IELTS Reading Intensive Lesson - Trí Đức English TRÍ ĐỨC ENGLISH IELTS Reading Intensive — Passage Analysis & Practice I. READING PASSAGE: The Proustian Phenomenon [Paragraph A] In recent years, the Proustian phenomenon in which specific odours can trigger or evoke specific memories has become a major talking point among scientists. For example, Rachel Herz, a cognitive neuroscientist at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, has discovered how sensory memories are shared across the brain, with different brain regions remembering the sights, smells, tastes and sounds of a particular experience. “There is this unique connection between the sense of smell and the part of the brain that processes emotion,” says Herz. Studies have shown that memories triggered by smells can be more emotional, as well as more detailed, than memories not related to smells. When you inhale, odour molecules set brain cells dancing within a region known as the amygdala, a part of the brain that helps control emotion. Comparatively, other senses like taste or touch travel indirectly through other parts of the brain before they reach the amygdala. The direct link between odours and the amygdala may help explain the emotional potency of smells. [Paragraph B] But the links don’t stop there. The memory of smells has influence on other brain regions as well. In recent experiments, neuroscientists at University College London (UCL) asked 15 volunteers to view specific pictures at the same time they were exposed to unrelated odours. For instance, the subjects might see a photo of a duck paired with the scent of a rose, and then be asked to create a story linking the picture with the odour. Brain scans taken at the time revealed that the volunteers’ brains were particularly active in a region known as the olfactory cortex, which is known to be involved in processing smells. A few minutes later, the volunteers were shown the same photo with no exposure to the rose smell. And in their brains, the olfactory cortex lit up again, even in the absence of the rose scent. The fact that this happened gives evidence to the idea that people’s sensory memory is distributed and retained by multiple regions of the brain. “Imagine going on a seaside holiday,” says UCL team leader, Jay Gottfried. “The sight of the waves becomes stored in one area, whereas the crash of the surf goes elsewhere, and the smell of seaweed in yet another place. There could be advantages of having memories spread around the brain. You can re-awake that memory from any one of the sensory triggers.” [Paragraph C] Remembered smells may also carry extra emotional baggage, according to Herz. According to her research, memories evoked by odours are more emotional than memories evoked by other senses. In one recent study, Herz recruited 232 volunteers who had vivid memories associated with a particular perfume, such as Opium for women and Juniper Breeze from Bath & Body Works. She monitored the brainwaves of the voluntee...