单选题. SECTION A MULTIPLE CHOICE QUESTIONS In this section there are several passages followed by fourteen multiple choice questions. For each multiple choice question, there are four suggested answers marked A, B, C and D. Choose the one that you think is the best answer and mark your answers on ANSWER SHEET TWO. PASSAGE ONE (1)There's this great recurring Saturday Night Live skit from several years back where Phil Hartman plays an unfrozen caveman who goes to law school. He pontificates (发表武断的意见) on the American judicial system while marveling at modern technology like The Tiny People in The Magic Box (a TV). It fits a common stereotype: Human ancestors were, well, cavemen, and not as smart as we are today. A new hypothesis from a Stanford geneticist tries to turn this stereotype upside down. (2)Human intelligence may have actually peaked before our ancient predecessors ever left Africa, Gerald Crabtree writes in two new journal articles. Genetic mutations during the past several millennia are causing a decline in overall human intellectual and emotional fitness, he says. Evolutionary pressure no longer favors intellect, so the problem is getting worse. He is careful to say that this is taking quite a long time, so it's not like your grandparents are models of brilliance while your children will be cavemen rivaling Hartman's SNL character. But he does maintain that an ancient Athenian, plucked from 1000 BC, would be "among the brightest and most intellectually alive of our colleagues and companions." (3)His central thesis is that each generation produces deleterious (有害的) mutations, so down the line of human history, our intelligence is ever more impaired compared to that of our predecessors. (4)Not surprisingly, the hypothesis, published in the journal Trends in Genetics, has several geneticists scratching their heads. (5)"It takes thousands of genes to build a human brain, and mutations in any one of those can impair that process, that's absolutely true. It's also true that with each new generation, new mutations arise...but Crabtree ignores the other side of the equation, which is selection," said Kevin Mitchell, associate professor at the Smurfit Institute of Genetics at Trinity College Dublin. "Natural selection is incredibly powerful, and it definitely has the ability to weed out new mutations that significantly impair intellectual ability. There are various aspects in these papers that I think are really just thinking about things in a wrong way." (6)Crabtree said he wanted to examine the cumulative effect of generation-to-generation mutation on intelligence, which is thought to be controlled by many genes. Using indexes that measure X-chromosome-related mental retardation, he comes up with between 2,000 and 5,000 genes related to human intellectual ability. Using another index measuring average mutations that arise in each generation of children, he calculates that within 3,000 years, "we have all sustained two or more mutations harmful to our intellectual or emotional stability." (7)"There is a general feeling that evolution constantly improves us, but it only does that if there is selection applied," Crabtree said in an interview. "In this case, it is questionable about how much selection is occurring now compared to the process of optimizing those genes, which occurred in the jungles of Africa 500,000 years ago." (8)There's already evidence for this in other areas, he argues: Take our sense of smell. Humans have far fewer olfactory receptors than other animals, he said—we're guided by our intellect now, not by smell. We can think about where a piece of food came from, how it was processed, which plant it's from, who has been around it, and so on. A dog, on the other hand, simply sniffs something and either eats it or doesn't. (9)Similarly, he believes evolution now selects for other traits—namely, the most healthy and the most immune, not the most intelligent. (10)But geneticists took issue with his claims, not to mention his citations and methods. Mitchell took issue with Crabtree's characterization of genes—he describes them as links in a chain, with incredible overall disruptive power. They're like a bulb on a string of Christmas tree lights that suddenly fails to work, taking out the entire strand with it: "It can be concluded that genes related to intelligence do not operate as a robust network, but rather as links in a chain, failure of any one of which leads to intellectual disability," he writes. Mitchell countered that this ignores other genes that don't cause intellectual disability. (11)"Biological systems are robust to degradation of several different components," Mitchell said. "Evolution has gone to a lot of trouble to craft your genome so it's finely honed to do its job, and it doesn't make sense that you would have all this random mutation in your brain cells. Also, you would have a very high rate of brain cancer." PASSAGE TWO (1)Social mobility in the U.K. could be reversed unless the government and universities make changes to encourage and pay for more students from disadvantaged backgrounds to take degrees, according to the government's independent adviser on the issue. Alan Milburn said in a report that social mobility was now "flatlining at best" after gains in the early part of the last decade. (2)"Given the headwinds that universities and higher education institutions are facing—tuition fees, student caps, public funding constraints—there's a real danger things will go backwards, rather than forwards," Milburn told The Guardian. "As the economy changes, who gets into university does become a very important driver of social mobility." (3)The report recommends changes across government policy and the way universities select, fund and encourage students from more disadvantaged areas, who he argues have been shown to do better at university than pupils from private schools with the same grades. Suggestions include offering all students from poorer backgrounds an interview and considering offering places to those with lower grades. Acknowledging pressure on public spending during the recession, Milburn calls on all parties to commit to government funding for higher education rising from 1.2% currently to 1.5%, the average for the OECD group of advanced economies. (4)The former Labour MP and cabinet member, who was the first person in his family to go to university, said social mobility created "fallers as well as risers", echoing candid comments by the Liberal Democrat business secretary, Vince Cable, who told an audience on Wednesday that social mobility was often a "two-way street" and "a zero-sum game". "We want everyone to move up and no one to move down," said Cable. "But in the real world not everyone can be a star. Social mobility is often embodied in the comprehensive school pupil who reaches Oxbridge, but what about the school dropout who finished up in a lowly menial job? That is also social mobility. But this is surely what meritocracy is all about—success through hard work, not through birth." (5)Milburn's report says universities spend more than ￡400m to soften the impact of higher tuition fees on students from poorer backgrounds, but says there is little evidence that it is well spent, and calls for deep changes. It advocates that money is spent not just on reducing fees but helping to fund poorer students, and calls for a new version of the scrapped Educational Maintenance Allowance, intended to help poorer pupils remain in school to do A-levels. Universities are asked to agree to use "contextual data" when assessing applications to give pupils from worse schools a better chance, even if they have lower grades. Because some universities—especially from the Russell Group of higher ranked institutions—have objected to such a move in the past, Milburn offers them alternatives, including running new programmes to assess and prepare school-leavers, such as summer schools, and guaranteeing interviews to pupils from schools in disadvantaged areas. (6)Ministers are urged to scrap a cap on student numbers, which Milburn calls an artificial limit on aspiration, and to better explain the tuition fees policy, under which students start repaying their loans when their earnings rise above a certain threshold. One option would be to rename the policy a graduate tax, which it is "in all but name", says Milburn, though he says it might be too late for that. He also calls for more funding for post-graduates, probably through upfront loans, saying the issue is "in danger of becoming a social mobility timebomb". (7)The proposal to re-introduce the EMA was widely welcomed by social and education organizations, including the children's charity Barnados, which said it had evidence that children were having to choose between the cost of breakfast and their bus fare to school. The left-of-centre IPPR thinktank welcomed the report's suggestion that "we should look at applying the lessons of the pupil premium in schools to the university sector, with more funding being provided to institutions if they recruit from disadvantaged backgrounds". PASSAGE THREE (1)Cambridge has taken the top spot in this year's Guardian University Guide league table, breaking its arch rival Oxford's six-year stint as the U.K.'s leading institution. Oxford has come second and St Andrews third, while the London School of Economics has climbed four places from last year to take fourth place. University College London, Warwick, Lancaster, Durham, Loughborough and Imperial College make up the top 10. (2)Our analysis shows that universities with low rankings are almost as likely to be planning to charge maximum tuition fees of ￡9,000 in autumn 2012 as those with high rankings. London Metropolitan University, which comes bottom of The Guardian tables, intends to charge between ￡4,500 and ￡9,000 for its degrees. Salford, Liverpool John Moores, Manchester Metropolitan and the University of East London— all of which rank in the bottom 20—want to charge ￡9,000 for at least some of their courses. (3)The government's access watchdog, the Office for Fair Access, is looking at the fees each university in England wants to charge and will announce in July whether it approves. All the English universities in our top 20 intend to charge ￡9,000 fees, apart from London School of Economics, which has not yet decided. The first university that proposes to charge less than ￡9,000 for all of its courses is Sunderland, which is ranked 48th. There are a total of 120 institutions in the tables: 38 in the top half intend to charge ￡9,000 for at least some of their courses, while 18 in the bottom half propose to do the same. (4)Universities are ranked according to how much they spend per student; their student/staff ratio; the career prospects of their graduates; what grades applicants need; a value-added score that compares the academic achievements of first-years and their final degree results; and how content final-year students are with their courses, based on the annual National Student Survey. Birmingham City University has fallen most since last year—24 places, from 66th to 90th—while Middlesex is the biggest climber, reaching 75th place this year compared with 112th last year. Durham has risen from 17th place to eighth. While the oldest universities dominate the top positions in the tables, the newest have improved their rankings since last year. Winchester has leapt from 96th place to 69th. (5)The tables, compiled by an independent consultancy firm, Intelligent Metrix, are weighted in favour of the National Student Survey. As part of the survey, final-year students are asked to score their universities for overall satisfaction, feedback and contact hours. Other league tables concentrate more on research ratings. The Guardian publishes an overall ranking table, separate tables to show which universities are best—and worst—for each subject and another table for specialist institutions. The more a university spends on each student, the more likely it is to have a high ranking and the more satisfied its students seem. However, our judges took into account that some universities do not teach expensive courses, such as engineering, and so their spending is lower. (6)The tables show that Cambridge has overtaken Oxford in philosophy, law, politics, theology, maths, classics, anthropology and modem languages. However, Oxford overtook Cambridge in psychology and also came top in chemistry, business and management, and art and design. Loughborough is best for sports science, while King's College London is top for dentistry. University College London topped the table for English, while Trinity Laban Conservatoire excelled for drama and dance. Northumbria has shot up the table for modem languages, from 48th last year to third this year. Universities with high rankings tend to have fewer dropouts, and fewer students per academic. The top 20 institutions have a drop-out rate after the first year of just 4%, compared with almost 12% for the bottom 20. (7)Professor David Tidmarsh, vice-chancellor of Birmingham City University, says he expects his university's fall in position to be temporary: "It is caused by student number growth, which has now been curbed, and student satisfaction scores, which we expect to improve significantly as a consequence both of increased investment and of the way in which we are engaging students as partners in their learning experience." He says the university is investing ￡180m in new buildings, facilities and equipment. Swansea Metropolitan, Wolverhampton and Liverpool Hope did not allow The Guardian to use their data. (8)Meanwhile, the government has cut the number of places universities can offer on teacher training courses. Cambridge University, which comes top of our table for education courses, will have 49 fewer places on its teacher training course this September, an 11% cut. Altogether, almost 4,000 fewer places will be available on teacher training programmes. A spokesman from the Department for Education says pupil numbers are falling sharply in secondary schools and so the need for new teachers has gone down. Passage Four (1)The gender pay gap for full-time workers has fallen below 10% for the first time in 15 years since comparable records began. The difference between men's and women's median hourly full-time pay fell from 10.5% in 2011 to 9.6% in 2012, according to the annual survey of hours and earnings from the Office for National Statistics (ONS). Women's average hourly earnings grew by 2% to ￡12 over the 12 months to April, while men's earnings grew by 1.1% to ￡13.27, prompting one employment expert to claim "women are steadily chipping away at the glass ceiling." (2)The figures show women now earn an average gross full-time salary of ￡23,100—￡5,600 less than their male counterparts and ￡200 less than the gap of ￡5,800 seen in 2011. But at the current rate of change women's full-time pay will not equal men's until 2040. (3)Economists said the narrowing gap can in part be explained by men's full-time earnings rising slower than women's. Others suggested a variety of reasons including a cultural shift, more progressive attitudes displayed by bosses, and higher aspirations among women. While women are better paid than men when it comes to part-time work, the ONS said the fact more women work part-time jobs, which tend to have lower rates of pay, means the overall pay gap remains high at 19.7% compared to 20.2% in 2011. (4)The Trades Union Congress(TUC) said the lack of high quality part-time work is illustrated by the five highest paid occupations—aircraft pilots; chief executives and directors of advertising and PR; marketing and sales; and telecommunications firms—being dominated by men and having "a negligible number" of part-time positions. In contrast, four of the five worst paid occupations—waiters and waitresses, bar staff, catering assistants and launderers—are dominated by women and have more part-time jobs than full-time ones. (5)Frances O'Grady, general secretary designate at the TUC, said: "No healthy modern economy should have an enduring gender pay gap and growing in-work poverty. Unfortunately, common sense solutions such as senior level job shares and flexible working are rarely available in the private sector, and are now under attack in the public sector." Unless we change the way we work we will never eliminate the pay gap or tackle poverty. (6)Wages for full-time employees in the U.K. increased by just half the rate of inflation, the study showed, with the median salary rising by 1.4% to ￡26,500 in 2012 against inflation of 3%—meaning households are experiencing pay cuts in real terms. (7)Xenios Thrasyvoulou, founder of the online freelance marketplace PeoplePerHour, said: "Women are steadily chipping away at the glass ceiling. They may be starting to win the battle of the sexes, but the workforce as a whole is losing the battle with inflation." (8)The gap between the highest and lowest paid employees also narrowed, with the hourly earnings (excluding overtime) of full timers in the top 1% of earners falling by 0.2%, compared to a rise of 2.3% for those in the bottom 1%. (9)The number of people earning below the national minimum wage fell during the past 12 months, the ONS said, from 299,000 in 2011 to 287,000 this year. But the ONS admitted the figures were not exact due to the impossibility of identifying people such as apprentices and trainees exempt from the minimum wage rate or only entitled to lower rates. (10)Public sector workers earned more than those in the private sector across almost all measures used by the ONS. The median gross weekly pay of full-time employees in the public sector was ￡565 in 2012, up 1.6% from ￡556 in 2011, compared to ￡479 in the private sector, up 1.5% from ￡472 in 2011. (11)But the ONS pointed out that many low-paid occupations such as hairdressers, bar and restaurant staff and junior sales roles do not exist in the public sector.1. According to the passage, Saturday Night Live skit is a ______. (PASSAGE ONE)

