The Term "CYBERSPACE" was coined by William Gibson, a science-fiction writer. In the book Mr. Gibson describes cyberspace as "a consensual hallucination experienced daily by billions of legitimate operators" and "a graphic representation of data abstracted from the banks of every computer in the human system." The myriad connections forged by these computing devices have brought tremendous benefits to everyone who uses the web to tap into humanity's collective store of knowledge every day. But data breaches are becoming ever bigger and more common. Last year over 800m records were lost. The potential damage, though, extends well beyond such commercial incursions. America's president, Barack Obama, said in a White House press release earlier this year that cyber-threats "pose one of the gravest national-security dangers" the country is facing. Securing cyberspace is becoming harder. Cyber-security, which involves protecting both data and people, is facing multiple threats, notably cybercrime and online industrial espionage, both of which are growing rapidly. A recent estimate by the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CEIS), puts the annual global cost of digital crime and intellectual-property theft at $445 billion—a sum roughly equivalent to the GDP of a smallish rich European country such as Austria. There is also the risk of cyber-sabotage. Terrorists or agents of hostile powers could mount attacks on companies and systems that control vital parts of an economy, including power stations, electrical grids and communications networks. Such attacks are hard to pull off, but not impossible. The biggest day-to-day threats faced by companies and government agencies come from crooks and spooks hoping to steal financial data and trade secrets. One is to ensure that organizations get the basics of cyber-security right. There is also a need to provide incentives to improve cyber-security, be they carrots or sticks. Cyberspace is about to undergo another massive change. Over the next few years billions of new devices, from cars to household appliances and medical equipment, will be fitted with tiny computers that connect them to the web and make them more useful. But unless these systems have adequate security protection, the internet of things could easily become the internet of new things to be hacked. Plenty of people are eager to take advantage of any weaknesses they may spot. Hacking used to be about geeky college kids tapping away in their bedrooms to annoy their elders. It has grown up with a vengeance.

Empirical evidence is evidence that one can see, hear, touch, taste, or smell; it is evidence that is susceptible to one"s senses.【F1】 Empirical evidence is important because it is evidence that others besides yourself can experience, and it is repeatable, so empirical evidence can be checked by yourself and others. 【F2】 Empirical evidence is the only type of evidence that possesses these attributes and is therefore the only type used by scientists and critical thinkers to make vital decisions and reach sound conclusions. We can contrast empirical evidence with other types of evidence to understand its value.【F3】 Hearsay evidence is what someone says they heard another say; it is not reliable because you cannot check its source. Better is testimonial evidence, which, unlike hearsay evidence, is allowed in courts of law. But even testimonial evidence is notoriously unreliable, as numerous studies have shown. Courts also allow circumstantial evidence(e. g. , means, motive, and opportunity), but this is obviously not reliable. The most common alternative to empirical evidence, authoritarian evidence, is what authorities(people, books, billboards, television commercials, etc.)tell you to believe. Sometimes, if the authority is reliable, authoritarian evidence is reliable evidence, but many authorities are not reliable, so you must check the reliability of each authority before you accept its evidence. In the end, you must be your own authority and rely on your own powers of critical thinking to know if what you believe is reliably true. Transmitting knowledge by authority is, however, the most common method among humans for three reasons; first, we are all conditioned from birth by our parents through the use of positive and negative reinforcement to listen to, believe, and obey authorities; second,【F4】 it is believed that human societies that relied on a few experienced or trained authorities for decisions that affected all had a higher survival value than those that didn"t, and thus the behaviorial trait of susceptibility to authority was strengthened and passed along to future generations by natural selection; third, authoritarian instruction is the quickest and most efficient method for transmitting information we know about.【F5】 But remember: some authoritarian evidence and knowledge should be validated by empirical evidence, logical reasoning, and critical thinking before you should consider it reliable, and, in most cases, only you can do this for yourself.

