From childhood to adulthood, you go through a lot of changes — jobs, regrettable haircuts and relationships that come and go. But what about who you are? As you grow older, does your personality change?
Personality is the pattern(模式) of thoughts, feelings and behaviors unique to a person. People always think of personality as fixed(固定的). But according to psychologists, that’s not how it works. “Personality is developing. It’s not just something that you’re stuck with and can’t get over,” said Brent Roberts, a psychologist at the University of Illinois.
That’s not to say that you’re a different person each day you wake up. In the short term, change can be nearly impossible to see, Roberts told Live Science. Longitudinal studies, in which researchers survey(调查) the personalities of participants(参与者) regularly over many years, suggest that our personality is actually stable in the short term.
But those years add up, throughout which our personality is still changing, but slowly, Roberts said. “It’s something that’s unnoticeable,” he added. You don’t feel it on that five-to-10-year time period, but in the long term, it becomes obvious. In 1960, psychologists surveyed over 440,000 high school students — around 5% of all students in the country at that time. The students answered questions about everything from how they behaved in emotional(情绪的) situations to how well and effectively they got work done. Fifty years later, researchers tracked down(追踪到) 1,952 of these former students and gave them the same survey. The results found that in their 60s, participants scored much higher than they had as teenagers.
Some people might change less than others, but in general, the maturity principle(成熟原则) goes for everyone. That makes personality change even harder to realize in ourselves — how your personality compares with that of your peers doesn’t change as much as our overall change in personality, because everyone else is changing right along with you. “It has been proved that the self-control of a 30-year-old is higher than a 20-year-old,” Donnellan said. “At the same time, people who are more self-controlled at 18 are also possibly more self-controlled at age 30.”
1. What does the writer think of personality?| A．It is what makes you different from others. |
| B．It is fixed since you were born. |
| C．It works when we meet difficulties. |
| D．It changes obviously from day to day. |
| A．not easily upset. | B．easy to change. |
| C．not likely to change. | D．difficult to destroy. |
| A．By giving examples. | B．By stating arguments. |
| C．By explaining causes. | D．By providing research results. |
| A．Everyone Has a Unique Personality. |
| B．Our Personality Changes as We Get Older. |
| C．Self-control Makes All the Difference. |
| D．We Grow Older but Change Less. |
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【推荐1】To learn new things, we must sometimes fail. But what's the right amount of failure? New research led by the University of Arizona proposes a mathematical answer to that question.
Educators have long recognized that there is something of a "sweet spot" when it comes to learning. That is, we learn best when we are challenged to grasp something just outside of our existing knowledge. When a challenge is too simple, we don't learn anything new; likewise, we don't expand our knowledge when a challenge is so difficult that we fail entirely or give up.
So where does the sweet spot lie? According to the new study, it's when failure occurs 15% of the time. Put another way, it's when the right answer is given 85%of the time.
Researchers at the University of Arizona came up with the so-called "85% Rule" after conducting a series of machine-learning experiments in which they taught computers simple tasks, such as classifying different patterns into one of two categories.
The computers learned fastest in situations in which the difficulty was such that they responded with 85% accuracy.
"If you have an error rate of 15% or accuracy of 85%, you are always maximizing your rate of learning in these two-choice tasks," said Professor Robert Wilson.
When we think about how humans learn, the 85%Rule would mostly likely apply to perceptual(感知的)learning, in which we gradually learn through experience and examples, Wilson said. Imagine, for instance, a radiologist(放射科医生)learning to tell the difference between images of tumors(肿瘤)and non-tumors.
"You need examples to get better at figuring out there's a tumor in an image, "Wilson said. "If I give really easy examples, you get 100% right all the time and there's nothing left to learn. You're not going to be taking as much from that as a situation where you are struggling a little hit. If I give really hard examples, you'll he 50% correct and still not learning anything new, while if I give you something in between, you can he at this sweet spot where you are getting the most information from each particular example."
1. Which of the following is linked with the sweet spot?| A．15 percent accuracy. | B．50 percent accuracy. |
| C．85 percent accuracy. | D．100 percent right. |
| A．To find out where the sweet spot lies. | B．To see how well computers carry out tasks. |
| C．To compare the results of their experiments. | D．To conduct some research on machine learning. |
| A．To teach what to do in the treatment of tumors. | B．To teach how to determine there is a tumor. |
| C．To help to remember what is learned. | D．To help to learn how a tumor develops. |
| A．Not taking failure too seriously. | B．Learning through experience and examples. |
| C．Struggling a little bit, but not too much. | D．Learning things that are completely new. |
【推荐2】Despite what so many people would love to believe，NASA hasn t discovered any evidence of past or present intelligent life on Mars. So，when the Curiosity rover (好奇号探测器）found something suspicious on the Red Planet’s surface, they were not only surprised but also a little bit worried.
The thin fragment (碎片）was suspicious enough to guarantee its own name, with NASA’s Curiosity rover team calling it the “Pettegrove Point Foreign Object Debris，” named for the location where it was discovered. With no idea what it was or where it came from, the rover s handlers began to worry that it might actually be a piece of the rover itself，suggesting some unseen damage or other issue with the robot. Thankfully，those concerns seem to have been unfounded.
