Under the environment of

[joham]

Under the environment of fierce competition, the only way John could imagine ______ stress was to get tougher by making greater efforts．
A．handling B．to handle C． handled D．having handled

This is taken from our recent test paper. The given answer is B. But I think we should say 'Under the circumstances of' and I feel 'get tougher by making greater efforts' sounds a bit strange. How does the test question read to native speakers?


Many thanks in advance.

[emsr2d2]

That sentence does not read at all well to me. "Under the environment" makes no sense and the end of the sentence, as you said, is unnatural although just about grammatical.

[BobK]

It's a LOUSY sentence. The test paper is bad. Candidates shouldn't be expected to choose between options that - grammatical or not - are meaningless. - Really, tests like this are a disgrace.

I've no idea what it's suppposed to mean - perhaps something like 'In an environment of fierce competition, the only way John could see of handling stress was to toughen up and make greater efforts．' (But that's still not good.)

b