单选题. Questions 6 to 10 are based on Part Two of the interview.6.

单选题. Questions 1 to 5 are based on Part One of the interview.1.

单选题 音频同上

单选题《复合题被拆开情况》 1There was music from my neighbor’s house through the summer nights. In his blue gardens men and girls came and went like moths among the whisperings and the champagne and the stars. At hig

单选题 音频同上

单选题. SECTION A MULTIPLE-CHOICE QUESTIONS In this section there are three passages followed by fourteen multiple choice questions. For each multiple choice question, there are four suggested answers marked A, B, C and D. Choose the one that you think is the best answer and mark your answers on ANSWER SHEET TWO. PASSAGE ONE (1)After taking a brief hiatus to weather the recession, an invasion of Britain by some of America's best-known retail brands—including Best Buy, Banana Republic and Forever 21—is back on the march. And early reports from the front line in the land of shopkeepers indicate that, unlike with earlier attempts by U.S. retailers to break Britain, British consumers are welcoming the invaders with open arms—and wallets. (2)That's not always been the case. While the British public has long had an appetite for American fast-food vendors, the record of U.S. retailers who have tried to make it big in Britain is mixed. But the latest arrivals enter the market as already established brands with built-in consumer awareness, thanks to the dominance of U.S. culture in media and online. And they satisfy British shoppers' desire for "something new," says analyst Natalie Berg, of London-based consultants Planet Retail. "They all bring a cult aspect" to the U.K. high street. (3)Best Buy—America's largest consumer-electronics chain—kicked off the latest rush into the British market in May, when it opened its first-ever U.K. store. The 4,650-sq-m big-box outlet in the London suburb of Thurrock is the first of eight to 10 stores Best Buy expects to open in the country this year. And it has proved an impressive beachhead: in terms of sales volume, that first weekend was the chain's biggest opening weekend in its 27-year history. "We had strong expectations," says Paul Antoniadis, CEO of Best Buy UK (who won't reveal how much they took in over those first three days). "But the actual delivery was brilliant." (4)For some U.S. stores, this will be their first foray into the U.K. Following in Best Buy's footsteps is California-based Forever 21, which specializes in cheap, trendy clothes for young women and will open its first U.K. branch in Birmingham, northern England, in November. But for others, now is the time to expand on past success. Hollister, which is owned by Abercrombie Fitch (AF), has proved extremely popular in Britain since it launched its first surf-shack-chic store in London in 2008. Hollister rode the recession like it was the perfect wave. Despite the economic downturn, it opened 11 more stores across the U.K. over the past two years, most recently in April. As a result, AF reports that average sales volume for Hollister's British stores is six times the level of its U.S. stores. (5)Meanwhile, Gap-owned Banana Republic, which debuted in London two years ago, opened its second and third stores in the city last December and April this year. Even in what was a tough year for retailers of all nationalities, Banana Republic's total U.K. net sales in last year hit $24 million, up from $23 million a year earlier. (6)What's the attraction? Britain boasts an overall retail market worth around $415 billion—a tempting target. The U.K. is also a good launchpad for further expansions into continental Europe. Moreover, thanks to growing online sales, U.S. retailers no longer have to blanket Blighty with shops to achieve full market penetration. They can open a few flagship stores in key cities, and back them up with a strong Web presence, which in turn reduces overheads and risk. (7)The Internet also provides a strong prelaunch marketing tool: Best Buy set up a U.K. website back in January that featured blogs, forums and advice, and used social-networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter to build anticipation for the Thurrock launch. And there's a new, postdownturn draw too: cheaper rents. U.K. retail rents have historically been sky high, particularly in London. Now many landlords-hit by a raft of vacancies-are willing to bargain. (8)While the invasion is off to strong start, U.S. retailers shouldn't consider Britain a sure thing. U.K. retailing is a highly mature market that's brutally competitive, particularly now as retailers battle to entice credit-crunched shoppers back into shops. "It's probably not a great time to enter the British market," says Sarah Peters, an analyst at British retailing consultants Verdict Research, "But I'm not sure if there is ever a good time." Indeed, Britain's retailing landscape is littered with the bones of successful U.S. retailers who stumbled badly when they crossed the Atlantic. (9)Limited Brands, in conjunction with British fashion chain Next, failed in an attempt in the 1990s to transplant Bath Body Works to Britain. And Whole Foods Market, which opened a massive food emporium in London in 2007, lost around $52 million in the British capital last year, thanks in part to formidable competition from mainstream British supermarket chains that are already well stocked with organic groceries. (10)If this latest flock of U.S. retailers does well in the U.K., it will likely be because they offer British shoppers something completely different. Forever 21, for example, will face resistance from established, strong domestic clothing brands, including Topshop, New Look and Primark. But Best Buy, on the other hand, has an edge. Not only are its big-box stores a novelty in Britain, but so is the brand's emphasis on customer service. Its Geek Squad unit gives customers round-the-clock technical support, and shoppers can use its in-store setup service to configure gadgets before taking them home. "Consumer-electronics stores in the U.K. traditionally have not had good reputations for customer service," says Matthew Piner, another Verdict Research analyst. "And no one has really challenged them before." (11)To pay for its U.K. invasion, Best Buy, which was pummeled by the recession, has already shelled out around $30.5 million and expects to spend around another $50 million to $58 million this fiscal year. That's a big bet. But for Best Buy, and many other U.S. retailers, the potential payoff for succeeding in Britain means it's one worth making. PASSAGE TWO (1)It was said by Sir George Bernard Shaw that "England and America are two countries separated by the same language." My first personal experience of this was when I worked as a camp counselor for two months in 1993 in Summer Camp run by the Boy Scouts of America, as part of an international leader exchange scheme. Before I went, all the participants in the scheme were given a short list of words that are in common use in the UK which Americans would either be confused by or would even offend them. I memorized the words and thought "I'll cope". (2)When I finally arrived in the States three months later, I realized that perhaps a lifetime of watching American television was not adequate preparation for appreciating and coping with the differences between American and British speech. In the first hour of arriving at the camp I was exposed to High School American English, Black American English and American English spoken by Joe Public, all very different to each other. Needless to say, I did cope in the end. The Americans I met were very welcoming and helpful, and I found they were patient with me when I made a social faux pas when I used an inappropriate word or phrase. (3)Upon my return I began to wonder whether anyone had documented the differences between American and British English. I found several books on the subject but often these were written in a dry and academic way. I felt that I could do better and use my sense of humor and personal experiences to help people from both sides of Atlantic to communicate more effectively when they meet. (4)My research into the subject led me to several conclusions. (5)Firstly, American English and British English are converging thanks to increased transatlantic travel and the media. The movement of slang words is mostly eastwards, though a few words from the UK have been adopted by the Ivy League fraternities. This convergent trend is a recent one dating from the emergence of Hollywood as the predominant film making center in the world and also from the Second World War when large numbers of American GIs were stationed in the UK. This trend was consolidated by the advent of television. Before then, it was thought that American English and British English would diverge as the two languages evolved and absorbed words brought to their respective countries by immigrants and their colonies. (6)In 1789, Noah Webster, in whose name American dictionaries are still published in to this day, stated that: "Numerous local causes, such as a new country, new associations of people, new combinations of ideas in the arts and some intercourse with tribes wholly unknown in Europe will introduce new words into the American tongue." He was right, but his next statement has since been proved to be incorrect. "These causes will produce in the course of time