In a new update from NASA the object has now been identified as a natural piece of rock rather than a piece of any man-made craft or vehicle. The team analyzed the bizarre object with a tool called the ChemCam RMI. The instrument uses a laser (激光器）to sniff out the makeup of anything it，s pointed at, and the results for this particular piece of debris revealed that it’s actually just a very thin piece of rock.
NASA describes the inspection： The planning day began with an interesting result from the previous plan’s ChemCam RMI analysis of a target that was referred to as “Pette Point Foreign Object Debris”（PPFOD)，and speculated to be a piece of spacecraft debris fact was found to be a very thin flake of rock, so we can all rest easy tonight-Curiosity not begun to shed its skin!
How this particularly thin sliver of rock got to where it is—and why it seems tobe a different colour than the surrounding sand and debris-remains unexplained, but at least the rover falling apart.
1. What attitude does NASA hold towards the newly found thin fragment?| A．Positive. | B．Surprised. |
| C．Interested. | D．Amazed but worried. |
| A．Its finder. | B．Its location. |
| C．Its researcher. | D．Its shape. |
| A．Strange. | B．Changeable. |
| C．Normal. | D．common |
| A．Travelling. | B．Sports. |
| C．Science. | D．music |
【推荐3】What does an astronaut eat in space? This is a question that will puzzle many, as people rarely think of that. In the early space-travel years, astronauts ate dehydrated (脱水的) foods that were eaten through straws (吸管) . In today’s space-age, the food that they eat is totally different. They eat food in the same way as people do on Earth.
Astronauts are able to prepare and eat a variety of foods in space. Some can be eaten in their natural form, like fruits, while some need to add water, like noodles. However, there are no refrigerators, so the food has to be prepared and eaten without being stored for a long time. When the astronauts are hungry, they simply eat the food by opening the food packages and with a fork, knife, and spoon.
Just like people on Earth, astronauts also eat three meals a day which include breakfast, lunch and dinner. Sometimes they also eat snacks. The US space agency NASA has found out that an astronaut’s diet reduced by about 70% on a space mission (任务), though he has a wide range of foods to choose from like nuts, chicken, beef, seafood, and candies. Drinks in the spaceship include coffee, tea, juice, and lemonade.
Astronauts can also request a particular food that they would like to have in space. Scientists are always experimenting and trying out different space foods that can be offered to astronauts when on space missions.
1. How did astronauts eat in the early space-travel years?| A．They had totally different foods. | B．They ate food as people did on Earth. |
| C．They ate dehydrated foods. | D．They ate food with a lot of water |
| A．Because there are no refrigerators. | B．Because of no air. |
| C．Because astronauts are more hungry than on Earth. | D．Because of no water. |
| A．only have nuts, chicken and beef | B．Only have lunch for a day |
| C．only drink coffee, tea and lemonade | D．Also eat three meals a day |
| A．eat as much in space as on Earth | B．eat less in space than on Earth |
| C．eat more in space than on Earth | D．don’t have drinks in space |
【推荐1】Acting is such an over-crowded profession that the only advice that should be given to a young person thinking of going on the stage is “Don’t!”. But it is useless to try to discourage someone who feels that he must act, though the chances of his becoming famous are slim. The normal way to begin is to go to a drama school. Usually only students who show promise and talent are accepted, and the course lasts two years. Then the young actor or actress takes up work with a repertory company, usually as an assistant stage manager. This means doing everything that there is to do in the theatre: painting scenery, looking after the furniture, taking care of the costumes, and even acting in very small parts. It is very hard work indeed. The hours are long and the salary is tiny. But young actors with the stage in their blood are happy, waiting for the chances of working with a better company, or perhaps in films or television.
Of course, some people have unusual chances which lead to fame and success without this long and dull training. Connie Pratt, for example, was just an ordinary girl working in a bicycle factory. A film producer happened to catch sight of her one morning waiting at a bus stop, as he drove past in his big car. He told the driver to stop, and he got out to speak to the girl. He asked her if she would like to go to the film studio to do a test, and at first she thought he was joking. Then she got angry and said she would call the police. It took the producer twenty minutes to tell Connie that he was serious. Then an appointment was made for her to go to the studio the next day. The test was successful. They gave her some necessary lessons and within a few weeks she was playing the leading part opposite one of the most famous actors of the day. Of Course, she was given a more dramatic name, which is now world-famous. But chances like this happen once in a blue moon!
1. According to the passage, the main reason why young people should be discouraged from becoming actors is ________.| A．actors are very unusual people | B．the course at the drama school lasts two years |
| C．acting is really a hard job | D．there are already too many actors |
| A．they don’t care if their job is hard | B．they like the stage naturally |
| C．they are born happy | D．they are easily satisfied |
| A．learning some lessons about the art of speaking |
| B．playing her part in the “Blue Colored Moon” |
| C．successfully matching the most famous actors |
| D．acting a leading part with a most famous actor at that time |
| A．all at once | B．once for a long time | C．once in a while | D．once and for all |
【推荐2】Researchers and policy makers have long studied pilot schemes(方案) such as public health initiatives or innovative schools. They find the phenomenon of the pilot delivering satisfying results, only to fade at a larger scale. This depressing tendency was called “voltage drop” by the psychiatrist Amy Kilbourne and her coworkers in 2007.