In the following text, some sentences have been removed. For Questions 41-45, choose the most suitable one from the list (A、B、C、D、E、F、G……) to fit into each of the numbered blank. There are several extra choices, which do not fit in any of the gaps. (10 points) Water is the most common substance on earth. It covers more than 70 percent of the earth"s surface. It fills the oceans, rivers, and lakes, and is in the ground and in the air we breathe. Water is everywhere. Without water, there can be no life. In fact, every living thing consists mostly of water. (41)______ (42)______. Rain hammers at the land and washes soil into rivers. The oceans pound against the shores, chiseling cliffs and carrying away land. Rivers knife through rock, carve, canyons, and build up land where they empty into the sea. Glaciers plow valleys and cut down mountains. (43)______. Land absorbs and releases heat from the sun quickly. But the oceans absorb and release the sun"s heat slowly. So breezes from the oceans bring warmth to the land in winter and coolness in summer. Throughout history, water has been people"s slave and their master. Great civilizations have risen where water supplies were plentiful. They have fallen when these supplies failed. People have killed one another for a muddy water hole. They have worshiped rain gods and prayed for rain. Often when rains have failed to come, crops have withered and starvation has spread across a land. (44)______ Today, more than ever, water is both slave and master to people. We use water in our homes for cleaning, cooking, bathing, and carrying away wastes. We use water to irrigate dry farmlands so we can grow more food. Our factories use more water than any other material. We use the water in rushing rivers and thundering waterfalls to produce electricity. Our demand for water is constantly increasing. Every year, there are more people in the world. Factories turn out more and more products, and need more and more water. We live in a world of water. But almost all of it, about 97 per cent, is in the oceans. This water is too salty to be used for drinking, farming, and manufacturing. Only about 3 percent of the world"s water is fresh (unsalty). (45)______.A. Ever since the world began, water has been shaping the earth.B. When we are running, we feel thirsty and drink a lot of water. In fact, when we eat, the food consists of plenty of water.C. Water helps keep the earth"s climate from getting too hot or too cold.D. Sometimes the rains have fallen too heavily and too suddenly. Then rivers have overflowed their banks, drowning large numbers of people and causing enormous destruction of property.E. Your body is about two-thirds water. A chicken is about three-fourths water, and a pineapple is about four-fifths water. Most scientists believe that life itself began in water—in the salty water of the sea.F. Nowadays, scientists are considering making use of ocean water. The application of the 4technology to turn salty water into fresh water will come into being very soon.G. Most of this water is not easily available to people because it is locked in icecaps and other glaciers. By the year 2010, the world demand for fresh water may be double what it was in the 1980"s. But there will still be enough to meet people"s needs.