a language in North America as different from the future language of England as the modern Dutch, Danish and Swedish are from the German or from one another." (7)Webster had underrated the amount of social intercourse between England and her former colony. Even before Webster had started to compile his dictionary, words and expressions from the America had already infiltrated the British language, for example "canoe" and "hatchet". Very few people in Britain realise how many of the words they use are of American origin. Often this importation of American words has encountered a linguistic snobbery by the British, which was a manifestation of the cultural snobbery that bedevilled Anglo-American relationships for a long time. This is not, thankfully, the case now. (8)Secondly, there are some generalizations that can be made about American and British English which can reveal the nature of the two nations and their peoples. British speech tends to be less general, and directed more, in nuances of meaning, at a sub group of the population. This can become a kind of code, in which few words are spoken because each, along with its attendant murmurings and pauses, carries a wealth of shared assumptions and attitudes. In other words, the British are preoccupied with their social status within society and speak and act accordingly to fit into the social class they aspire to. This is particularly evident when talking to someone from "the middle class" when he points out that he is "upper middle class" rather than "middle class" or "lower middle class". John Major (the former UK Prime Minister) may have said that we are now living in a "classless society" but the class system still prevails. At that moment both he and the Leader of the Opposition were talking about capturing the "middle England", "middle class vote" as the key to winning the next general election. (9)American speech tends to be influenced by the over-heated language of much of the media, which is designed to attach an impression of exciting activity to passive, if sometimes insignificant events. Yet, curiously, really violent activity and life-changing events are hidden in blind antiseptic tones that serve to disguise the reality. Two examples come readily to mind—the US Military with their "friendly fire" and "collateral damages" and the business world with their "downsizing". British people tend to understatement whereas Americans towards hyperbole. A Briton might respond to a suggestion with a word such as "Terrific!" only if he is expressing rapturous enthusiasm, whereas an American might use the word merely to signify polite assent. (10)Thirdly, The American language has less regard than the British for grammatical form, and will happily bulldoze its way across distinctions rather than steer a path between them. American English will casually use one form of a word for another, for example turning nouns into verbs or verbs and nouns into adjectives. In Britain, a disrespect for grammatical rules, particularly amongst the middle classes, would immediately reveal you to be "not one of us". Listening to listener feedback programmes on Radio 4 (one of the radio stations run by BBC) would reveal this. People actually write into complain about grammatical mistakes made by news presenters! PASSAGE THREE (1)Silicon Valley is a magnet to which numerous talented engineers, scientists and entrepreneurs from overseas flock in search of fame, fast money and to participate in a technological revolution whose impact on mankind will surely surpass the epoch-making European Renaissance and Industrial Revolution of the bygone age. (2)With the rapid spread of the Internet since the early '90s, and the relentless technological innovations generated through it, the information era is truly upon us, profoundly influencing and changing not only our lifestyle, but also the way we work, do business, think and communicate with others. The unprecedented success of the Valley is a testimony to the concerted international endeavours and contributions by people from diverse cultural and racial backgrounds, made possible by the favourable political, economic and intellectual climate prevailing, as well as the farsighted policies of the US government. (3)It is noteworthy that close to 50% of its skilled manpower, including engineers, scientists and entrepreneurs, come from Asia. Prominent among them are Indians and Chinese, and not a few Singaporeans. They include such illustrious names as Vinod Khosla who co-founded Sun Microsystems, Jerry Yang of Yahoo fame and Singaporean Sim Wong Hoo, to name a few. (4)Many countries have, or are in the process of creating, their own "Silicon Valley". So far, none has as yet threatened the preeminence of the US prototype. What makes Silicon Valley such a unique entity? There are several crucial factors. (5)First and foremost, it has the largest concentration of brilliant computer professionals and the best supporting services in the world, and easy access to world-class research institutions, like Stanford University, which continually nurtures would-be geniuses that the industry needs in order to move forward. Without these advantages, the Valley would be a different place. (6)Secondly, it actively encourages, or even exalts, risk-taking. Hence, failure holds no terror and there is no stigma attached to a failed effort. On the contrary, they will try even harder next time round. Such never-say-die approach is the sine qua non for the ultimate triumph in entrepreneurship and technological breakthrough. (7)A third decisive factor is the vital role of venture capitalists who willingly support promising start-ups with urgently needed initial capital to get them started. Some would even give failed entrepreneurs a second chance if convinced that a fresh concept might lead to eventual success. (8)Of equal importance, many bright young people and middle level professionals are keen to work for a new venture at substantially reduced remuneration, as it offers more scope for entrepreneurship and job satisfaction than the established companies. There is also a pride of achievement if their efforts contribute to its fruition. (9)Intellectual challenges aside, it is a common practice for start-ups to offer generous share options to employees in order to attract the right talent into their folds. This is a powerful incentive to motivate the staff to do their utmost and to share in the company's prosperity if it reaches its goal. Many regard this as the foundation of a successful enterprise. Those that have become high fliers, such as Netscape, Intel, Cisco and Yahoo, have turned many of their employees, including support staff like secretaries, into dot.com millionaires overnight, often at the relatively young age of 20s or 30s. (10)The Valley's professionals are among the most hardworking people anywhere. A 15-hour day and 7-day week is not uncommon, especially during the start-up stage. They would give up social life, and curtail their family life too, in order to pursue the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. It is this single minded pursuit of excellence, supported by strong ethos of team work and esprit de corps, which sustain them until their mission is accomplished. (11)Paper qualifications, though useful, is not a be all and end all. More weight is given to a candidate's proven abilities and aptitude for the job. This is amply demonstrated by industry icons like Apple's Jobs and Wozniak and Microsoft's Gates, all college dropouts who might not have emerged in a qualification-conscious community. (12)While racial prejudice no doubt still exists in the United States, albeit in a less degrading form as before, it is hardly discernible in the Valley. What counts most is one's vision and track record, and not one's nationality, skin colour or creed. This, together with its multiracial society, informal lifestyle and agree-able climate, lure foreigners to its shores. (13)Its phenomenal success has led to a worldwide fever to proliferate dot.com companies, both as a prestigious symbol and a quicker way to wealth. Singapore is part of this rising tide. In consequence, many bright young people have given up their secure jobs to join in the race. But the reality is that, because of its high-risk nature, for every success story there are hundreds who will, perforce, fall by the wayside. Will they get a second chance, given their own operating environment? (14)However, with the collapse of the US NASDAQ share index earlier this year resulting in the plunge in prices of technology shares listed on it and elsewhere, the hitherto valuable share options held by numerous paper dot.com millionaires have become virtually worthless in these changed circumstances. Those who could not take the heat, as it were, left their employment feeling disillusioned. Be that as it may, the majority in the Valley view this traumatic experience only as a temporary setback for the industry. They are sanguine that its longer term prospects remain bright as the ultimate potential of the information age has not yet run its full course. They are confident that it will flourish well into this century provided it maintains its cutting-edge in science and technology.1. According to the reports, the U.S. retailers won the popularity among British consumers because ______.(PASSAGE ONE)

