Which of the following pairs are correctly matched?
1. Anorexia : Sleep disorder
2. Insomnia : Eating disorder
3. Dyspnoea : Shortness of breath
4. Anosmia : Partial or full loss of smell
Select the c

Question

Which of the following pairs are correctly matched?
1. Anorexia : Sleep disorder
2. Insomnia : Eating disorder
3. Dyspnoea : Shortness of breath
4. Anosmia : Partial or full loss of smell
Select the correct answer using the codes given below.

UnlockIAS · Accepted Answer

Correct — C, Only 3 and 4. The item is built out of one clean swap and two straight definitions, and the whole of it can be settled from the Greek roots. Pair 3 is right: dyspnoea is dys- (difficult, disordered) plus pnoia (breathing), and it denotes the subjective sensation of breathlessness or air hunger. It is a symptom rather than a disease, and it can arise from the lung (asthma, COPD, pneumonia, pleural effusion), from the heart (left-ventricular failure), from the blood (severe anaemia) or from anxiety. Its relatives share the ending: apnoea is a complete pause in breathing, tachypnoea abnormally rapid breathing, bradypnoea abnormally slow, and orthopnoea breathlessness that appears only on lying flat. Pair 4 is also right: anosmia is an- (without) plus osme (smell), the partial or complete loss of the sense of smell. A reduced sense of smell is hyposmia, a distorted one parosmia, a phantom one phantosmia, and the equivalent loss of taste is ageusia. Anosmia moved from an obscure ENT term to a household word in 2020, when sudden loss of smell turned out to be one of the more specific early markers of COVID-19. Pairs 1 and 2 have simply been exchanged with one another. Anorexia is an- plus orexis (appetite) — literally the absence of appetite — and anorexia nervosa is an eating disorder, defined by restriction of food intake to a significantly low body weight together with an intense fear of gaining weight and a disturbed perception of one's own body. Insomnia is the sleep disorder: in- (not) plus somnus (sleep), a persistent difficulty in falling asleep, staying asleep or getting back to sleep despite an adequate opportunity, with impairment the following day; the chronic form is defined as occurring at least three nights a week for at least three months. Restore each term to its own category and only pairs 3 and 4 stand as printed, which is option (c).

Why the other options are wrong — (a) The exact inversion of the truth — it accepts the two swapped pairs and rejects the two accurate ones. This is what a candidate picks who registers that anorexia and insomnia are both real, serious and frequently discussed disorders, but never checks which category each belongs to, and who then assumes that the unfamiliar-looking Greek words at 3 and 4 must be the planted errors. In fact 3 and 4 are the only pairs printed correctly.  (b) Half right and half wrong: dyspnoea really is shortness of breath, but insomnia is a sleep disorder and not an eating disorder, so pair 2 fails. This is the classic outcome of checking the list from the top, catching the anorexia error at pair 1, and then not applying the same scrutiny to pair 2 — where the very same swap has been made in the opposite direction.  (d) Cannot stand, because accepting it means accepting that anorexia and insomnia have exchanged their standard meanings — that a loss of appetite is a disorder of sleep and a loss of sleep is a disorder of eating. An 'all of the above' option is the standard reward for recognising every term in the list without verifying a single mapping, and this item is designed around exactly that reflex.

Concept: Clinical vocabulary in English is assembled from a small stock of Greek and Latin word parts, and a candidate who learns the parts can decode terms never seen before instead of memorising them one by one. The prefixes a- or an- mean absence (anaemia, apnoea, ageusia, anuria); dys- means difficult or disordered (dyspnoea, dysphagia, dysentery); hypo- and hyper- mean below and above normal; brady- and tachy- mean slow and fast. The endings carry the organ or function: -pnoea breathing, -phagia swallowing, -osmia smell, -geusia taste, -uria urine, -algia pain, -aemia blood, -itis inflammation. The two Latin-rooted words in this question follow the same logic — insomnia from somnus, sleep, and anorexia from the Greek orexis, appetite. Note also the distinction between a symptom and a disorder. Anorexia in strict usage is a symptom, the loss of appetite, which accompanies infections, cancers and many drugs; anorexia nervosa is the named psychiatric eating disorder. Dyspnoea likewise is a symptom, never a diagnosis in itself.

State PCS 2023 Q8 — Science & Technology PYQ with Answer

State PCS 2023 Q8 — Science & Technology PYQ with Answer