Having an older brother comes with plenty of benefits. Big brothers tend to look after their younger brothers and sisters, and despite the occasional unpleasant moments here and there, many siblings(兄弟姐妹) enjoy life-long close relationships. However, a new study finds an interesting disadvantage. Children with older brothers take longer when it comes to developing language skills.
Researchers studied more than 1,000 children from birth to the age of five-and-a-half years old. Each child’s language skills were tested at ages 2, 3,and 5.5,using tests specially designed to measure lots of aspects of language development such as vocabulary, syntax(句法), and verbal(文字的)reasoning. What the research team discovered was significant. Children with an older brother had, on average, a two-month delay in their language development compared to studied children with an older sister.
As far as explaining this phenomenon(现象), researchers have proposed two assumptions. The first is that older sisters tend to talk more often than older brothers, which would compensate(补偿)for parents potentially being less present than they were for their first child. The second assumption is that older sisters usually compete with their siblings less than older brothers for their parents attention. The study’s authors say they can’t say for certain why children with older brothers have a harder time developing language skills. In the future they would like to study if culture or location impacts the prevalence(盛行)of these results.
The study is published in Psychological Science.
1. What did the new study find?| A．Big brothers tend to look after their siblings. |
| B．Siblings tend to fight each other. |
| C．Many siblings enjoy life-long relationships. |
| D．Children with older brothers are slower in learning language. |
| A．To explain the approach of the research. |
| B．To show some problems of the findings. |
| C．To offer some evidence given by experts. |
| D．To convince readers to get involved in. |
| A．Older brothers fight for parents’attention. |
| B．Older brothers are stronger than older sisters. |
| C．Parents prefer older brothers to older sisters. |
| D．Older sisters can’t control their siblings. |
| A．Doubtful. | B．Negative. | C．Satisfied. | D．Excited. |
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【推荐1】Do you know the following expressions?
Homeric laughter
The “Homer” in this expression is the Greek poet who wrote The Iliad and the Odyssey. People laugh differently. Some laugh silently, while others tend to laugh loudly. “Homeric laughter” refers to laughter of the latter (后者) kind. It is at times uncontrollable, and the entire body shakes during the process. This kind of laughter is called Homeric laughter because this is how the gods laughed in Homer’s classics.
Faustian bargain
According to most stories, Faust was a German scholar who was rather unhappy with his life. The devil( 魔 鬼 ), Mephistopheles, promises him that in return for his soul, he will give Faust unlimited power and knowledge. Faust agrees and experiences all kinds of pleasures, but, in the end, his soul is condemned to the hell (下地狱). A “Faustian bargain” therefore is a deal that finally results in one's ruin. It means a bargain made for temporary gain without taking future consequences into consideration.
A three-ring circus (马戏团)
When you refer to a situation as being a three-ring circus, you are saying that it is a situation of complete confusion. There are so many activities taking place all together that they leave you confused or annoyed. The expression comes from the world of entertainment — the circus. The area where the artists perform their acts is called the “ring”. In the past, some of the circuses were so grand that they had three acts taking place simultaneously in three different “rings”. The audience had to decide which “ring” they wanted to focus on.
In the swim (of things)
When someone is in the swim of things, the individual is actively participating in the things happening around him, as in “I've been ill, but soon I'll be back in the swim of things.” In the world of fishing, fishermen use the word “swim” to refer to the section of the lake/river where fish can be found in plenty. So, if you are a fisherman and wish to catch a lot of fish, where would you be? You would be “in the swim”!
1. According to the text, Homeric laughter _______.| A．was the way Homeric laughed |
| B．means nervous, silent laughter |
| C．is a way to show disagreement |
| D．comes from a Greek poet’s works |
| A．he might come to a bad end |
| B．he would be considered clever |
| C．his life would become satisfying |
| D．he would gain power and knowledge |
| A．All of a sudden. | B．Little by little. |
| C．At the same time. | D．One after another. |
| A．It means having a lot of things to do． |
| B．It has nothing to do with swimming． |
| C．Originally it was used to refer to "going fishing"． |
| D．Patients use it to express their desire for health. |
【推荐2】Do you ever have problems describing people? No worries! We’ll give you practical ways to define someone’s personality using popular film characters to help you remember! So, join us at the cinema and learn the useful character adjectives!
1. Narcissistic
Meaning: If someone is narcissistic, they think — they’re very special and more important than others.
Example: In the movie Beauty and the Beast directed by, Bill Condon, the villain Gaston is narcissistic. He admires himself and his appearance too much (he’s always looking in the mirror), and he has a lack of sympathy for others.
2. Culculating
Meaning: If someone is calculating, they make careful plans so they can get what they want in life.
Example: In the movie The Lion King directed by Rob Minkoff and Roger Allers, the baddie Scar is extremely calculating. He plots a plan to kill his brother, King Mufasa. After doing that, he blames this on his nephew, Simba.
3. Demanding
Meaning: If someone is demanding, they have very high standards and want everyone else to have these standards too.
Example: In the movie The Devil Wears Prada directed by David Frankel, the boss Miranda Presley is very demanding. She has always worked very hard, and she expects everyone else to do the same.