单选题《复合题被拆开情况》 1It’s 7 pm on a balmy Saturday night in June, and I have just ordered my first beer in I Cervejaria, a restaurant in Zambujeira do Mar, one of the prettiest villages on Portugal’s south-wes

单选题. SECTION A MULTIPLE-CHOICE QUESTIONS In this section there are three passages followed by fourteen multiple choice questions. For each multiple choice question, there are four suggested answers marked A, B, C and D. Choose the one that you think is the best answer and mark your answers on ANSWER SHEET TWO. PASSAGE ONE (1)After taking a brief hiatus to weather the recession, an invasion of Britain by some of America's best-known retail brands—including Best Buy, Banana Republic and Forever 21—is back on the march. And early reports from the front line in the land of shopkeepers indicate that, unlike with earlier attempts by U.S. retailers to break Britain, British consumers are welcoming the invaders with open arms—and wallets. (2)That's not always been the case. While the British public has long had an appetite for American fast-food vendors, the record of U.S. retailers who have tried to make it big in Britain is mixed. But the latest arrivals enter the market as already established brands with built-in consumer awareness, thanks to the dominance of U.S. culture in media and online. And they satisfy British shoppers' desire for "something new," says analyst Natalie Berg, of London-based consultants Planet Retail. "They all bring a cult aspect" to the U.K. high street. (3)Best Buy—America's largest consumer-electronics chain—kicked off the latest rush into the British market in May, when it opened its first-ever U.K. store. The 4,650-sq-m big-box outlet in the London suburb of Thurrock is the first of eight to 10 stores Best Buy expects to open in the country this year. And it has proved an impressive beachhead: in terms of sales volume, that first weekend was the chain's biggest opening weekend in its 27-year history. "We had strong expectations," says Paul Antoniadis, CEO of Best Buy UK (who won't reveal how much they took in over those first three days). "But the actual delivery was brilliant." (4)For some U.S. stores, this will be their first foray into the U.K. Following in Best Buy's footsteps is California-based Forever 21, which specializes in cheap, trendy clothes for young women and will open its first U.K. branch in Birmingham, northern England, in November. But for others, now is the time to expand on past success. Hollister, which is owned by Abercrombie Fitch (AF), has proved extremely popular in Britain since it launched its first surf-shack-chic store in London in 2008. Hollister rode the recession like it was the perfect wave. Despite the economic downturn, it opened 11 more stores across the U.K. over the past two years, most recently in April. As a result, AF reports that average sales volume for Hollister's British stores is six times the level of its U.S. stores. (5)Meanwhile, Gap-owned Banana Republic, which debuted in London two years ago, opened its second and third stores in the city last December and April this year. Even in what was a tough year for retailers of all nationalities, Banana Republic's total U.K. net sales in last year hit $24 million, up from $23 million a year earlier. (6)What's the attraction? Britain boasts an overall retail market worth around $415 billion—a tempting target. The U.K. is also a good launchpad for further expansions into continental Europe. Moreover, thanks to growing online sales, U.S. retailers no longer have to blanket Blighty with shops to achieve full market penetration. They can open a few flagship stores in key cities, and back them up with a strong Web presence, which in turn reduces overheads and risk. (7)The Internet also provides a strong prelaunch marketing tool: Best Buy set up a U.K. website back in January that featured blogs, forums and advice, and used social-networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter to build anticipation for the Thurrock launch. And there's a new, postdownturn draw too: cheaper rents. U.K. retail rents have historically been sky high, particularly in London. Now many landlords-hit by a raft of vacancies-are willing to bargain. (8)While the invasion is off to strong start, U.S. retailers shouldn't consider Britain a sure thing. U.K. retailing is a highly mature market that's brutally competitive, particularly now as retailers battle to entice credit-crunched shoppers back into shops. "It's probably not a great time to enter the British market," says Sarah Peters, an analyst at British retailing consultants Verdict Research, "But I'm not sure if there is ever a good time." Indeed, Britain's retailing landscape is littered with the bones of successful U.S. retailers who stumbled badly when they crossed the Atlantic. (9)Limited Brands, in conjunction with British fashion chain Next, failed in an attempt in the 1990s to transplant Bath Body Works to Britain. And Whole Foods Market, which opened a massive food emporium in London in 2007, lost around $52 million in the British capital last year, thanks in part to formidable competition from mainstream British supermarket chains that are already well stocked with organic groceries. (10)If this latest flock of U.S. retailers does well in the U.K., it will likely be because they offer British shoppers something completely different. Forever 21, for example, will face resistance from established, strong domestic clothing brands, including Topshop, New Look and Primark. But Best Buy, on the other hand, has an edge. Not only are its big-box stores a novelty in Britain, but so is the brand's emphasis on customer service. Its Geek Squad unit gives customers round-the-clock technical support, and shoppers can use its in-store setup service to configure gadgets before taking them home. "Consumer-electronics stores in the U.K. traditionally have not had good reputations for customer service," says Matthew Piner, another Verdict Research analyst. "And no one has really challenged them before." (11)To pay for its U.K. invasion, Best Buy, which was pummeled by the recession, has already shelled out around $30.5 million and expects to spend around another $50 million to $58 million this fiscal year. That's a big bet. But for Best Buy, and many other U.S. retailers, the potential payoff for succeeding in Britain means it's one worth making. PASSAGE TWO (1)It was said by Sir George Bernard Shaw that "England and America are two countries separated by the same language." My first personal experience of this was when I worked as a camp counselor for two months in 1993 in Summer Camp run by the Boy Scouts of America, as part of an international leader exchange scheme. Before I went, all the participants in the scheme were given a short list of words that are in common use in the UK which Americans would either be confused by or would even offend them. I memorized the words and thought "I'll cope". (2)When I finally arrived in the States three months later, I realized that perhaps a lifetime of watching American television was not adequate preparation for appreciating and coping with the differences between American and British speech. In the first hour of arriving at the camp I was exposed to High School American English, Black American English and American English spoken by Joe Public, all very different to each other. Needless to say, I did cope in the end. The Americans I met were very welcoming and helpful, and I found they were patient with me when I made a social faux pas when I used an inappropriate word or phrase. (3)Upon my return I began to wonder whether anyone had documented the differences between American and British English. I found several books on the subject but often these were written in a dry and academic way. I felt that I could do better and use my sense of humor and personal experiences to help people from both sides of Atlantic to communicate more effectively when they meet. (4)My research into the subject led me to several conclusions. (5)Firstly, American English and British English are converging thanks to increased transatlantic travel and the media. The movement of slang words is mostly eastwards, though a few words from the UK have been adopted by the Ivy League fraternities. This convergent trend is a recent one dating from the emergence of Hollywood as the predominant film making center in the world and also from the Second World War when large numbers of American GIs were stationed in the UK. This trend was consolidated by the advent of television. Before then, it was thought that American English and British English would diverge as the two languages evolved and absorbed words brought to their respective countries by immigrants and their colonies. (6)In 1789, Noah Webster, in whose name American dictionaries are still published in to this day, stated that: "Numerous local causes, such as a new country, new associations of people, new combinations of ideas in the arts and some intercourse with tribes wholly unknown in Europe will introduce new words into the American tongue." He was right, but his next statement has since been proved to be incorrect. "These causes will produce in the course of time a language in North America as different from the future language of England