低碳也可促进经济 低碳经济是指温室气体排放量尽可能低的经济发展方式，尤其要有效控制二氧化碳这一主要温室气体的排放。 在全球变暖的大背景下，低碳经济受到越来越多国家的关注。低碳经济以低能耗、低排放、低污染为基础，其实质是 提高能源利用效率和创建清洁能源结构，核心是技术创新、制度创新和发展观的改变。发展低碳经济是一场涉及生 产模式、生活方式、价值观念和国家权益的全球性革命。 在即将于20日落幕的全国节能宣传周中，低碳经济成了一个热门词汇。低碳意味着环保，彰显出我们应对气 候变化的努力方向，但它并不仅仅意味着减少使用化石燃料。从国际经验来看，低碳经济是一项系统工程，低碳也 可以促进经济。 英国是全球低碳经济的积极倡导者和先行者。在2003年的能源白皮书中，英国首次以政府文件形式提出要创 建低碳经济，领先其他各国。英国将发展低碳经济置于国家战略高度，不仅是为了推动环保、应对气候变化，还希望 通过发展、应用和输出低碳技术来创造新的商机和就业机会，在未来可能的低碳大产业中占据先机。 以英国能源和气候变化部17日刚刚公布的“清洁煤炭”计划草案为例，评估认为，这一计划将在工程、制造等领 域提供3万到6万个就业岗位，到2030年它对英国经济的贡献值将达到每年40亿英镑。 其他发达国家在发展低碳经济上也不甘落后。美国奥巴马政府将把发展绿色能源作为重要的经济刺激手段， 计划在10年内创造500万个新能源、节能和清洁生产就业岗位；日本的《绿色经济与社会变革》政策草案被认为可 使日本环境领域的市场规模在2020年增长到120万亿日元(1美元约合96日元)。 具体来说，低碳目标最有可能在三个方面促进经济发展。首先是加速太阳能、风能等新能源产业的发展。这是 减少使用化石燃料，从而减排二氧化碳等温室气体的治本之策。目前世界新能源产业已具备相当规模，并正得到各 国持续追加的投资。 其次是对传统产业的低碳化升级改造。前述英国“清洁煤炭”计划便是针对煤电厂的技术改造计划，要求煤电厂 具有捕捉并储存二氧化碳的能力。汽车产业中兴起的电动汽车、生物能源汽车，也是传统产业向低碳化发展的范例。 最后，全球碳交易市场本身也是一种新兴的经济活动。根据联合国“清洁发展机制”等规定，没有减排指标的发 展中国家或减排工作做得较好的机构，可以将碳排放配额拿到市场上交易。碳交易已经有效帮助了许多发展中国 家的经济发展。 英国(前)首相布朗曾表示，英国将力争用“低碳经济模式”帮助经济复苏。在当前全球经济衰退的大背景下，低 碳经济将是科学而可持续发展的良好方向。 我们也参与了上面提到的日本和英国的合作研究，并进行了相应的针对中国低碳社会的研究。这里的研究目 标是在英国和日本等发达国家实现低碳社会理想的情况下，发展中国家和发达国家共享技术和对策，那么中国有可 能迎接低碳未来。这些技术或者政策有可能会晚些进入发展中国家，但只是时间的问题。 明年，有关部门将对完成“十一五”节能目标有困难的地区加强督导，确保节能减排设施的有效运行。同时在全 国范围内继续深入开展节能减排全民行动。此外，我国还将完善有关政策法规和标准，促进节能减排；积极推进十 大重点节能工程，全面实施节能产品惠民工程。在做好财政补贴推广高效节能空调的基础上，制定冰箱、洗衣机、平 板电视、燃气热水器、电机等节能产品的财政补贴推广实施细则。

People do not analyze every problem they meet. Sometimes they try to remember a solution from the last time they had a similar problem. They often accept the opinions or ideas of other people. Other times they begin to act without thinking; they try to find a solution by trial and error. However, when all these methods fail, the person with a problem has to start analyzing. There are six stages in analyzing a problem. First the person must recognize that there is a problem. For example, Sam"s bicycle is broken, and he cannot ride it to class as he usually does. Sam must see that there is a problem with his bicycle. Next the thinker must define the problem. Before Sam can repair his bicycle, he must find the reason why it does not work. For instance, he must determine if the problem is with the gears, the brakes, or the frame. He must make his problem more specific. Now the person must look for information that will make the problem clearer and lead to possible solutions. For in stance, suppose Sam decided that his bike does not work because there is something wrong with the gear wheels. At this time, he can look in his bicycle repair book and read about gears. He can talk to his friends at the bike shop. He can look at his gears carefully. After studying the problem, the person should have several suggestions for a possible solution. Take Sam as an illustration. His suggestions might be: put oil on the gear wheels; buy new gear wheels and replace the old ones; tighten or loosen the gear wheels. Eventually one suggestion seems to be the solution to the problem. Sometimes the final idea comes very suddenly because the thinker suddenly sees something new or sees something in a new way. Sam, for example, suddenly sees that there is a piece of chewing gum between the gear wheels. He immediately realizes the solution to his problem: he must clean the gear wheels. Finally the solution is tested. Sam cleans the gear wheels and finds that afterwards his bicycle works perfectly. In short, he has solved the problem.