4. Naive
Meaning: If someone is naive, they're very innocent and have a Jack of experience in life.
Example: In the movie Elf directed by David Berenbaum, Buddy is a naive character. He’s a human who grew up in the North Pole with elves (小精灵). One day, he goes to New York City for the first time and soon realises that things are very different there.
1. Which character may help you remember the adjective “narcissistic”?| A．Buddy. | B．Gaston. | C．Miranda. | D．Scar. |
| A．Narcissistic. | B．Calculating. | C．Demanding. | D．Naive. |
| A．Teachers. | B．Moviegoers. | C．Film directors. | D．Language learners. |
【推荐3】There are close to 7,000 languages spoken on Earth. However, it’s estimated that by the end of this century, up to 50% of them may be lost.
It’s commonly thought that majority languages tend to be valued for being useful and for promoting progress, while minority languages are seen as barriers to progress, and the value placed on them is seen mainly as sentimental. But is sentimentality really the only motivation for preserving language diversity?
Speakers of endangered languages often live in remote areas with unique landform. It is quite common for these languages to distinguish between hundreds more types of plants and animals than those known to modern science. For example, in Southeast Asia, some tribes have discovered the medicinal properties of over sixty-five hundred plant species. This has led to many of landmark achievements in medicine.
It was once believed that the limits of one’s language defined the limits of one’s thought. This theory, called the Sapir-Wharf hypothesis (假说), has been largely rejected in favor of the improved version, which assumes that the language we speak does not set the limits of our thoughts, but it does direct our focus in certain ways. For example, English is a tense-based language. It’s nearly impossible: to talk about doing something without specifying the time — i. e. I went to the party(past), I’m going to the party(present), or I’ll go to the party(future). This differs from Chinese, where it’s perfectly reasonable to say, “I go to the party” without defining the “when”. Thus, part of the richness of language is that it allows us to organize the world in ‘so many unique ways.
Some languages categorize the world in ways so different from our own that they are difficult to conceptualize (概念化). The United States employed native Navajo speakers to create a system of message coding during the Second World War. The Japanese were never able to break it, and the “code talkers” are often cited today as having helped decide the outcome of the war.
As we’ve already seen, minority languages are valuable for many practical reasons. In conclusion, I’d say the short answer is yes — dying languages are certainly worth saving!
1. Why does the author list the numbers in the first paragraph?| A．To alarm people. | B．To offer background information. |
| C．To reveal the topic. | D．To arouse the readers’ interest. |
| A．Emotional. | B．Reliable. | C．Reasonable. | D．Experimental. |
| A．Helping us discover drugs in more ways. |
| B．Saving us the trouble of distinguishing different medicines. |
| C．Making it possible for us to acquire a broader knowledge of nature. |
| D．Inspiring us to learn more as to how to protect plants and animals. |
| A．To explain ways of saving some languages. | B．To correct the Sapir-Wharf hypothesis. |
| C．To show how languages categorize the world. | D．To prove the value of minority languages. |
【推荐1】In late 2022, Matthew Pittman and Eric Haley carried out three studies on Americans aged 18-65 to test how people in different situations react to ads differently.
The control group in each study was asked to just look at an ad. The second group had to memorize a nine-digit number and then look at an ad. The third group looked through their Instagram updates for 30 seconds before looking at an ad. The first study used an ad for a meal preparation service, the second was for ice cream and the third was for coffee beans. The ad photos and introductions were the same for everyone in each group, with only the number of likes being different. Participants may see an ad with a few hundred likes or tens of thousands of likes. After viewing the ad, each participant rated how willing they would be to buy the product. The group that used Instagram first was the most likely to want to buy the product when there were lots of likes.
In the second study, participants were asked why they wanted to buy the product and those in the control group gave simple, reasonable answers for their choice. “I was thinking of the taste of the ice cream and how delicious it would be.” Or “I like the ad. It’s simple and clean. It gets straight to the point.” However, most of those who had viewed social media content for 30 seconds gave answers that made no sense. For example, some gave one-word answers like “food” or “plate”. Researchers refer to this as “cognitive overload”.
Then the researchers further developed their study of the ad for coffee beans. And they discovered that those who often drank coffee carefully considered many factors, like the type of the beans and their country of production. So even when these people were in a mental fog, they were not convinced by ads with a large number of likes.
By understanding how they might be influenced by social media in unconscious ways, consumers can be more thoughtful and hopefully won’t buy a product they don’t need.