as the modern Dutch, Danish and Swedish are from the German or from one another." (7)Webster had underrated the amount of social intercourse between England and her former colony. Even before Webster had started to compile his dictionary, words and expressions from the America had already infiltrated the British language, for example "canoe" and "hatchet". Very few people in Britain realise how many of the words they use are of American origin. Often this importation of American words has encountered a linguistic snobbery by the British, which was a manifestation of the cultural snobbery that bedevilled Anglo-American relationships for a long time. This is not, thankfully, the case now. (8)Secondly, there are some generalizations that can be made about American and British English which can reveal the nature of the two nations and their peoples. British speech tends to be less general, and directed more, in nuances of meaning, at a sub group of the population. This can become a kind of code, in which few words are spoken because each, along with its attendant murmurings and pauses, carries a wealth of shared assumptions and attitudes. In other words, the British are preoccupied with their social status within society and speak and act accordingly to fit into the social class they aspire to. This is particularly evident when talking to someone from "the middle class" when he points out that he is "upper middle class" rather than "middle class" or "lower middle class". John Major (the former UK Prime Minister) may have said that we are now living in a "classless society" but the class system still prevails. At that moment both he and the Leader of the Opposition were talking about capturing the "middle England", "middle class vote" as the key to winning the next general election. (9)American speech tends to be influenced by the over-heated language of much of the media, which is designed to attach an impression of exciting activity to passive, if sometimes insignificant events. Yet, curiously, really violent activity and life-changing events are hidden in blind antiseptic tones that serve to disguise the reality. Two examples come readily to mind—the US Military with their "friendly fire" and "collateral damages" and the business world with their "downsizing". British people tend to understatement whereas Americans towards hyperbole. A Briton might respond to a suggestion with a word such as "Terrific!" only if he is expressing rapturous enthusiasm, whereas an American might use the word merely to signify polite assent. (10)Thirdly, The American language has less regard than the British for grammatical form, and will happily bulldoze its way across distinctions rather than steer a path between them. American English will casually use one form of a word for another, for example turning nouns into verbs or verbs and nouns into adjectives. In Britain, a disrespect for grammatical rules, particularly amongst the middle classes, would immediately reveal you to be "not one of us". Listening to listener feedback programmes on Radio 4 (one of the radio stations run by BBC) would reveal this. People actually write into complain about grammatical mistakes made by news presenters! PASSAGE THREE (1)Silicon Valley is a magnet to which numerous talented engineers, scientists and entrepreneurs from overseas flock in search of fame, fast money and to participate in a technological revolution whose impact on mankind will surely surpass the epoch-making European Renaissance and Industrial Revolution of the bygone age. (2)With the rapid spread of the Internet since the early '90s, and the relentless technological innovations generated through it, the information era is truly upon us, profoundly influencing and changing not only our lifestyle, but also the way we work, do business, think and communicate with others. The unprecedented success of the Valley is a testimony to the concerted international endeavours and contributions by people from diverse cultural and racial backgrounds, made possible by the favourable political, economic and intellectual climate prevailing, as well as the farsighted policies of the US government. (3)It is noteworthy that close to 50% of its skilled manpower, including engineers, scientists and entrepreneurs, come from Asia. Prominent among them are Indians and Chinese, and not a few Singaporeans. They include such illustrious names as Vinod Khosla who co-founded Sun Microsystems, Jerry Yang of Yahoo fame and Singaporean Sim Wong Hoo, to name a few. (4)Many countries have, or are in the process of creating, their own "Silicon Valley". So far, none has as yet threatened the preeminence of the US prototype. What makes Silicon Valley such a unique entity? There are several crucial factors. (5)First and foremost, it has the largest concentration of brilliant computer professionals and the best supporting services in the world, and easy access to world-class research institutions, like Stanford University, which continually nurtures would-be geniuses that the industry needs in order to move forward. Without these advantages, the Valley would be a different place. (6)Secondly, it actively encourages, or even exalts, risk-taking. Hence, failure holds no terror and there is no stigma attached to a failed effort. On the contrary, they will try even harder next time round. Such never-say-die approach is the sine qua non for the ultimate triumph in entrepreneurship and technological breakthrough. (7)A third decisive factor is the vital role of venture capitalists who willingly support promising start-ups with urgently needed initial capital to get them started. Some would even give failed entrepreneurs a second chance if convinced that a fresh concept might lead to eventual success. (8)Of equal importance, many bright young people and middle level professionals are keen to work for a new venture at substantially reduced remuneration, as it offers more scope for entrepreneurship and job satisfaction than the established companies. There is also a pride of achievement if their efforts contribute to its fruition. (9)Intellectual challenges aside, it is a common practice for start-ups to offer generous share options to employees in order to attract the right talent into their folds. This is a powerful incentive to motivate the staff to do their utmost and to share in the company's prosperity if it reaches its goal. Many regard this as the foundation of a successful enterprise. Those that have become high fliers, such as Netscape, Intel, Cisco and Yahoo, have turned many of their employees, including support staff like secretaries, into dot.com millionaires overnight, often at the relatively young age of 20s or 30s. (10)The Valley's professionals are among the most hardworking people anywhere. A 15-hour day and 7-day week is not uncommon, especially during the start-up stage. They would give up social life, and curtail their family life too, in order to pursue the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. It is this single minded pursuit of excellence, supported by strong ethos of team work and esprit de corps, which sustain them until their mission is accomplished. (11)Paper qualifications, though useful, is not a be all and end all. More weight is given to a candidate's proven abilities and aptitude for the job. This is amply demonstrated by industry icons like Apple's Jobs and Wozniak and Microsoft's Gates, all college dropouts who might not have emerged in a qualification-conscious community. (12)While racial prejudice no doubt still exists in the United States, albeit in a less degrading form as before, it is hardly discernible in the Valley. What counts most is one's vision and track record, and not one's nationality, skin colour or creed. This, together with its multiracial society, informal lifestyle and agree-able climate, lure foreigners to its shores. (13)Its phenomenal success has led to a worldwide fever to proliferate dot.com companies, both as a prestigious symbol and a quicker way to wealth. Singapore is part of this rising tide. In consequence, many bright young people have given up their secure jobs to join in the race. But the reality is that, because of its high-risk nature, for every success story there are hundreds who will, perforce, fall by the wayside. Will they get a second chance, given their own operating environment? (14)However, with the collapse of the US NASDAQ share index earlier this year resulting in the plunge in prices of technology shares listed on it and elsewhere, the hitherto valuable share options held by numerous paper dot.com millionaires have become virtually worthless in these changed circumstances. Those who could not take the heat, as it were, left their employment feeling disillusioned. Be that as it may, the majority in the Valley view this traumatic experience only as a temporary setback for the industry. They are sanguine that its longer term prospects remain bright as the ultimate potential of the information age has not yet run its full course. They are confident that it will flourish well into this century provided it maintains its cutting-edge in science and technology.1. According to the reports, the U.S. retailers won the popularity among British consumers because ______.(PASSAGE ONE)

