Question

(1) In everyday advertising, one observes many obvious attempts to package and sell products and ideas (toothpaste, aspirin, presidential candidates) through clever influence tactics. (2) Many people claim that such blatant attempts at persuasion are so pitifully obvious that they are not much affected by them. (3) Nevertheless, the sales of Benson & Hedges 100s cigarettes increased sevenfold during a four-year period of heavy advertising. (4) The Mattel Toy Company increased company size twenty-four-fold after it began to advertise extensively on television. (5) Grape-Nuts, a venerable but nearly forgotten cereal, experienced a sudden 30 percent increase in sales when a well-known natural foods enthusiast began plugging this rather bland cereal. (6) And there are many other advertising success stories as well. (7) It appears that tremendous numbers of consumers are influenced by advertising, despite their claims to the contrary. what is the main idea?

Answer 1

Answer:  (7) It appears that tremendous numbers of consumers are influenced by advertising, despite their claims to the contrary.

Explanation:

The main idea of this passage is that advertising works despite people's claims to the contrary.

This is the main idea because every other sentence centres around this one with the first sentence attempting to explain how it works.

The second sentence then attempts to disprove it while the third, fourth, fifth and the sixth show show evidence of its truthfulness.