Exposure to sustained noise

GRE Verbal Problem Solving
1

Exposure to sustained noise has been claimed to
------- blood pressure regulation in human beings
and, particularly, to increase hypertension, even
though some researchers have obtained inconclu-
sive results that ------- the relationship.

In this problem “and, particularly,” is taken as support to fill 1st blank. The first blank is supposed to be bad because of supporting idea “to increase hypertension” is bad.

But while choosing the options which are “impaired”, “increase”, isn’t it subjective knowledge to know that “increased blood pressure regulation” is good thing ?

2

There are two clues here:

  1. increased blood pressure regulation does not sound natural. We can say: impair/disrupt blood pressure regulation (negative) or improve/enhance blood pressure regulation (positive).
    ‘Increase’ could have been considered if the sentence were : Exposure to sustained noise has been claimed to ------- blood pressure.
  2. The word ‘regulation’ indicates that it is something desirable.

Using math strategy:
The second part of the sentence is negative (-),
and,particularly a support (+) → first part of the sentence has to be negative.(-)

Since regulation is a good thing, '______ blood pressure regulation’ has to be a bad thing —> ‘impair’ is the perfect fit.