[A] Message transmission in the body from the chemical perspective[B] How Food Influences Mood and Mind[C] Substances Contained in Some Foods can Improve Brainpower [D] An Example of the Influence of Food on Mind and Mood[E] Food Produces Chemical Messengers in the Brain[F] The Effects and Application of Neurotransmitters Hippocrates, the "Father of Medicine", said, "Let your food be your medicine, and let your medicine be your food. " For a Greek born in the fifth century B. C. , Hippocrates was wise beyond his time. Today, we know that a low-fat diet rich in whole grains, fruits, and vegetables strengthens the immune system and reduces the risk of cancer, heart disease, and stroke. But, Hippocrates, lend an ear! There's more to the story. New evidence suggests that food may influence how healthy people think and feel. Were he alive today, Hippocrates might look back to his last meal to explain his cheerful (or sour) mood. He might also change his eating habits to become happier or smarter. 【C1】______ Imagine yourself lying in bed, your mind in turmoil. You toss and turn, but sleep won't come. Maybe a bedtime snack would help. What should you choose? If you think first of toaster waffles or popcorn, some experts would say you're on the right track. Foods high in complex carbohydrates—such as cereals, potatoes, pasta, crackers, or rice cakes—make many people relaxed and drowsy. Try one more. You have a math test coming up in the afternoon. You want to be sharp, but you usually feel sleepy after lunch. Is your best choice an energy fix of fries and a shake or a broiled chicken breast and low-fat yogurt? If you pick the high-fat fries and shake,you may feel sluggish and blow that test. The protein-rich chicken and yogurt are better choices. Protein foods energize, some experts say. 【C2】______ How does food affect mood and mind? The answer may lie in the chemistry of the brain and nervous system. Molecules called neurotransmitters are chemical messengers. They carry a nerve impulse across the gap between nerve cells. The release of neurotransmitter molecules from one neuron and their attachment to receptor sites on another keep a nerve impulse moving. Nerve impulses carry messages from the environment to the brain for example, the pain you feel when you stub your toe. They also carry messages in the other direction, from the brain to the muscles. That's why you back away from the obstacle that initiated the pain signal and exclaim, "Ouch!" 【C3】______ "Many neurotransmitters are built from the foods we eat," says neuroscientist Eric Chudler of the University of Washington. Too little or too much of a particular nutrient in the diet can affect their production, Chudler says. For example, tryptophan from foods such as yogurt, milk, bananas, and eggs is required for the production of the neurotransmitter serotonin. 【C4】______ Dozens of neurotransmitters are known; hundreds may exist. Their effects depend on their amounts and where they work in the brain. The neurotransmitter serotonin, for example, is thought to produce feelings of calmness, relaxation, and contentment. Drugs that prevent its reuptake (into the neuron that released it) are prescribed to treat depression. In at least some healthy, non-depressed people, carbohydrate foods seem to enhance serotonin production and produce similar effects. "It is the balance between different neurotransmitters that helps regulate mood," Chudler says. 【C5】______ Proper nutrition may also enhance brainpower. Choline is a substance similar to the B vitamins. It's found in egg yolks, wholewheat, peanuts, milk, green peas, liver, beans, seafood, and soybeans. The brain uses it to make the neurotransmitter acetylcholine. To test the effects of choline on memory and learning, researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology gave memory tests to college students before increasing the amount of choline in their subjects' diets. Later, they retested. On the average, memories were better, and the students learned a list of unrelated words more easily. "We're just scratching the surface in this field," says Larry Christensen, a psychologist at the University of South Alabama, "but we know that there are definite behavioral effects of diet." There's a lot to learn, and future research may reveal more about the chemistry of mood, brain, and nutrition. Until then, it makes sense to choose healthy foods that nourish both body and mind.

