When you first arrive in a new culture, there is a period of confusion that comes from the new situation and from a lack of information. It leaves you quite dependent and in need of help in the form of information and above. The second stage begins as you start to interact with the new culture. It is called the stage of small victories. Each new encounter with the culture is fraught with peril. It is preceded by anxiety and information collection and rehearsal. Then the event occurs and you return home either triumphant or defeated. When successful, the feelings really are very much as though a major victory has been won. A heightened roller coaster effect is particularly characteristic of this stage. The support needed is emotional support, people who appreciate what you are going through and who can cheer you onward. It often happens that once some of the fundamentals of life are mastered, there is time to explore and discover the new culture. This is the honeymoon stage of wonder and infatuation, in it there is a heightened appreciation of the new, the different, the aesthetic. Depending on the degree of cultural immersion and exploration it may continue for a considerable period of time. During this time there is no interest in attending to the less attractive downsides of the culture.
After a while, a self-correction takes place. No honeymoon can last forever. Irritation and anger begin to be experienced. Why in the world would anyone do it that way? Can’t these people get their act together? Now the deficits seem glaringly apparent. For some people, they overwhelm the positive characteristics and become predominant. Finally, if you are lucky enough to chart a course through these stages and not get stuck (and people do get stuck in these stages), there is a rebalance of reality. There is the capacity to understand and enjoy the new culture without ignoring those features that are less desirable. This cultural entry and engagement process is both cognitive and affective. New information is acquired and remembered; old schema and perceptions are revised and qualified. An active learning process occurs. At the same time, anxiety arises in reaction to uncertainties and the challenges of the learning processes. It must be managed, as must the extremes of feeling that occur in this labile period. Thus, I am describing a learning process that results in valuing and affirming the best in the culture while at the same time seeing it in its completeness, seeing it whole. The capacity to affirm the whole — including those aspects that are less desirable yet are part of the whole — is critically important. An appreciative process, “appreciative inquiry” is proposed as a way of helping members of different cultures recognize and value their differences and create a new culture where different values are understood and honoured. Executives — those who must lead this culture–change projects — need to understand that equal employment opportunity, affirmative action and sexual harassment policies, as viewed and implemented in organizations, are problem-oriented change strategies. They focus on correcting what is wrong rather than creating a valued future. Executives themselves will need to inquire appreciatively into cultures that are not known to them before they are equipped to lead cultural change in their own organizations.
Which of the following statements is not true?
Show Hint
- A particular effect of interaction with a new culture is an opportunity to enjoy a roller coaster ride.
- Entering a new culture brings about a shift in processes of thinking and feeling.
- An initial sense of wonder and awe makes a new entrant oblivious to the less pleasant side of the new culture.
- Some people can forever remain angry and dissatisfied with the new culture.
The Correct Option is D
Solution and Explanation
Entering new cultures can predominantly help the entrant in
Show Hint
- understanding the appreciative process.
- appreciating stages in cultural development.
- appreciating diversity.
- understanding the problem solving process.
The Correct Option is B
Solution and Explanation
Opening a bank account in a new culture is an example of which stage?
Show Hint
- Confusion.
- Small victories.
- Honeymoon.
- (b) and (c).
The Correct Option is B
Solution and Explanation
According to the passage, entering a culture that is very different from your own is overall
Show Hint
- an infatuating process.
- a learning process.
- an exhausting process.
- a depressing process.
The Correct Option is B
Solution and Explanation
Which of the following statements cannot be inferred from the above passage?
Show Hint
- Acts that are meaningful in the familiar culture cannot be taken for granted in a new one.
- Social interaction becomes less predictable in a new culture.
- Seeing someone in completeness means accepting him with his strengths and weaknesses.
- Modifications in organization culture must result in appreciative inquiry.
The Correct Option is D
Solution and Explanation
Which of the following is true?
Show Hint
- Infatuation and heightened appreciation with a new culture can be maintained forever.
- Entry to a new culture evokes an extremely negative feeling.
- Affirmation of a new culture involves viewing it in its entirety with its strengths as well as weak points.
- Organizational policies to deal with sexual harassment can bring about a change in the organizational culture.
The Correct Option is C
Solution and Explanation
The author is making a case for
Show Hint
- varying interest rates on loans.
- withdrawing the legislation on usury.
- reducing the interest rate difference on large deposits as against small.
- ensuring that owners get interest rates, which are determined by free market operations.
The Correct Option is B
Solution and Explanation
The lament of the author is that the mischief that the law makes is that
Show Hint
- it puts a ceiling on interest rates.
- it overlooks economic theory.
- it accepts the selling of a product at an exorbitant price while lending at high interest rates as illegal.
- many needy people do not get money.
The Correct Option is C
Solution and Explanation
The author suggests that
Show Hint
- usury is desirable.
- there should be no legal restrictions on interest rates.
- one should have one’s cake and eat it too.
- he has no answer to the question of usury legislation.
The Correct Option is B
Solution and Explanation
How is usury defined?
Show Hint
- Charging interest rates in excess of legal limits.
- Charging exorbitant interest rates.