The economist John List has been exploring the cause of this voltage drop, first in 2019 paper with Omar Al-Ubaydli and Dana Suskind, then in a recent book, The Voltage Effect. So why does the voltage drop for so many promising ideas? One common problem is that the original effect was not real. Consider a famous experiment, conducted by psychologists Sheena lyengar and Mark Lepper, in which customers in a high-end supermarket were offered free samples of jam from a choice of either 6 or 24 flavours. The wider choice was dramatically de-motivating. Ten times as many people bought jam after being shown the smaller range.
It is one of the most famous results in psychology; it has also proved rather difficult to repeat in follow-up experiments. Perhaps the effect is completely non-existent, or perhaps the effect exists but with nothing like the force exhibited in the original experiment. Does anyone seriously believe your local supermarket would sell 10 times as much produce if only it simplified its product line?
Another source of voltage drop is when the original effect does not generalise beyond unusual circumstances. My favourite example is the Arch Deluxe, a hamburger launched by McDonald’s with a marketing fanfare(宣传). The fast-food giant had every reason to expect success, because focus groups loved the Arch Deluixe’s bakery-style rolls, peppered bacon and stoneground mustard-mayo dressing.
The problems, says List, is that the focus group enthusiasts were not a good guide to the attitude of the typical consumer: “A person who signs up to take part in a McDonald’s focus group is probably someone who is crazy about McDonald’s or loves all kinds of burgers, or both. But the average person, it turns out, goes to McDonald’s for the Big Mac, not a fancier version of one.”
Even if the idea is real, and generalises to a wide audience, it may be difficult to repeat the performance once it ventures beyond the control of the original creative team. A pilot school may work well, but it is easier to hire 20 good teachers than 20,000. A brilliant chef can work in only one kitchen at a time.
1. Which statement best describes “voltage drop”？| A．A scheme has been piloted before being really carried out. |
| B．A scheme serves its intended purpose well on a large scale. |
| C．A scheme works well when tested but fails when launched. |
| D．A scheme like a health initiative is designed for a group of people. |
| A．It lasted too long a time. |
| B．Its conclusion may not be reliable. |
| C．Its follow-up experiments showed opposite results. |
| D．It discouraged people from going to the supermarket. |
| A．To explain the creativity of an idea matters a lot. |
| B．To explain an idea may not generalise to a larger group. |
| C．To explain McDonald’s is not popular with average people. |
| D．To explain the attitude of the typical consumer varies. |
| A．Why some great ideas fail. | B．How to avoid voltage drop. |
| C．How to make a workable plan. | D．Why experimentation is important. |
【推荐3】While the idea of living on the moon was once a thing of science fiction,several space agencies including NASA and Roscosmos are racing to make it a reality.Now,one scientist has revealed what he thinks the lunar cities could look like in the next 150 years,in a project named“Moontopia”.
Professor Lewis Dartnell,a science communication expert at the University of Westminster,has teamed up with Hillarys to bring his vision to light.He said:“As our understanding of space advances,the opportunity to start a new world becomes ever more possible.Moving home or to another country is already incredibly exciting,imagine what it would be like to move to an entirely different environment.The challenges and problems would be new and hard but the mind boggles at what the human race could achieve if we take this next step.”
Professor Dartnell predicts that homes in Moontopia will be built in lava tubes,and that settlers will travel around using bikes or on foot.Moontopia would also include an airlock that would keep the city pressurized,meaning people could walk around freely with spacesuits.The lunar city could have a lakes,parks and basketball courts.
While this sounds pretty great so far,if you’re used to eating what you want,when you want it,living in Moontopia could be a struggle.Other key challenges would include adapting to the temperatures on the Moon.In direct sunlight,the moon can reach up to 100℃,while at night,temperatures can drop to-170℃!Thankfully,the temperature inside lava tubes would be easily controlled.
While Professor Dartnell’s vision is merely based on predictions,lunar cities could become a reality in the not-so-distant future.In 2016,Russia announced plans to build a human settlement on the Moon by 2030,while NASA plans to establish a lunar outpost in 2028.
1. What do we know about Moontopia from the text?| A．Moontopia is a project about doing research on the moon. |
| B．People can choose whatever to eat in Moontopia. |
| C．People can travel freely in Moontopia. |
| D．Moontopia will be challenging to live in. |
| A．It is extremely cold in Moontopia. |
| B．Living on the moon is on its way. |
| C．Professor Dartnell carried out the research alone. |
| D．NASA has built a lunar settlement earlier than Russia. |
| A．We may be worried about. | B．We may be puzzled at. |
| C．We may hesitate about. | D．We may be amazed at. |
| A．Finding out whether lunar cities can exist. |
| B．Exploring the weather condition on the moon. |
| C．Predicting what lunar cities will be like. |
| D．Offering the opportunity to move to the moon. |
