Passives in use: Activity
Extract A (from a student exam paper on emotion)
Furthermore there is evidence that supports these bodily changes as being essential to an emotional state. This evidence involved testing patients with spine severances. The patients were interviewed and tested in a laboratory and results consistently showed that the higher the spine severance the less patients reported being able to ‘feel’ an emotion.
Extract B (from a news broadcast)
Between fifteen and twenty nurses and junior doctors whose formal work contracts have expired have stopped working voluntarily at the Ibn al Bitar hospital in Baghdad. It’s run by a subsidiary of Aer Lingus, the Irish state airline, under an agreement with the Iraqi ministry of health.
Extract C (from a university lecture)
The biotechnology research on human cells consists broadly of three technologies: tissue and cell culture technology, hypodermic technology and recombinant DNA technology. The promise of these methods is the development of new drugs and treatments which may alter conventional medicine. The commercial value of these developments cannot be readily calculated.
Extract D (from a sports commentary broadcast)
It’s back with Saba, who’s an interesting character actually. He’s played for Dinamo Tbilisi. He was in the International Squad, but once the political troubles started in Georgia he was persuaded by Balshevitz the Soviet manager that it would be in his best interests to move club, and he’s since gone to Dinamo Kiev.
