单选题
Under the right circumstances, choosing to spend time alone can be a huge psychological blessing. In the 1980s, the Italian journalist and author Tiziano Terzani, after many years of reporting across Asia, holed himself up in a cabin in Ibaraki Prefecture, Japan. "For a month I had no one to talk to except my dog Baoli," he wrote in his book A
Fortune Teller Told Me
. Terzani passed the time with books, observing nature, "listening to the winds in the trees, watching butterflies, enjoying silence." For the first time in a long while he felt free from the unending anxieties of daily life: "At last I had time to have time."
Terzani"s embrace of isolation was relatively unusual: Humans have long considered solitude an inconvenience, something to avoid, a punishment, a realm of loners. Science has often associated it with negative outcomes. Freud, who linked solitude with anxiety, noted that, "in children the first fears relating to situations are those of darkness and solitude." John Cacioppo, a modern social neuro-scientist who has extensively studied loneliness—what he calls "chronic perceived isolation"—contends that, beyond damaging our thinking powers, isolation can even harm our physical health. But increasingly scientists are approaching solitude as something that, when pursued by choice, can prove a therapy.
This is especially true in times of personal disorder, when the instinct is often for people to reach outside of themselves for support. "When people are experiencing crisis it"s not always just about you. It"s about how you are in society," explains Jack Fong, a sociologist at California State Polytechnic University who has studied solitude.
In other words, when people remove themselves from the social context of their lives, they are better able to see how they"re shaped by that context. Thomas Merton, a monk and writer who spent years alone, held a similar notion. "We cannot see things in perspective until we cease to hug them to our breast," he writes in
Thoughts in Solitude
. "People can go for a walk or listen to music and feel that they are deeply in touch with themselves."
单选题
Tiziano Terzani spent a month alone to ______.
单选题
The word "solitude" (Para. 2) is closest in meaning to ______.
【正确答案】
D
【答案解析】[解析] 第二段第一句“...Humans have long considered solitude an inconvenience, ...”。
词汇题。题目问的是第二段的“solitude”和哪个词的意思最接近?第二段开头说坦尚尼的“接受孤独”不同寻常，然后用冒号开始解释，表示后面提到的都是一般人们对孤独的看法，因此“solitude”应该是“isolation”(独处，孤独)的近义词。A项“变得焦虑”，B项“感觉空虚”，C项“感到无助”，D项“一个人呆着”。综合考虑，D项符合题意，故选D。
单选题
The opinions of Freud and Cacioppo are cited to show that ______.
【正确答案】
D
【答案解析】[解析] 第二段第三句“Freud, who linked solitude with anxiety...”和第二段第四句“John Cacioppo, ...contends that, beyond damaging our thinking powers, isolation can even harm our physical health. ”。
综合分析题。题目问的是引用弗洛伊德和卡乔波的话是为了说明什么?第二段第三句弗洛伊德将孤独和焦虑联系在一起；第四句中卡乔波认为孤独不仅会伤害我们的思考能力，甚至还会损害我们的生理健康。这些都是孤独的负面结果，正如本段第二句说的“科学常把孤独和负面的结果联系在一起”。综上所述，只有D正确，故选D。
单选题
According to Jack Fong, the sense of personal crisis may be influenced by ______.
【正确答案】
D
【答案解析】[解析] 第三段最后一句“When people are experiencing crisis it"s not always just about you: It"s about how you are in society...”。
细节题。题目问的是根据杰克·方，个人危机感可能受到什么的影响?第三段最后一句里杰克·方提到当人们有危机感时，这不是你一个人的事情：这还涉及到你在社会中的表现。这说明个人危机感和社会环境有关系，D项“社会环境”正确，故选D。
单选题
The main idea of the passage is that ______.
【正确答案】
C
【答案解析】[解析] 第一段第一句“Under the right circumstances, choosing to spend time alone can be a huge psychological blessing. ”。
主旨题。题目问的是文章的大意是什么?全文从坦尚尼的例子说明独处对人有好处，然后说了传统科学界认为孤独会带来负面的影响，随后介绍了较新的观点认为孤独可以作为一种疗法，最后又回归开头认为孤独能让人和自身进行深入的对话。由此可见，文章认为孤独是一种对人有好处的事物。A项“应极力避免孤独”；B项“日常生活中的焦虑可能会导致个人危机感”；C项“选择独处一段时光是一种福佑”；D项“寻求帮助对解决个人危机没有用处”。浏览四个选项，只有C项最符合文义，故选C。