A young woman goes to university and earns a degree in religious and women's studies. In the process she piles up some $ 100,000 in student-loan debt. Upon graduation, she cannot find a job in her field and struggles to pay her bills. An example of unwise decision-making perhaps, but is it also proof of a long-debated bubble in American higher education? It is for Glenn Reynolds, the productive blogger, law professor and author of a new book, "The New School". With tuition costs rising much faster than inflation, Americans are taking on record amounts of debt over $1 trillion by 2013—to fund their education. Many are finding that their job prospects do not justify the investment. Whereas a university degree once meant automatic entry into the middle class, it now comes with no such guarantee. But is higher education as bad a deal as Mr. Reynolds makes it out to be? "Some people are graduating with debts of $100,000 or more," he says, "sometimes much more." Most are not, though. The average graduate holds student-loan debt of $29,400, a number not found in this book. College Board, a non-profit organisation, finds that the median earnings of university graduates emerging from four-year courses and without a further degree, such as a master's, are 65% higher over their lifetimes than those of high-school graduates. Short on numbers, the book contributes little to the bubble debate. But Mr. Reynolds puts forward criticism of American universities that will ring true to anyone who has attended one recently. Universities can help people make money in three ways: by teaching them skills, giving them credentials that employers want and providing access to a valuable social network. Some studies have shown that university students fail to learn much of anything. Acquiring skills, of course, can be quite expensive. Prices should not continue going up forever, so new thinking is needed. The web provides one way forward, and although Mr. Reynolds is doubtful about the ability of colleges to reinvent themselves, some are catching on. Take the Georgia Institute of Technology, which has joined up with Udacity, an online educator, to offer a master's degree in computer science for $ 7,000. "It's a real, accredited degree," says Mr. Reynolds, "just like the ones that cost six times as much if earned on campus."

European farm ministers have ended three weeks of negotiations with a deal which they claim represents genuine reform of the common agricultural policy(CAP). Will it be enough to kickstart the Doha world trade negotiations? On the face of it, the deal agreed in the early hours of Thursday June 26th looks promising. Most subsidies linked to specific farm products are, at last, to be broken—the idea is to replace these with a direct payment to farmers, unconnected to particular products. Support prices for several key products, including milk and butter, are to be cut—that should mean European prices eventually falling towards the world market level. Cutting the link between subsidy and production was the main objective of proposals put forward by Mr. Fischler, which had formed the starting point for the negotiations. The CAP is hugely unpopular around the world, ft subsidises European farmers to such an extent that they can undercut farmers from poor countries, who also face trade barriers that largely exclude them from the potentially lucrative European market. Farm trade is also a key feature of the Doha round of trade talks, launched under the auspices of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) in November 2001. Developing countries have lined up alongside a number of industrial countries to demand an end to the massive subsidies Europe pays its farmers. Several Doha deadlines have already been missed because of the EU"s intransigence, and the survival of the talks will be at risk if no progress is made by September, when the world"s trade ministers meet in Cancun, Mexico. But now even the French seem to have gone along with the deal hammered out in Luxembourg. Up to a point, anyway. The package of measures gives the green light for the most eager reformers to move fast to implement the changes within their own countries. But there is an escape clause of sorts for the French and other reform-averse nations. They can delay implementation for up to two years. There is also a suggestion that the reforms might not apply where there is a chance that they would lead to a reduction in land under cultivation. These let-outs are potentially damaging for Europe"s negotiators in the Doha round. They could significantly reduce the cost savings that the reforms might otherwise generate and, in turn, keep European expenditure on farm support unacceptably high by world standards. More generally, the escape clauses could undermine the reforms by encouraging the suspicion that the new package will not deliver the changes that its supporters claim. Close analysis of what is inevitably a very complicated package might confirm the sceptics" fears.

