BUSINESS COMMUNICATIONS
CHAPTER 7 REVIEW
True/False
- When revising business messages, try to go through your document three times: once for content and organization, one for style and readability, and once for mechanics and format.
- The middle section of a message has the greatest impact on the audience.
- Conjunctions, prepositions, articles, and pronouns are all types of content words.
- Well-written business messages contain very few compound or compiles sentences.
- Most business writing has an average sentence length of 20 words or fewer.
- "Consensus of opinion," "at the present time," and "until such time as" are all examples of expressions that could be replaced with single words.
- The phrase "attached herewith" is considered standard modern usage in business letters.
- The subject and predicate of a sentence are kept as close together as possible.
Multiple Choice
- When revising business messages, you (A) edit long reports only; it is a waste of time to edit short messages that will be read quickly and discard. (B) edit for content and organization as well for style, readability, mechanics, and format. (C) have someone else do your editing. (D) edit your material as soon after writing it as possible.
- When editing for content and organization, pay special attention to (A) grammar and usage. (B) punctuation and spelling. (C) the beginning and ending of the message. (D) style and tone.
- Which of the following are functional words? (A) into, and, the (B) bath, baby, rattle (C) give, shake, wash (D) nice, wet, quickly
- The connotative meaning of a word is (A) its dictionary meaning. (B) its literal meaning. (C) all the associations and feelings the word evokes. (D) its object meaning.
- Which of the following words are the most abstract? (A) kiss, rose, house (B) red, sharp, piercing (C) kick, sniff, tickle (D) love, beauty, innocence
- Which of the following sentences contains the strongest and most effective wording? (A) "Given the parameters of the situation, the most propitious choice would be to make adjustments in certain budget areas." (B) "We need to cut the operating budget by 12 percent or profits will plummet." (C) "Someone's going to need to do some budget cutting around here or heads will roll." (D) "Perusal of budgetary figures reveals that a 12 percent reduction in operations is called for it we are to stave off a negative impact on profits."
- Which of the following sentences contains a camouflaged verb? (A) "Some do; others don't." (B) "She is a marketing but also serves as ad manager." (C) "It is John's recommendation that she be hired." (D) "He slowly, deliberately added the numbers."
- Which of the following sentences contains biased language? (A) "The school lunch program was set up for disadvantaged Asian children." (B)"Disabled workers face many barriers on the job." (C) "Discrimination has been with us since the dawn of the human race." (D) "Colleen Dewhurst, an actor on both stage and screen, will be spokesperson for the campaign."
- Which of the following is a compound sentence? (A) "David is a good worker, and he deserves a raise." (B) "Because David is a good worker, he deserves a raise." (C) "David, a good worker, deserves a raise." (D) "Having been a good worker, David will no doubt receive a raise."
- A complex sentence is one characterized by (A) two independent clauses joined by a coordinating conjunction. (B) a single subject and a single predicate plus a modifying phrases. (C) two or more independent clauses along with all modifying phrases. (D) an independent clause and one or more dependent clauses related to it.
- Short sentences are best for (A) emphasizing important information. (B) grouping or combining ideas. (C) showing relationships among ideas. (D) summarizing or previewing information.
- Using the passive voice makes sense when (A) you want to be diplomatic in pointing out a problem or error. (B) you want your sentence to be easier to understand. (C) you need to make your sentences shorter. (D) you want to emphasize the subject.
- "Government task force report recommendations" is an example of (A) redundancy. (B) a dangling modifier. (C) a dependant clause. (D) stringing together a series of nouns.
- A paragraph developed by cause and effect (A) points out similarities or differences between ideas. (B) gives the reasons for something. (C) gives examples that illustrate the general idea. (D) shows how a general idea is broken into specific categories.
- How is the following paragraph developed? "Improving our performance will be difficult this year, given the slowdown in the economy. However, even though scales are relatively flat, profits can be improved if we trim costs. The two most promising targets for improvement are direct labor costs and overhead, because analysis of industry data suggests we are above the average in both these categories." (A) by comparison (B) by classification (C) by illustration (D) by discussion of problem and solution
- When designing you document, avoid (A) cluttering your message with too many design elements. (B) including too many decorative touches. (C) using too much highlighting. (D) doing all of the above.
- Grammar and spell checkers (A) help identify mistakes you may overlook on your own. (B) do all your revision work. (C) catch the mistakes that computers leave behind. (D) do all of the above.