单选题. Questions 1 to 5 are based on the first interview.1.

单选题. Questions 1 to 5 are based on the first interview.1.

单选题《复合题被拆开情况》　　1 PICASSO THE PAINTER WE ALL KNOW. Picasso the sculptor? Not so much. But that all changes with "Picasso Sculpture", a once-in-a-lifetime show now at the Museum of Modern Art in New York C

单选题 音频同上

单选题. SECTION A MULTIPLE-CHOICE QUESTIONS PASSAGE ONE (1)Of all the lessons taught by the financial crisis, the most personal one has been that Americans aren't too slick with money. We take out home loans we can't afford. We run up sky-high credit-card debt. We don't save nearly enough for retirement. (2)In response, proponents of financial-literacy education are stumping with renewed zeal. School districts in states such as New Jersey and Illinois are adding money-management courses to their curriculums. The Treasury and Education departments are sending lesson plans to high schools and encouraging students to compete in the National Financial Capability Challenge that begins in March. (3)Students with top scores on that exam will receive certificates—but chances for long-term benefits are slim. As it turns out, there is little evidence that traditional efforts to boost financial know-how help students make better decisions outside the classroom. Even as the financial-literacy movement has gained steam over the past decade, scores have been falling on tests that measure how informed students are about things such as budgeting, credit cards, insurance and investments. A survey of college students conducted for the JumpStart Coalition for Personal Financial Literacy found that students who'd had a personal-finance or money-management course in high school scored no better than those who hadn't. (4)"We need to figure out how to do this in the right way," says Lewis Mandell, a professor at the University of Washington who after 15 years of studying financial-literacy programs has come to the conclusion that current methods don't work. A growing number of researchers and educators agree that a more radical approach is needed. They advocate starting financial education a lot earlier than high school, putting real money and spending decisions into kids' hands and talking openly about the emotions and social influences tied to how we spend. (5)One promising example of new thinking is found on Chicago's South Side. At the Ariel Community Academy, financial education starts in kindergarten with books like A Chair for My Mother (the moral: if you want to buy something, save money first) and quickly becomes hands-on. Each entering class at Ariel is entrusted with a $20,000 investment portfolio, and by seventh grade, kids are deciding what to buy and sell (profits help pay for college). Last year, for the first time, the eighth-grade class graduated with less than the original $20,000. Talk about a teachable moment: stocks don't always go up. (6)Other initiatives are tackling such real-world issues as the commercial and social pressures that affect purchasing decisions. Why exactly do you want those expensive name-brand sneakers so badly? "It takes confidence to take a stand and to think differently," says Jeroo Billimoria, founder of Aflatoun, a nonprofit whose curriculum, used in more than 30 countries, aims to help kids get a leg up in their financial lives. "This goes beyond money and savings." (7)That approach might have helped in the recent housing bubble. Buyers didn't just need to know how different sorts of mortgages worked; they also needed the fortitude to choose a 30-year fixed rate when everyone around them was buying a bigger house with a riskier loan. (8)Amid such a complicated landscape, some experts question whether there could ever be enough education to adequately prepare Americans for financial life. A better solution, these critics contend, is to reform the system. "What works is creating institutions that make it easy to do the right thing," says David Laibson, a Harvard economics professor who, like Mandell, has decided after years of research that education isn't a silver bullet. One idea being discussed in Washington is the automatic IRA. Employers would have to enroll each worker in a personal retirement-savings account unless that worker decided to opt out. (9)Yet even the skeptics are slow to write off financial education completely. More than anything, they say, we need to rigorously study the financial decisions of alumni of programs like Ariel and Aflatoun and compare them with those of peers who didn't get the same sort of education. "Until you have experimental evidence, it's all a little speculative," says Michael Sherraden, a professor at Washington University in St. Louis who is conducting a seven-year, randomized, controlled study on whether giving children bank accounts inculcates the habit of saving—a program already being tried on a large scale in the U.K. Yes, good, solid research like this takes a lot of time and resources. But if what we're doing right now isn't working, it's in our own best interest to figure out what does. PASSAGE TWO (1)Boundaries have underpinned pretty much every aspect of my life, both past and present. From the profound lack of them in early childhood right through to growing up and discovering ways to create ones clear enough and strong enough to be able to stay off drugs, out of prison and create healthy relationships with friends, family and colleagues. (2)The emotional and psychological free for all spiraling around me as a kid pretty much guaranteed that I'd develop a series of debilitating addictions, court potentially lethal violence and begin the slow inevitable slide toward prison. An early death was always on the cards. The profound lack of boundaries throughout my father's own life lead to his suicide. Seeing how his inability to create a safe boundary around his dysfunctional emotional life contributed to his early death, woke me up to what I needed to do to stay off drugs, out of prison and alive. (3)It's no surprise to me then that the biggest problem we have when working with young people in prison is around boundaries. Implementing and holding them is key to the work we do in Write to Freedom (W2F). Young people from dysfunctional families who end up in custody seem to have a built-in biological default to test any form of boundary presented to them. If there's a weak boundary in our staff team the young prisoners make it their business to push it to breaking point. (4)Every weekend we've organized has had a problem with the security clearance needed to get the lads out and onto the moors. There are always a variety of reasons for this, not least of all the volatility of the young people themselves. Whatever the reason, each weekend we've set up we've found ourselves below the minimum number set to make a weekend happen. So we ended up walking onto the wings, going from cell to cell looking for rookies to come on a writing weekend on Dartmoor. Locked cell door or open Devon moor? The decision for them is clearly a no brainer. Doing this has lead to lads coming on the weekend who were far from ready to engage with what we were asking of them. As a result we faced chaos and stress that could easily have been avoided. (5)So I tightened up the criteria. Each participant had to complete three memoir based assignments before the weekend. All was good till the security board meeting two days before the March weekend. Out of the four lads who'd worked hard, completed the assignments and proved their understanding and commitment to W2F, only one was cleared to leave prison for the weekend. I could easily have done the same thing as last time, gone from wing to wing to build the numbers back up, I wanted to believe me, and Ashfield put pressure on me to do it. But we chose to stick to the assessment criteria. Right or wrong it had to be kept. The weekend has been postponed till May. (6)The psychology of boundaries, implicit and explicit, for the staff and participants in W2F is crucial to making the work we do safe. It builds trust, even if it means I do something I don't want to, like cancel a weekend after so much work has gone into its preparation. This is about self esteem; of the staff and the participants. Low self esteem crippled me in my early years and is still prone to erosion if I'm not careful. Boundaries inside and outside were the making of me. Lack of boundaries for these young people led them to prison. Everybody needs a line that must not be crossed. Boundaries create trust. This can and has lead to changed lives and changed relationships, and offers all of us hope in the darkest of times. PASSAGE THREE (1)Divorce is one of those creations, like fast food and lite rock, that has more people willing to indulge in it than people willing to defend it. Back in the 1960s, easier divorce was hailed as a needed remedy for toxic relationships. But familiarity has bred contempt. In recent years, the divorce revolution has been blamed for worsening all sorts of problems without bringing happiness to people in unhappy marriages. (2)There's a lot of evidence that marital breakup does more social harm than good. In their 2000 book, The Case for Marriage, Linda Waite and Maggie Gallagher document that adults who are married do better than singles in wealth, health, and personal satisfaction. Children living with a divorced or unwed single parent are more likely to fall into poverty, sickness, and crime than other kids. (3)Marriage is a good thing, most people agree, while divorce is, at best, a necessary evil. So the laws that accompanied the divorce revolution have come under fire for destroying families and weakening safeguards for spouses who keep their vows. (4)Waite and Gallagher argue that loose divorce laws harm even intact households by fostering chronic uncertainty. Louisiana, in line with this criticism, has gone so far as to provide a "covenant marriage" option for couples who want the protection of stricter divorce rules. (5)It may seem obvious that easier divorce laws make for more divorce and more insecurity. But what is obvious is not necessarily true. What two scholars have found is that when you make divorce easier to get, you may actually produce better marriages. (6)In the old days, anyone who wanted to escape from the trials of wedlock had to get his or her spouse to agree to a split, or else go to court to prove the partner had done something terribly wrong. The 1960s and '70s brought "no-fault" divorce, which is also known as "unilateral divorce," since either party can bring it about without the consent of the other. (7)The first surprise is that looser divorce laws have actually had little effect on the number of marriages that fall apart. Economist Justin Wolfers of Stanford University, in a study published by the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), found that when California passed a no-fault divorce law in 1970, the divorce rate jumped, then fell back to its old level—and then fell some more. (8)That was also the pattern in other states that loosened their laws. Over time, he estimates, the chance that a first marriage would break up rose by just one-fourth of one percentage point, which is next to nothing. (9)In short, nothing bad happened. But in another NBER paper, Wolfers and fellow economist Betsey Stevenson of the University of Pennsylvania report that in states that relaxed their divorce laws, some very good things happened: Fewer women committed suicide, and fewer were murdered by husbands or other "intimate" partners. In addition, both men and women suffered less domestic violence, compared to states that didn't change their laws. (10)We're not talking about tiny improvements here. Wolfers and Stevenson say that in no-fault states, there was a 10-percent drop in a woman's chance of being killed by her spouse or boyfriend. The rate of female suicide in new no-fault states fell by about 20 percent. The effect was more dramatic still for domestic violence—which "declined by somewhere between a quarter and a half between 1976 and 1985 in those states that reformed their divorce laws," according to Stevenson and Wolfers. (11)What could account for these surprising benefits? Something simple: A change in divorce laws alters the balance of power in a marriage, giving more leverage to the weaker or more vulnerable spouse. (12)If either partner can demand a divorce, each has a greater incentive to keep the other content If an abused spouse has an open exit, some abusers—and potential abusers—will find it possible to behave themselves. (13)By assuring both people in a marriage that they can get out ff things go badly, the looser laws can foster the sort of behavior needed to make sure things go well. Just as a driver in a small car will drive more cautiously than someone in an oversized SUV, couples faced with loose divorce laws may handle their family obligations with greater care. (14)No-fault divorce once looked like a remedy for bad marriages, in the same way that amputation is a remedy for a gangrenous limb. The good news is that it may prevent the disease in the first place. PASSAGE FOUR (1)They poison the mind and corrupt the morals of the young, who waste their time sitting on sofas immersed in dangerous fantasy worlds. That, at least, was the charge levelled against novels during the 18th century by critics worried about the impact of a new medium on young people. Today the idea that novels can harm people sounds daft. And that is surely how history will judge modern criticism of video games, which are accused of turning young people into violent criminals. This week European justice ministers met to discuss how best to restrict the sale of violent games to children. Some countries, such as Germany, believe the answer is to ban some games altogether. That is going too far. (2)Criticism of games is merely the latest example of a tendency to demonize new and unfamiliar forms of entertainment. In 1816 waltzing was condemned as a "fatal contagion" that encouraged promiscuity; in 1910 films were denounced as "an evil pure and simple, destructive of social interchange"; in the 1950s rock 'n' roll music was said to turn young people into "devil worshippers" and comic books were accused of turning children into drug addicts and criminals. In each case the pattern is the same: young people adopt a new form of entertainment, older people are spooked by its unfamiliarity and condemn it, but eventually the young grow up and the new medium becomes accepted—at which point another example appears and the cycle begins again. (3)The opposition to video games is founded on the mistaken belief that most garners are children. In fact, two thirds of garners are over 18 and the average garner is around 30. But the assumption that garners are mostly children leads to a double standard. Violent films are permitted and the notion that some films are unsuitable for children is generally understood. Yet different rules are applied to games. (4)Aren't games different because they are interactive? It is true that video games can make people feel excited or aggressive, but so do many sports. There is no evidence that video gaming causes long term aggression. (5)Games ought to be age-rated, just as films are, and retailers should not sell adult-rated games to children any more than they should sell them adult-rated films. Ratings schemes are already in place, and in some countries restrictions on the sale of adult-rated games to minors have the force of law. (6)Oddly enough, Hillary Clinton, one of the politicians who has led the criticism of the gaming industry in America, has recently come round to this view. Last month she emphasized the need for parents to pay more attention to game ratings and called on the industry, retailers and parents to work together. But this week some European politicians seemed to be moving in the other direction: the Netherlands may follow Germany, for example, in banning some games outright. Not all adults wish to play violent games, just as not all of them enjoy violent movies. But they should be free to do so if they wish.1. What is Lewis Mandell's feeling toward the current financial-literacy movement?______PASSAGE ONE