【F1】 Much of the language used to describe monetary policy, such as steering the economy to a soft landing or a touch on the brakes, makes itself sound like a precise science. Nothing could be further from the truth. The link between interest rates and inflation is uncertain. And there are long, variable lags before policy changes have any effect on the economy.【F2】 Hence there is an analogy that likens the conduct of monetary policy to driving a car with a blackened windscreen, a cracked rearview mirror and a faulty steering wheel. Given all these disadvantages, central bankers seem to have had much to boast about of late. Average inflation in the big seven industrial economies fell to a mere 2.3% last year, close to its lowest level in 30 years, before rising slightly to 2.5% this July. This is a long way below the double-digit rates which many countries experienced in the 1970s and early 1980s. It is also less than most forecasters had predicted. In late 1994 the panel of economists which The Economist polls each month said that America"s inflation rate would average 3.5% in 1995. In fact, it fell to 2.6% in August, and is expected to average only about 3% for the year as a whole.【F3】 In Britain and Japan inflation is running half a percentage point below the rate predicted at the end of last year, this is no flash in the pan; over the past couple of years, inflation has been consistently lower than expected in Britain and America. 【F4】 Economists have been particularly surprised by favourable inflation figures in Britain and the linked States, since conventional measures suggest that both economies, and especially America"s, have little productive slack. America"s capacity utilisation, for example, hit historically high levels earlier this year, and its jobless rate(5.6% in August)has fallen below most estimates of the natural rate of unemployment—the rate below which inflation has taken off on the past. Why has inflation proved so mild? The most thrilling explanation is, unfortunately, a little defective.【F5】 Some economists argue that powerful structural changes in the world have upended the old economic models that were based upon the historical link between growth and inflation.

When you are small, all ambitions fall into one grand category: when I"m grown up. When I"m grown up, you say, I"ll go up in space. I"m going to be an author. I"ll kill them all and then they"ll be sorry. I"ll be married in a cathedral with sixteen bridesmaids in pink lace. I"ll have a puppy of my own and no one will be able to take him away. None of it ever happens, of course—or darn little, but the fantasies give you the idea that there is something to grow up for. Indeed one of the saddest things about gilded adolescence is the feeling that from eighteen on, it"s all downhill; I read with horror of an American hip pie wedding where someone said to the groom(aged twenty) "you seem so kind a grown up somehow", and the lad had to go round seeking assurance that he wasn"t. No, really he wasn"t. A determination to be better adults than the present incumbents is fine, but to refuse to grow up at all is just plain unrealism. When my children are grown up, I"ll learn to fly an airplane. I will career round the sky, knowing that if I do "go pop", there will be no little ones to suffer shock and maladjustment; that even if the worst does come to the worst, I will at least dodge the geriatric ward and all that look for your glasses in order to see where you"ve left your teeth. When my children are grown up, I"ll have fragile lovely things on low tables; I"ll have a white carpet; I"ll go to the pictures in the afternoons. When the children are grown up, I"ll actually be able to do a day"s work in a flay, instead of spreading over three, and go away for a weekend without planning as if for a trip to the Moon. When I"m grown up—I mean when they"re grown up—I"ll be free. Of course, I know it"s got to get worse before it gets better. Twelve-year-old, I"m told, don"t go to bed at seven, so you don"t even get your evening. Once they"re past ten you have to start worrying about their friends instead of simply shooting the intruders off the doorstep, and to settle down to a steady ten years of criticism of everything you"ve ever thought or done or won. Boys, it seems, may be less of a trial than girls, since they can"t get pregnant and they don"t borrow your clothes—if they do borrow your clothes, of course, you"ve got even more to worry about. The young don"t respect their parents any more. Goodness, how sad. Still, like eating snails, it might be all right once you"ve got over the idea; it might let us off having to bother quite so much with them when the time comes. But one is simply not going to be able to drone away one"s days, toothless by the fire, brooding on the past.

