单选题 How to jump queue fury? If you find yourself waiting in a long queue at an airport or bus terminus this holiday, will you try to analyze what it is about queuing that makes you angry? Or will you just get angry with the nearest official?
Professor Richard Larson, an electrical engineer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, hates queuing but rather than tear his hair out, he decided to study the subject. His first finding, which backs up earlier work at the US National Science Foundation, was that the degree of annoyance was not directly related to the time. He cites an experiment at Houston airport where passengers had to walk for one minute from the plane to the baggage reclaim and then wait a further seven minutes to collect their luggage. Complaints were frequent, especially from those who had spent seven minutes watching passengers with just hand baggage get out immediately.
The airport authorities decided to lengthen the walk from the aircraft, so that instead of a one minute fast walk, the passengers spent six minutes walking. When they finally arrived at the baggage reclaim, the delay was then only two minutes. The extra walk extended the delay by five minutes for those carrying only hand baggage, but passenger complaints dropped almost to zero.
The reason? Larson suggests that it all has to do with what he calls" social justice ". If people see others taking a short cut, they will find the wait unbearable. So in the case of the airport, it was preferable to delay everyone.
Another aspect Larson studied was the observation that people get more fed up if they are not told what is going on. Passengers told that there will be a half-hour delay are less unhappy than those left waiting even twenty minutes without an explanation.
But even knowing how long we have to wait isn' t the whole answer. We must also believe that everything is being done to minimize our delay. Larson cites the example of two neighboring American bands. One was highly computerized and served a customer, on average, every 30 seconds. The other band was less automated and took twice as long. But because the tellers at the second band looking extremely busy, customers believed the service was faster and many transferred their accounts to the slower bank. Ultimately, the latter had to introduce time-wasting ways of appearing more dynamic.

单选题 According to the passage, "How to jump queue fury" means ______.

A. how to stand in a queue comfortably
B. how to avoid feeling angry while waiting
C. how to jump a queue when in a hurry
D. how to avoid standing in a queue

【正确答案】 B

【答案解析】[解析] 理解题。fury表示“great anger”，jump表示“跳，越过”。通读全文便可选出正确答案是B。因为在文章中professor就是在研究如何能够使人们在排队等候的时候不至于感到不耐烦或生气。

单选题 ______ is the key to prevent travelers from feeling angry.

A. The walk from the plane to the baggage reclaim
B. The waiting time aspect at the baggage reclaim
C. An illusion of "social justice"
D. The realization of "equal rights"

【正确答案】 C

【答案解析】[解析] 文章第三段和第四段指出人们原来在机场是要花费1分钟从飞机上走到行李认领处，在行李认领处排队等候?分钟才能拿到行李出机场，这时候人们往往对排队等候很不满。尤其是他们在那7分钟的排队等候中眼看着那些只有手提行李的乘客马上就能出机场，更是满心抱怨。然而当机场将从飞机到行李认领处的路程延长至 6分钟，排队等候认领行李的时间缩至2分钟时，那些手提行李的人们也要花费6分钟才能出机场，而那些取行李的人也因为只比别人多耽误2分钟而显得平衡得多，不再牢骚满腹了，人们的这种心理被作者称为social justice，即“社会公正”。但事实上两种办法同样是要花费8分钟出机场，没有任何根本性的改变，只是人们的平等心理得到了一定程度的满足。所以这种所谓的social justice只不过是一种illusion(错觉)罢了。

单选题 Which of the following statements is true with regard to the Houston Airport experiment?

A. Professor Richard Larson hates queuing so much that he tears his hair out.
B. According to Larson' s study, the long waiting was the cause of annoyance.
C. When all the travelers had to wait for 2 minutes, there were a lot of complaints.
D. When the walking time was extended to 6 minutes, there were hardly any complaints.

【正确答案】 D

【答案解析】[解析] 原文是说Professor Richard Larson hates queuing but rather than tear his hair out，而不是Professor Richard Larson hates queuing so much that he tears his hair out．因此A是错的，在上面一句话中tear one’s hair out意思是“悲伤或愤怒时举动狂野”。B的错误也很明显，原文说the degree of annoyance was not directly related to the time，所以不能说人们不满的原因是长时间的等待。C错误，原文说当从飞机到行李认领处的路程被延长至6分钟时需要认领行李的人只要比提手提行李的人多耽误两分钟的时候，passenger complaints dropped almost to zero，而不是a lot of complaints。同样，上面这一段文字也说明了答案D的正确性。

单选题 Customers transferred their accounts to the slower bank, because ______.

A. the tellers seemed more efficient
B. customers didn't trust computers
C. the tellers did everything to minimize the delay
D. they didn't like the inefficiency of the old bank

【正确答案】 A

【答案解析】[解析] 文章最后一段指出第一家银行由于实现了高度的计算机化办公，为每位客户服务的平均时间是30秒，效率高了自然显得员工没那么手忙脚乱。而另外一家银行因为没有采用计算机系统，所以服务效率比前者低一倍，该银行的出纳也因此显得异常忙碌，而顾客则误认为忙碌代表高效，所以都把自己的业务转到这家事实上效率比较低的银行，只因为这家银行的出纳看起来比较忙。故A为正确答案。

单选题 The passage implies that ______.

A. people won't feel angry if they are informed of everything
B. it's unbearable for the airport to delay everyone
C. people tend to trust their eyes rather than their brains
D. passengers should be encouraged to carry hand baggage

【正确答案】 C

【答案解析】[解析] people tend to trust their eyes rather than their brains意思是：“人们倾向于相信自己的眼睛而不愿意相信自己的头脑”，或者说“人们往往倾向于注重事情的表面现象，而不仔细动脑去思考其反映的本质”。这是作者对本文反映的问题的一个分析和归纳，文章指出第一家银行由于实现了高度的计算机化办公，为每位客户服务的平均时间仅是30秒，效率非常高，员工则显得没那么忙碌，而另外一家银行因为没有采用计算机系统，服务效率较低，员工也显得异常忙碌。然而顾客则误认为忙碌代表高效，这正是人们往往注重表象，忽视实质的反映，故选答案C。