单选题　　(1) In the town there were two mutes, and they were always together. Early every morning they would come out from the house where they lived and walk arm in arm down the street to work. The one who always steered the way was an obese and dreamy Greek. In the summer he would come out wearing a yellow or green polo shirt stuffed sloppily into his trousers in front and hanging loose behind. When it was colder he wore over this a shapeless gray sweater. His face was round and oily, with half-closed eyelids and lips that curved in a gentle, stupid smile. The other mute was tall. His eyes had a quick, intelligent expression. He was always immaculate and very soberly dressed. Every morning the two friends walked silently together until they reached the main street of the town. Then when they came to a certain fruit and candy store they paused for a moment on the sidewalk outside. The Greek, Spiros Antonapoulos, worked for his cousin, who owned this fruit store. His job was to make candies and sweets, uncrate the fruits, and keep the place clean. The thin mute, John Singer, nearly always put his hand on his friend’s arm and looked for a second into his face before leaving him. Then after this goodbye Singer crossed the street and walked on alone to the jewelry store where he worked as a silverware engraver. In the late afternoon the friends would meet again. Singer came back to the fruit store and waited until Antonapoulos was ready to go home. The Greek would be lazily unpacking a case of peaches or melons, or perhaps looking at the funny paper in the kitchen behind the store where he cooked. Before their departure Antonapoulos always opened a paper sack he kept hidden during the day on one of the kitchen shelves. Inside were stored various bits of food he had collected—a piece of fruit or samples of candy. Usually before leaving Antonapoulos waddled gently to the glassed case in the front of the store where some meats and cheeses were kept. He glided open the back of the case and his fat hand groped lovingly for some particular dainty inside which he had wanted. Sometimes his cousin who owned the place did not see him. But if he noticed he stared at his cousin with a warning in his tight, pale face. Sadly Antonapoulos would shuffle the morsel from one corner of the case to the other. During these times Singer stood very straight with his hands in his pockets and looked in another direction. He did not like to watch this little scene between the two Greeks. For, except drinking and a certain solitary secret pleasure, Antonapoulos loved to eat more than anything else in the world.　　(2) In the dusk the two mutes walked slowly home together. At home Singer was always talking to Antonapoulos. His hands shaped the words in a swift series of designs. His face was eager and his gray-green eyes sparkled brightly. With his thin, strong hands he told Antonapoulos all that had happened during the day.　　(3) When back at home, Antonapoulos sat back lazily and looked at Singer. It was seldom that he ever moved his hands to speak at all—and then it was to say that he wanted to eat or to sleep or to drink. These three things he always said with the same vague, fumbling signs. At night, if he were not too drunk, he would kneel down before his bed and pray awhile. Then his plump hands shaped the words Holy Jesus, or God, or Darling Mary. These were the only words Antonapoulos ever said. Singer never knew just how much his friend understood of all the things he told him. But it did not matter.　　(4) They shared the upstairs of a small house near the business section of the town. There were two rooms. On the oil stove in the kitchen Antonapoulos cooked all of their meals. There were straight, plain kitchen chairs for Singer and an overstuffed sofa for Antonapoulos. The bedroom was furnished mainly with a large double bed covered with an eiderdown comforter for the big Greek and a narrow iron cot for Singer.　　(5) Dinner always took a long time, because Antonapoulos loved food and he was very slow. After they had eaten, the big Greek would lie back on his sofa and slowly lick over each one of his teeth with his tongue, either from a certain delicacy or because he did not wish to lose the savor of the meal—while Singer washed the dishes.　　(6) Sometimes in the evening the mutes would play chess. Singer had always greatly enjoyed this game, and years before he had tried to teach it to Antonapoulos. At first his friend could not be interested in the reasons for moving the various pieces about on the board. Then Singer began to keep a bottle of something good under the table to be taken out after each lesson. The Greek never got on to the erratic movements of the knights and the sweeping mobility of the queens, but he learned to make a few set, opening moves. He preferred the white pieces and would not play if the black men were given him. After the first moves Singer worked out the game by himself while his friend looked on drowsily. If Singer made brilliant attacks on his own men so that in the end the black king was killed, Antonapoulos was always very proud and pleased.　　(7) The two mutes had no other friends, and except when they worked they were alone together. Each day was very much like any other day, because they were alone so much that nothing ever disturbed them. Once a week they would go to the library for Singer to withdraw a mystery book and on Friday night they attended a movie. Then on payday they always went to the ten-cent photograph shop above the Army and Navy Store so that Antonapoulos could have his picture taken. These were the only places where they made customary visits. There were many parts in the town that they had never even seen. The town was in the middle of the deep South. The summers were long and the months of winter cold were very few. Nearly always the sky was a glassy, brilliant azure and the sun burned down riotously bright. Then the light, chill rains of November would come, and perhaps later there would be frost and some short months of cold. The winters were changeable, but the summers always were burning hot. The town was a fairly large one. On the main street there were several blocks of two- and three-story shops and business offices. But the largest buildings in the town were the factories, which employed a large percentage of the population. These cotton mills were big and flourishing and most of the workers in the town were very poor. Often in the faces along the streets there was the desperate look of hunger and of loneliness. But the two mutes were not lonely at all. At home they were content to eat and drink, and Singer would talk with his hands eagerly to his friend about all that was in his mind. So the years passed in this quiet way until Singer reached the age of thirty-two and had been in the town with Antonapoulos for ten years.

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单选题《复合题被拆开情况》　　1 Like many historical films, Amadeus is far from a faithful account of what is known about the period and the people that it portrays. Events are exaggerated, condensed and simplified, an