- Allowing any amount to be borrowed.
- None of the above.
The Correct Option is A
Solution and Explanation
Bentham was primarily concerned with
Show Hint
- all loans in the economy.
- loans by money lenders.
- loans by individuals and businesses.
- loans by banks and financial institutions.
The Correct Option is B
Solution and Explanation
To reclaim his own money, man becomes an oppressor because
Show Hint
- he will reclaim it with high interest.
- the borrower cannot repay.
- borrowers do not like to part with money.
- the critical need being over, the money lent is of less value to the borrower.
The Correct Option is D
Solution and Explanation
Who should be allowed to borrow and lend at any interest rate?
Show Hint
- Individuals and businesses.
- Money lenders.
- Sane men acting freely and with full knowledge.
- Small lenders and borrowers.
The Correct Option is C
Solution and Explanation
The author is
Show Hint
- a politician.
- a plutocrat.
- a reformed post glasnost Marxist.
- a staunch supporter of free market operations.
The Correct Option is D
Solution and Explanation
Mischief of usury legislation has increased as
Show Hint
- loans have increased.
- more people have become lenders.
- small lenders are hardest hit by the legislation.
- more people, among the working class, are net lenders.
The Correct Option is C
Solution and Explanation
Top Questions on Reading Comprehension
- Shown below are letters ‘e’ taken from four popular logos, arranged in a sequence. Which of the options is the correct sequence?
- UCEED - 2026
- English Language Comprehension
- Reading Comprehension
- Shown below are four options, each showing consecutive frames representing the movement of a pendulum of an old-style wall clock for an animation movie. Which is the correct option?
- UCEED - 2026
- English Language Comprehension
- Reading Comprehension
- Acrucial moderating factor in how people experience comparisons is self-esteem. Individuals with high self-esteem are more likely to interpret upward comparison as informative rather than threatening. They are more resilient in the face of others’ success and more likely to believe they can reach their own goals. In contrast, people with low self-esteem are more prone to interpret comparison as judgment, reinforcing negative self-views and triggering feelings of inadequacy.
This dynamic creates a self-reinforcing loop. People with high self-esteem are less vulnerable to upward comparison, which intensifies those doubts. Those with a secure sense of self are more likely to use comparison as a learning tool. The same external stimulus—a colleague’s achievements, a friend’s popularity—can have radically different effects depending on internal stability.
Self-esteem also influences how people choose their comparison targets. Research has found that individuals often engage in “selective comparison,” seeking out those who confirm their existing beliefs about themselves. This can become a subtle form of self-sabotage. Someone who feels unworthy may subconsciously seek out targets that reinforce that sense, perpetuating a narrative of inferiority. One of the most promising antidotes to social comparison is temporal comparison—evaluating oneself not against others, but against one’s own past. This method has been shown to increase motivation and satisfaction, especially when individuals can see concrete progress. Temporal comparison activates the same reward circuits as social comparison but avoids the threat systems associated with social ranking. It also reinforces agency: individuals focus on what they can control and improve rather than what others control. In therapeutic and coaching settings, temporal comparison is used to help clients build self-efficacy and track growth over time.
Moreover, people who focus on self-improvement rather than social dominance are less likely to fall into cycles of envy or self-pity. They can still use others as inspiration, but they do so without attaching their self-worth to the outcome. This is not to say they never compare—but that they focus on learning, rather than judgment. The most skilful approach to comparison may lie in eliminating it, but in reframing it as feedback. When we interpret comparison as information rather than a verdict, we can ask, “What can I learn from this?” This shift turns comparison into a growth tool. Teachers mentor their students, not as rivals. Psychologists emphasize that the key variable here is mindset.
A fixed mindset sees comparison as a threat. If someone else is better, it means we are worse. A growth mindset sees comparison as a map. If someone else has reached a certain level, it means the path exists. This reframing is not just a cognitive trick. It changes the emotional tone of comparison, making it more likely to inspire than to wound. Reframing also requires emotional regulation—the ability to notice an initial pang of envy or shame without reacting impulsively. With practice, individuals can learn to pause, reflect, and reinterpret their emotional responses. Over time, this builds resilience and self-trust, allowing comparison to become a learning tool rather than a cage.- XAT - 2026
- Verbal and Logical Ability
- Reading Comprehension
When people who are talking don’t share the same culture, knowledge, values, and assumptions, mutual understanding can be especially difficult. Such understanding is possible through the negotiation of meaning. To negotiate meaning with someone, you have to become aware of and respect both the differences in your backgrounds and when these differences are important. You need enough diversity of cultural and personal experience to be aware that divergent world views exist and what they might be like. You also need the flexibility in world view, and a generous tolerance for mistakes, as well as a talent for finding the right metaphor to communicate the relevant parts of unshared experiences or to highlight the shared experiences while demphasizing the others. Metaphorical imagination is a crucial skill in creating rapport and in communicating the nature of unshared experience. This skill consists, in large measure, of the ability to bend your world view and adjust the way you categorize your experiences. Problems of mutual understanding are not exotic; they arise in all extended conversations where understanding is important.
