs of future generations will be is mistaken and inevitably leads to the debilitating sense that we are living on borrowed time.

Only if we assume that society will remain static can we understand the needs of the future. The way we live today could not have been predicted twenty years ago. The sustainability paradigm fails to recognize this. It is a static view and thus places limits on human ingenuity. Similarly, a whole host of false assumptions dominate environmental thought; the scale of problems is exaggerated, the amount of resources is underestimated and spurious links are made between areas such as green policies and profit, poverty and environmental degradation. Those of us who want a better future need to question these assumptions.

SWT – Sustainable Development – Sample Answer:

The definition of sustainable development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generation to meet their own needs is not true since development in the past led to new technologies and huge improvements in living standards, and that the sustainability paradigm fails to recognize needs of the future because a whole host of false assumptions dominate environmental thought. (64 words)