单选题. SECTION A MULTIPLE CHOICE QUESTIONS PASSAGE ONE (1)The multimillion dollar brain training industry is under attack. In October 2014, a group of over 100 eminent neuroscientists and psychologists wrote an open letter warning that "claims promoting brain games are frequently exaggerated and at times misleading". Earlier this year, industry giant Lumosity was fined $2m, and ordered to refund thousands of customers who were duped by false claims that the company's products improve general mental abilities and slow the progression of age-related decline in mental abilities. And a recent review examining studies purporting to show the benefits of such products found "little evidence...that training improves everyday cognitive performance". (2)While brain training games and apps may not live up to their hype, it is well established that certain other activities and lifestyle choices can have neurological benefits that promote overall brain health and may help to keep the mind sharp as we get older. One of these is musical training. Research shows that learning to play a musical instrument is beneficial for children and adults alike, and may even be helpful to patients recovering from brain injuries. (3)Playing a musical instrument is a rich and complex experience that involves integrating information from the senses of vision, hearing, and touch, as well as fine movements, and learning to do so can induce long-lasting changes in the brain. Professional musicians are highly skilled performers who spend years training, and they provide a natural laboratory in which neuroscientists can study how such changes—referred to as experience-dependent plasticity—occur across their lifespan. (4)Early brain scanning studies revealed significant differences in brain structure between musicians and non-musicians of the same age. For example, the corpus callosum, a massive bundle of nerve fibres connecting the two sides of the brain, is significantly larger in musicians. The brain areas involved in movement, heating, and visuo-spatial abilities also appear to be larger in professional keyboard players. And, the area devoted to processing touch sensations from the left hand is increased in violinists. (5)These studies compared data from different groups of people at one point in time. As such, they could not determine whether the observed differences were actually caused by musical training, or if existing anatomical differences predispose some to become musicians. But later, longitudinal studies that track people over time have shown that young children who do 14 months of musical training exhibit significant structural and functional brain changes compared to those who do not. (6)Together, these studies show that learning to play a musical instrument not only increases grey matter volume in various brain regions, but can also strengthen the tong-range connections between them. Other research shows that musical training also enhances verbal memory, spatial reasoning, and literacy skills, such that professional musicians usually outperform non-musicians on these abilities. (7)Importantly, the brain scanning studies show that the extent of anatomical change in musicians' brains is closely related to the age at which musical training began, and the intensity of training. Those who started training at the youngest age showed the largest changes when compared to non-musicians. (8)Even short periods of musical training in early childhood can have long-lasting benefits. In one 2013 study, for example, researchers recruited 44 older adults and divided them into three groups based on the level of formal musical training they had received as children. Participants in one group had received no training at all; those in the second had done a little training, defined as between one and three years of lessons; and those in the third had received moderate levels of training (four to fourteen years). (9)The researchers played recordings of complex speech sounds to the participants, and used scalp electrodes to measure the timing of neural responses in a part of the auditory brainstem. As we age, the precision of this timing deteriorates, making it difficult to understand speech, especially in environments with a lot of background noise. Participants who had received moderate amounts of musical training exhibited the fastest neural responses, suggesting that even limited training in childhood can preserve sharp processing of speech sounds and increase resilience to age-related decline in hearing. (10)More recently, it has become clear that musical training facilitates the rehabilitation of patients recovering from stroke and other forms of brain damage, and some researchers now argue that it might also boost speech processing and learning in children with dyslexia and other language impairments. What's more, the benefits of musical training seem to persist for many years, or even decades, and the picture that emerges from this all evidence is that learning to play a musical instrument in childhood protects the brain against the development of cognitive impairment and dementia. (11)Unlike commercial brain training products, which only improve performance on the skills involved, musical training has what psychologists refer to as transfer effects—in other words, learning to play a musical instrument seems to have a far broader effect on the brain and mental function, and improves other abilities that are seemingly unrelated. (12)Learning to play a musical instrument, then, seems to be one of the most effective forms of brain training there is. Musical training can induce various structural and functional changes in the brain, depending on which instrument is being learned, and the intensity of the training regime. It's an example of how dramatically life-long experience can alter the brain so that it becomes adapted to the idiosyncrasies of its owner's lifestyle. PASSAGE TWO (1)In the quest to fend off forgetfulness, some people build a palace of memory. It's a method for memorizing invented in ancient times by the Greek poet Simonides of Ceos, as legend has it, and more recently made popular by multiple best-selling books. Memory palaces provide imaginary architectural repositories for storing and retrieving anything you would like to remember. Sixteen centuries ago, St. Augustine spoke of "treasures of innumerable images" stored in his "spacious palaces of memory." But 21st-century scientists who study memory have identified an important point to remember: Even the most luxurious palace of memory needs trash cans. (2)Traditionally, forgetting has been regarded as a passive decay over time of the information recorded and stored in the brain. But while some memories may simply fade away like ink on paper exposed to sunlight, recent research suggests that forgetting is often more intentional, with erasure orchestrated by elaborate cellular and molecular mechanisms. And forgetfulness is not necessarily a sign of a faulty memory. Instead, forgetting may be the brain's frontline strategy in processing incoming information. Forgetting is essential, some researchers now argue, because the biological goal of the brain's memory apparatus is not preserving information, but rather helping the brain make sound decisions. Understanding how the brain forgets may offer clues to enhancing mental performance in healthy brains while also providing insights into the mechanisms underlying a variety of mental disorders. (3)Memory itself is still something of a mystery, but it basically consists of physical changes in the brain that encode a representation of past experiences. Those memory traces—known as engrams—can be accessed to reconstruct the past, albeit imperfectly. Recalling a memory reactivates a pattern of nerve-cell signaling that mimics the original experience. (4)Engrams obviously do not save every detail of every experience. Some records of activity patterns do not persist. And that's a good thing. An overly precise memory is maybe not really what we want in the long term, because it prevents us from using our memories to generalize them to new situations. In fact, what we might want is a more flexible and more generalized memory, and that would involve a bit of forgetting of the details and more the development of a gist of a memory. (5)Getting the gist, and just the gist, is therefore valuable as an aid to making smart decisions. In fact, it is wrong to think of memory simply as a means for high-fidelity transmission of information through time. Rather, the goal of memory is to guide intelligent decision making. (6)Getting just the gist is especially helpful in changing environments, where loss of some memories improves decision making in several ways. For one thing, forgetting can eliminate outdated information that would hamper sound judgment. And memories that reproduce the past too faithfully can impair the ability to imagine differing futures, making behavior too inflexible to cope with changing conditions. Failure to forget can result in the persistence of unwanted or debilitating memories, as with post-traumatic stress disorder. (7)Forgetting's great value implies that it doesn't happen accidentally. Psychologists have considered the possibility of active forgetting for more than half a century, but only in the past 15 years or so have researchers accumulated substantial neurobiological evidence on the issue. While the neuroscientific study of forgetting is still in its infancy, scientists have begun to discern some of the brain's tactics for information erasure. Some forgetting does appear to be "passive", as a result of either natural decay of the biological material forming engrams or the loss of ability to retrieve them. But many forms of forgetting are more like running a program that wipes data off your hard drive. New stimuli can actively interfere with old memories, for instance. Recalling parts of a memory can induce loss of other parts of it. In fact, forgetting could be the brain's main strategy in managing information. (8)If forgetting is the key to how the brain successfully processes the massive data input it encounters each day—as research accumulated so far suggests—then flaws in the forgetting process could plausibly contribute to brain disorders. Deficits in the ability to forget may be involved in autism spectrum disorders, for instance. Certainly the powerful and debilitating memories of post-traumatic stress disorder reflect an inability to forget disturbing experiences. Unwanted, repetitive invasive memories are a feature of some psychiatric disorders, such as schizophrenia. And the inability to forget cues associated with addictive drug use impairs recovery from substance abuse. On the plus side, better insight into the biology of forgetting could help identify drugs capable of enhancing needed memories while disposing of undesirable ones. But such benefits may appear only after much more research. PASSAGE THREE (1)The policeman on the beat moved up the avenue impressively. The impressiveness was habitual and not for show, for spectators were few. The time was barely 10 o'clock at night, but chilly gusts of wind with a taste of rain in them had well-nigh de-peopled the streets. (2)Trying doors as he went, twirling his club with many intricate and artful movements, turning now and then to cast his watchful eye adown the pacific thoroughfare, the officer, with his stalwart form and slight swagger, made a fine picture of a guardian of the peace. The vicinity was one that kept early hours. Now and then you might see the lights of a cigar store or of an all-night lunch counter; but the majority of the doors belonged to business places that had long since been closed. (3)When about midway of a certain block the policeman suddenly slowed his walk. In the doorway of a darkened hardware store a man leaned, with an unlighted cigar in his mouth. As the policeman walked up to him the man spoke up quickly. (4)"It's all right, officer," he said, reassuringly. "I'm just waiting for a friend. It's an appointment made twenty years ago. Sounds a little funny to you, doesn't it? Well, I'll explain if you'd like to make certain it's all straight. About that long ago there used to be a restaurant where this store stands—'Big Joe' Brady's restaurant." (5)"Until five years ago," said the policeman. "It was torn down then." (6)The man in the doorway struck a match and lit his cigar. The light showed a pale, square-jawed face with keen eyes, and a little white scar near his right eyebrow. His scarfpin was a large diamond, oddly set. (7)"Twenty years ago tonight," said the man, "I dined here at 'Big Joe' Brady's with Jimmy Wells, my best chum, and the finest chap in the world. He and I were raised here in New York, just like two brothers, together. I was eighteen and Jimmy was twenty. The next morning I was to start for the West to make my fortune. You couldn't have dragged Jimmy out of New York; he thought it was the only place on earth. Well, we agreed that night that we would meet here again exactly twenty years from that date and time, no matter what our conditions might be or from what distance we might have to come. We figured that in twenty years each of us ought to have our destiny worked out and our fortunes made, whatever they were going to be." (8)"It sounds pretty interesting," said the policeman. "Rather a long time between meets, though, it seems to me. Haven't you heard from your friend since you left?" (9)"Well, yes, for a time we corresponded," said the other. "But after a year or two we lost track of each other. You see, the West is a pretty big proposition, and I kept hustling around over it pretty lively. But I know Jimmy will meet me here if he's alive, for he always was the truest, stanchest old chap in the world. He'll never forget. I came a thousand miles to stand in this door tonight, and it's worth it if my old partner turns up." (10)The waiting man pulled out a handsome watch, the lids of it set with small diamonds. (11)"Three minutes to ten," he announced. "It was exactly ten o'clock when we parted here at the restaurant door." (12)"Did pretty well out West, didn't you?" asked the policeman. (13)"You bet! I hope Jimmy has done half as well. He was a kind of plodder, though, good fellow as he was. I've had to compete with some of the sharpest wits going to get my pile. A man gets in a groove in New York. It takes the West to put a razor-edge on him." (14)The policeman twirled his club and took a step or two. (15)"I'll be on my way. Hope your friend comes around all right. Going to call time on him sharp?" (16)"I should say not!" said the other. "I'll give him half an hour at least. If Jimmy is alive on earth he'll be here by that time. So long, officer." (17)"Good-night, sir," said the policeman, passing on along his beat, trying doors as he went. (18)There was now a fine, cold drizzle falling, and the wind had risen from its uncertain puffs into a steady blow. The few foot passengers astir in that quarter hurried dismally and silently along with coat collars turned high and pocketed hands. And in the door of the hardware store the man who had come a thousand miles to fill an appointment, uncertain almost to absurdity, with the friend of his youth, smoked his cigar and waited. (19)About twenty minutes he waited, and then a tall man in a long overcoat, with collar turned up to his ears, hurried across from the opposite side of the street. He went directly to the waiting man. (20)"Is that you, Bob?" he asked, doubtfully. (21)"Is that you, Jimmy Wells?" cried the man in the door. (22)"Bless my heart!" exclaimed the new arrival, grasping both the other's hands with his own. "It's Bob, sure as fate. I was certain I'd find you here if you were still in existence. Well, well, well! —twenty years is a long time. The old gone, Bob; I wish it had lasted, so we could have had another dinner there. How has the West treated you, old man?" (23)"Bully; it has given me everything I asked it for. You've changed lots, Jimmy. I never thought you were so tall by two or three inches." (24)"Oh, I grew a bit after I was twenty." (25)"Doing well in New York, Jimmy?" (26)"Moderately. I have a position in one of the city departments. Come on, Bob; we'll go around to a place I know of, and have a good long talk about old times." (27)The two men started up the street, arm in arm. The man from the West, his egotism enlarged by success, was beginning to outline the history of his career. The other, submerged in his overcoat, listened with interest. (28)At the corner stood a drug store, brilliant with electric lights. When they came into this glare each of them turned simultaneously to gaze upon the other's face. (29)The man from the West stopped suddenly and released his arm. (30)"You're not Jimmy Wells," he snapped. "Twenty years is a long time, but not long enough to change a man's nose from a Roman to a pug." (31)"It sometimes changes a good man into a bad one," said the tall man. "You've been under arrest for ten minutes, 'Silky' Bob. Chicago thinks you may have dropped over our way and wires us she wants to have a chat with you. Going quietly, are you? That's sensible. Now, before we go on to the station here's a note I was asked to hand you. You may read it here at the window. It's from Patrolman Wells." (32)The man from the West unfolded the little piece of paper handed him. His hand was steady when he began to read, but it trembled a little by the time he had finished. The note was rather short. (33)"Bob: I was at the appointed place on time. When you struck the match to light your cigar I saw it was the face of the man wanted in Chicago. Somehow I couldn't do it myself, so I went around and got a plain clothes man to do the job. JIMMY."1. By mentioning industry giant Lumosity, the author ______. (PASSAGE ONE)

单选题. Questions 1 to 5 are based on the first interview.1.

单选题《复合题被拆开情况》 1"Britain’s best export," I was told by the head of the Department of Immigration in Canberra ,"is people. " Close on 100,000 people have applied for assisted passages in the first five mon