When it really counts, meaning is almost never communicated according to the CONDUIT metaphor, that is, where one person transmits a fixed, clear proposition to another by means of expressions in a common language, where both parties have all the relevant common knowledge, assumptions, values, etc. When the chips are down, meaning is negotiated: you slowly figure out what you have in common, what it is safe to talk about, how you can communicate unshared experience or create a shared vision. With enough flexibility in bending your world view and with luck and charity, you may achieve some mutual understanding.
Communication theories based on the CONDUIT metaphor turn from the pathetic to the evil when they are applied indiscriminately on a large scale, say, in government surveillance or computerized files. There, what is most crucial for real understanding is almost never included, and it is assumed that the words in the file have meaning in themselves—disembodied, objective, understandable meaning. When a society lives by the CONDUITmetaphor on a large scale, misunderstanding, persecution, and much worse are the likely products.- XAT - 2026
- Verbal and Logical Ability
- Reading Comprehension
Later, I realized that reviewing the history of nuclear physics served another purpose as well: It gave the lie to the naive belief that the physicists could have come together when nuclear fission was discovered (in Nazi Germany!) and agreed to keep the discovery a secret, thereby sparing humanity such a burden. No. Given the development of nuclear physics up to 1938, development that physicists throughout the world pursued in all innocence of any intention of finding the engine of a new weapon of mass destruction—only one of them, the remarkable Hungarian physicist Leo Szilard, took that possibility seriously—the discovery of nuclear fission was inevitable. To stop it, you would have had to stop physics. If German scientists hadn’t made the discovery when they did, French, American, Russian, Italian, or Danish scientists would have done so, almost certainly within days or weeks. They were all working at the same cutting edge, trying to understand the strange results of a simple experiment bombarding uranium with neutrons. Here was no Faustian bargain, as movie directors and other naifs still find it intellectually challenging to imagine. Here was no evil machinery that the noble scientists might hide from the problems and the generals. To the contrary, there was a high insight into how the world works, an energetic reaction, older than the earth, that science had finally devised the instruments and arrangements to coart forth. “Make it seem inevitable,” Louis Pasteur used to advise his students when they prepared to write up their discoveries. But it was. To wish that it might have been ignored or suppressed is barbarous. “Knowledge,” Niels Bohr once noted, “is itself the basis for civilization.” You cannot have the one without the other; the one depends upon the other. Nor can you have only benevolent knowledge; the scientific method doesn’t filter for benevolence. Knowledge has consequences, not always intended, not always comfortable, but always welcome. The earth revolves around the sun, not the sun around the earth. “It is a profound and necessary truth,” Robert Oppenheimer would say, “that the deep things in science are not found because they are useful; they are found because it was possible to find them.”
...Bohr proposed once that the goal of science is not universal truth. Rather, he argued, the modest but relentless goal of science is “the gradual removal of prejudices.” The discovery that the earth revolves around the sun has gradually removed the prejudice that the earth is the center of the universe. The discovery of microbes is gradually removing the prejudice that disease is a punishment from God. The discovery of evolution is gradually removing the prejudice that Homo sapiens is a separate and special creation.- XAT - 2026
- Verbal and Logical Ability
- Reading Comprehension
Questions Asked in CAT exam
- The passage given below is followed by four summaries. Choose the option that best captures the essence of the passage.
In the dynamic realm of creativity, artists often find themselves at the crossroads between drawing inspiration from diverse cultures and inadvertently crossing into the territory of cultural appropriation. Inspiration is the lifeblood of creativity, driving artists to create works that resonate across borders. In a globalized era of the modern world, artists draw from a vast array of cultural influences. When approached respectfully, inspiration becomes a bridge, fostering understanding and appreciation of cultural diversity. However, the line between inspiration and cultural appropriation can be thin and easily blurred.
Cultural appropriation occurs when elements from a particular culture are borrowed without proper understanding, respect, or acknowledgment. This leads to the commodification of sacred symbols, the reinforcement of stereotypes, and the erasure of the cultural context from which these elements originated. It is essential to recognize that the impact of cultural appropriation extends beyond the realm of artistic expression, influencing societal perceptions and perpetuating power imbalances.- CAT - 2025
- Para Summary
- The number of distinct integers $n$ for which $\log_{\left(\frac14\right)}(n^2 - 7n + 11)>0$ is:
- CAT - 2025
- Linear Inequalities
- In the set of consecutive odd numbers $\{1, 3, 5, \ldots, 57\}$, there is a number $k$ such that the sum of all the elements less than $k$ is equal to the sum of all the elements greater than $k$. Then, $k$ equals?
- CAT - 2025
- Number Systems
- The number of distinct pairs of integers $(x, y)$ satisfying the inequalities $x>y \ge 3$ and $x + y<14$ is:
- CAT - 2025
- Number Systems
For any natural number $k$, let $a_k = 3^k$. The smallest natural number $m$ for which \[ (a_1)^1 \times (a_2)^2 \times \dots \times (a_{20})^{20} \;<\; a_{21} \times a_{22} \times \dots \times a_{20+m} \] is:
- CAT - 2025
- Linear Inequalities