Fill in the blank with most appropriate option:
She was ___ embarrassed to speak in front of the class.
Show answer & explanation
Correct answer: B
Explanation
Correct Answer
too
Explanation
The question asks you to select the correct adverb of degree to fill in the blank.
Let's look at the grammatical pattern hidden in the sentence:
"She was ___ embarrassed to speak in front of the class."
This sentence relies on a very specific, standard English grammatical structure: "too + adjective + to-infinitive". This correlation is used to express a negative result—meaning that an intensity has gone beyond a desirable limit, making the subsequent action impossible.
Let's see how the choices function:
Too fits this exact formula perfectly. Saying she was "too embarrassed to speak" means her embarrassment was so excessive that she was unable to speak in front of the class.
Fairly, quite, and somewhat are all regular adverbs of degree that mean "moderately" or "to a certain extent." While you can say "She was quite embarrassed," these adverbs cannot be grammatically paired with a "to-infinitive" verb phrase to show a consequence. For example, sentences like "She was quite embarrassed to speak" would mean something entirely different (that she felt embarrassed while speaking or because she had to speak), which does not align with the standard causative structure of this question format.
Because "too... to" is a fixed grammatical pair used to show that an excess of an emotion prevents an action from happening, Option 2 is the only correct choice.
Key Points
To lock down easy marks on English exams, always keep an eye out for an infinitive verb (the word "to" followed by a base verb, like to speak, to walk, to carry) later in the sentence.
Whenever you see that "to + verb" pattern following an adjective blank, your absolute first instinct should be to look for "too" in the options.