When it comes to suing doctors, Philadelphia is hardly the city of brotherly love. A combination of sprightly lawyers and sympathetic juries has made Philadelphia a hotspot for medical-malpractice lawsuits. Since 1995, Pennsylvania state courts have awarded an average of $2m in such cases, according to Jury Verdict Research, a survey firm. Some medical specialists have seen their malpractice insurance premiums nearly double over the past year. Obstetricians are now paying up to $104,000 a year to protect themselves. The insurance industry is largely to blame. Carol Golin, the Monitor"s editor, argues that in the 1990s insurers tried to grab market share by offering artificially low rates (betting that any losses would be covered by gains on their investments). The stock-market correction, coupled with the large legal awards, has eroded the insurers" reserves. Three in Pennsylvania alone have gone bust. A few doctors—particularly older ones—will quit. The rest are adapting. Some are abandoning litigation-prone procedures, such as delivering babies. Others are moving parts of their practice to neighboring states where insurance rates are lower. Some from Pennsylvania have opened offices in New Jersey. New doctors may also be deterred from setting up shop in litigation havens, however prestigious. Despite a Republican president, tort reform has got nowhere at the federal level. Indeed doctors could get clobbered indirectly by a Patients" Bill of Rights, which would further expose managed care companies to lawsuits. This prospect has fuelled interest among doctors in Pennsylvania"s new medical malpractice reform bill, which was signed into law on March 20th. It will, among other things, give doctors $40m of state funds to offset their insurance premiums, spread the payment of awards out over time and prohibit individuals from double dipping—that is, suing a doctor for damages that have already been paid by their health insurer. But will it really help? Randall Bovbjerg, a health policy expert at the Urban Institute, argues that the only proper way to slow down the litigation machine would be to limit the compensation for pain and suffering, so-called "non-monetary damages". Needless to say, a fixed cap on such awards is resisted by most trial lawyers. But Mr. Bovbjerg reckons a more nuanced approach, with a sliding scale of payments based on well-defined measures of injury, is a better way forward. In the meantime, doctors and insurers are bracing themselves for a couple more rough years before the insurance cycle turns. Nobody disputes that hospital staff make mistakes: a 1999 Institute of Medicine report claimed that errors kill at least 44,000 patients a year. But there is little evidence that malpractice lawsuits on their own will solve the problem.

BSection III Writing/B

How soon your performance will be rated may influence how well you do, according to a new study published in the journal Psychological Science. In the study, researchers Keri L. Kettle and Gerald Haubl from the University of Alberta set out to determine whether the timing of feedback influences performance. Because earlier feedback means a more proximate possibility of disappointment, the researchers hypothesized that students told they would be learning their grade sooner would be more likely to perform well, compared with those who wouldn"t find out their grade until later. Of 501 students taking a particular course, 271 agreed to participate in the study. All students were assigned a four minute oral presentation, which they had to deliver in front of about 10 classmates. Their performance was ranked on a scale of 1-10 by classmates, and the average of those scores made up their grade for the assignment Prior to giving their oral presentation, study participants were asked to predict how well they would do, and were also told how soon they would learn their grade. The researchers found that study participants who"d been told they would be given their scores earlier performed far better than those told they"d receive their scores later. What"s more, despite the fact that, on average, students who anticipated finding out how they"d done earlier significantly outperformed classmates who were given their scores later, they were more likely to predict low marks for themselves. In contrast, those who were told they wouldn"t learn their scores until later were more likely to predict very high marks—which they seldom actually went on to earn. As a control, the researchers also assessed the scores of the 230 students who had declined to participate in the study. While students with the earliest feedback scored in the 60th percentile on average, and those with the latest feedback scored in the 40th percentile on average, those not included in the study(and whose feedback time hadn"t been manipulated)consistently scored in the 50th percentile. The findings suggest that "mere anticipation of more rapid feedback improves performance," the authors conclude, and that, interestingly, proximity of feedback influences predicted performance and actual performance differently. As the authors sum up: "People do best precisely when their predictions about their own performance are least optimistic." The influence of feedback anticipation on performance has implications beyond the classroom as well, the researchers argue—in the way that managers respond to employee work, for example, or maybe even how Mom and Dad size up how clean that room is. The findings, Kettle and Haubl conclude, "have important practical implications for all individuals who are responsible for mentoring and for evaluating the performance of others."

Title: SCHOOL ACTIVITIESWord limit: 160-200 wordsTime limit: 40 minutesYou are required to develop your essay according to the given topic sentence of each paragraph.Outline:1. The school activities announcements on the campus.2. The first group takes part in these activities actively for various reasons.3. The second group spends their time differently.4. Your preference.

