atswa pilot questions answers part i - The Institute of Chartered ...

SECTION B:
COMPULSORY
COMPREHENSION
Read the following passage carefully and answer the questions on it.
Advertisements are part of our everyday lives. We meet them in newspapers, on the
radio and television, in the street and even in buses and trains. We are so
accustomed to them that it would be very strange to wake up one morning and find
that they had all disappeared.
Yet advertising by manufacturers only occurs on a large scale in democratic
countries, where free enterprise leads to competition and completion to
advertisement. In certain totalitarian countries where the state controls production,
there is no cut-throat competition but equally there are very few brand names and
only a meagre choice of articles. In these circumstances, most of the brand names
are naturally well- known. If there is, for instance, only one brand of toothpaste, it is
pointless to advertise it.
On the other hand, people often feel that competing manufacturers spend so much
money on advertising their various brands that they have to increase the price of
their article considerably in order to cover the advertising costs. But although a lot
of money is spent on advertising, this only raises the selling price of each massproduced
article by an insignificant amount. And from the manufacturers‟ point of
view, such a small price reduction would be a poor selling device. It might attract a
few purchasers who would not otherwise buy the article, but their number would be
nothing in comparison with those who are attracted by advertisements.
Even though advertisements are the result of competition, they do have a useful
function: that of giving information. Of course, people often complain that – with all
their exaggerations, half-truths and distorted facts- advertisements misinform
rather than inform. But do any of us actually believe all we are told in an
advertisement? Are we really persuaded that a particular soap powder washes
whitest of all or that one kind of margarine is better for us than any other? On the
other hand , we do often derive valuable information from such advertisements. All
of us have probably at some time been helped to find a commodity we were looking
for through seeing it advertised. And when we read a whole range of
advertisements for similar products, we are least informed that we have a choice.
It is also sometimes argued that, by their advertisements, manufacturers make people
buy things they do not really want. But how can they force us into doing this? We are
always at liberty to refuse to buy a particular product. Of course, advertisements may
sometimes induce people to buy articles which they did not want before they read
about them. But even then, the desire for the advantages conferred by these articles
(e.g. greater prestige, comfort, popularity, enjoyment) must have already existed or
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