IELTS Research Reports

Construct validity in the IELTS Academic Reading testRhetorical categoryReactions/responsesMethods/approachesPredictionsViews/consensusSuggestions /recommendationsSample promptGroup response to alarming predictionsReaction of Inuit communities to climate changeHolistic approach to healthPredictions regarding the availability of the synthetic silkThe views of the medical establishmentGrowing consensus on sea levelA suggestion for improving trade in the futureTable 5. Rhetorical categories used in summary promptsFor this type of engagement, the moving between propositional content and summary, or whatvan Dijk and Kintsch (1983) call a mediating of ‘micro- and macro-processes’, is analysed as an‘interpretative’ form of reading, or at least a more interpretative one than was seen in the True/False/Not given format discussed previously. The task for test takers in the Section–summary match formatdoes not involve identifying a one-to-one correspondence between propositions as we saw in TaskType 1, but instead requires a ‘pragmatic’ understanding of material of the type identified by Taylor(2009 – see section 3.1). On the ‘literal-interpretative’ continuum on our grid, the generic Section–summary match task is therefore placed somewhat below the first task type (See Figure 4).Regarding the degree of ‘interpretative-ness’, a variation in the design of Section – summary matchtasks deserves brief comment here. Whereas most summary prompts were typically realised in aneutral, academic style; it was observed that in some instances a more idiomatic, ‘journalistic’ styleof heading was used. Examples of this latter style are shown in Sample 2:3 below. (In this case theprompts relate to a reading passage describing the function of different types of security devices).List of Headingsi) Common objectivesii)iii)iv)Who’s planning whatThis type sells best in the shopsThe figures say it allv) Early trialsvi)vii)viii)ix)They can’t get in without theseHow does it work?Fighting fraudSystems to avoidx) Accepting the inevitableIELTS Research Reports Volume 11207