English speaking country

Can Wealth Bring Happiness?

BPart ADirections: Write a composition/letter of no less than 100 words on the following information./B

BPart CDirections: Read the following text carefully and then translate the underlined segments into Chinese./B

For the past several years, the Sunday newspaper supplement Parade has featured a column called "Ask Marilyn." People are invited to query Marilyn vos Savant, who at age 10 had tested at a mental level of someone about 23 years old; that gave her an IQ of 228—the highest score ever recorded. IQ tests ask you to complete verbal and visual analogies, to envision paper after it has been folded and cut, and to deduce numerical sequences, among other similar tasks. So it is a bit confusing when vos Savant fields such queries from the average Joe(whose IQ is 100)as, what's the difference between love and fondness? Or what is the nature of luck and coincidence? It's not obvious how the capacity to visualize objects and to figure out numerical patterns suits one to answer questions that have eluded some of the best poets and philosophers. Clearly, intelligence encompasses more than a score on a test. Just what does it mean to be smart? How much of intelligence can be specified, and how much can we learn about it from neurology, genetics, computer science and other fields? The defining term of intelligence in humans still seems to be the IQ score, even though IQ tests are not given as often as they used to be. The test comes primarily in two forms: the Stanford-Binet Intelligence Scale and the Wechsler Intelligence Scales(both come in adult and children's version). Generally costing several hundred dollars, they are usually given only by psychologists, although variations of them populate bookstores and the World Wide Web. Superhigh scores like vos Savant' s are no longer possible, because scoring is now based on a statistical population distribution among age peers, rather than simply dividing the mental age by the chronological age and multiplying by 100. Other standardized tests, such as the Scholastic Assessment Test(SAT)and the Graduate Record Exam(GRE), capture the main aspects of IQ tests. Such standardized tests may not assess all the important elements necessary to succeed in school and in life, argues Robert J. Sternberg. In his article "How Intelligent Is Intelligence Testing?", Sternberg notes that traditional test best assess analytical and verbal skills but fail to measure creativity and practical knowledge, components also critical to problem solving and life success. Moreover, IQ tests do not necessarily predict so well once populations or situations change. Research has found that IQ predicted leadership skills when the tests were given under low-stress conditions, but under high-stress conditions, IQ was negatively correlated with leadership—that is, it predicted the opposite. Anyone who has toiled through SAT will testify that test-taking skill also matters, whether it's knowing when to guess or what questions to skip.

Chronic insomnia is a major public health problem. And too many people are using 【B1】______ therapies, even while there are a few treatments that do work. Millions of Americans 【B2】______ awake at night counting sheep or have a stiff drink or 【B3】______ an pill, hoping it will make them sleepy. 【B4】______ experts agree all that self-medicating is a bad idea, and the causes of chronic insomnia remain【B5】______. Almost a third of adults have trouble sleeping, and about 10 percent have 【B6】______ of daytime impairment that signal true insomnia. But【B7】______the complaints, scientists know surprisingly little about what causes chronic insomnia, its health consequences and how best to treat it, a panel of specialists【B8】______together by the National Institutes of Health concluded Wednesday. The panel called 【B9】______ a broad range of research into insomnia,【B10】______that if scientists understood its【B11】______causes, they could develop better treatments. Most, but not all, insomnia is thought to【B12】______other health problems, from arthritis and depression to cardiovascular disease. The question often is whether the insomnia came first or was a result of the other diseases and how trouble sleeping in【B13】______complicates those other problems. Other diseases【B14】______, the risk of insomnia seems to increase with age and to be more【B15】______among women, especially after their 50s. Smoking, caffeine and numerous【B16】______drugs also affect sleep. The NIH is spending about $200 million this year on sleep-related research, some【B17】______to specific disorders and others【B18】______the underlying scientific laws that control the nervous system of sleep. The agency was【B19】______the pane' s review before deciding what additional work should be【B20】______at insomnia.