1. What can be inferred from the three studies?| A．Social media greatly influences consumer behavior. |
| B．Ads for food are more popular than other types of ads. |
| C．People using social media choose more useful products. |
| D．Memorizing numbers has little effect on buying intentions. |
| A．New ideas come into mind quickly. |
| B．One’s attention can be easily directed. |
| C．One shows little interest in communication. |
| D．The brain has too much information to process. |
| A．Social media is a valuable advertising tool. |
| B．Product knowledge reduces the outside influence on buying. |
| C．Consumers with health concerns are careful about shopping. |
| D．People with a high quality of life hardly buy unnecessary things. |
| A．Focus on yourself: you can make good choices |
| B．Click on more ads to choose the most cost-effective goods |
| C．Keep up with the times to improve your shopping experience |
| D．Buy without thinking: you are being influenced by social media |
By Robert Woodhouse Monday, 27 December 2004
The most powerful earthquake in the past 40 years caused a tsunami that crashed into coastlines across Asia yesterday, killing more than 6,500 people in Indonesia, India. Thailand, Malaysia, and at least four other countries. Fishermen, tourists, hotels, homes, and cars were swept away by huge waves caused by the strong earthquake that reached a magnitude of 9.0. The undersea quake struck around 7:00 a. m. Sunday off the west coast of Indonesia’s Sumatra Island. In that area alone, at least 1,870 people were killed.
In Sri Lanka, some 1, 600 kilometres west of the quake centre, the number of deaths stood at 2,498, and one million more were affected by the tsunami, government officials said. Indian officials said as many as 1,900 had been killed along the southern coast. Another 254 were found dead in Thailand and 54 in three other countries. In southern Thailand, 1,900 people were hurt and many more were missing, local officials said. “I was having breakfast with my three children when water started filling my home. We had to leave everything and run to safety.” said Chandra Theeravit, a local Thai woman.
Thousands of people are still missing, and the number of deaths is expected to grow even higher over the next few days. Foreign aid is being organised for the tsunami-hit countries. However, dangerous conditions and damaged roads will make it difficult to deliver food and supplies.
1. When did the tsunami happen?2. What caused the tsunami?
3. Why would it be difficult to deliver food and supplies?
【推荐3】In many places, a moonless night sky is no longer totally black. Artificial lighting can give the night a lasting light. This so-called light pollution can affect animals. Even moderate light pollution, a new study finds, can roughly double how long a house sparrow infected with West Nile Virus (WNV) remains at high risk of spreading disease. If bitten by a mosquito, that virus can now spread to other animals, including people.
“In the United States, house sparrows are about as widespread as artificial lighting. So they made a useful test species in a new first-of-its-kind study,” says Meredith Kernbach. Her team used these birds to test whether light at night might affect the spread of the West Nile Virus.
Kernbach based much of her lab test on real-world conditions. In the study, some house sparrows in the lab spent the night in an area that was dimly (昏暗地) lit. These birds were slower in fighting off West Nile Virus infections than those that spent the night in full darkness.
WNV needs a mosquito to spread from bird to bird, or from bird to human. If a mosquito doesn’t pick up enough viruses from the blood of an infected animal, its new victim might be able to avoid getting sick. House sparrows kept under a dim night light typically had enough viruses in their blood to be a source of virus for at least four days, Kernbach reports. House sparrows in full darkness had enough viruses to spread the disease only for two days.
What light does to the birds is only part of the story, points out Davide Dominon, a physiologist at the Nether-lands Institute of Ecology in Wageningen. “Researchers will need to look for effects on the virus itself,” he says. “And, of course, on the mosquitoes.”
1. Why are house sparrows chosen as the test species?| A．They are sensitive to light. | B．Their distribution is wide. |
| C．Mosquitoes like biting them. | D．Their immune system is weak. |
| A．West Nile Virus becomes stronger under light. |
| B．Darkness can help people avoid getting sick. |
| C．It’s better for house sparrows to live in the dark. |
| D．It takes house sparrows longer to kill this virus under light. |
| A．It needs further study. |
| B．It’s very useful. |
| C．New victims are ignored. |
| D．Other birds should be studied. |
| A．Artificial lighting can affect house sparrows’ reproduction. |
| B．Mosquitoes can spread WNV from animals to humans. |
| C．Light pollution lengthens the time of birds’ spreading WNV. |
| D．The light pollution may help WNV develop slower. |
【推荐1】Helping Your Kids to Be Interested in Sports
Being active and moving is something that is so important for us all, especially for children.
It is such a good idea to lead by example when you are a parent. This is true for a variety of aspects, but especially forgetting children involved in sport.
If something is dull, it will be hard for children to be enthusiastic about it. This will make them resent(讨厌) it, which is not a good thing for later in life. If they show particular skill and learn to play sport, then more practice and training can come in.
Whatever sport your child chooses to play, encourage them and make it fun, and then it will be something that they will want to carry on doing as they go about the rest of their lives.
| A．They won’t be interested in sports if you’re not. |
| B．here are some other tips that you would share with them. |
| C．Share your enthusiasm and it will help to lighten a passion. |
| D．So think about ways that can get them to be active in the sports. |
| E．How active a child is will impact their overall health and learning. |
| F．Apart from leading by example, you could also share your favorite team. |
| G．However, the main message forgetting children into sport is to keep it fun. |
【推荐2】Millions of people are familiar with if -snoring(打鼾). The number one annoyance in the bedroom at night. About one i two men and one in four women of middle age or older snores in their sleep. Previously dismissed as just an annoying disturbance of the peace, snoring is now recognized as a serious sleep and health disorder. These nightly problems in sleep can even be life-threatening!
When snoring, loud breathing noises occur in the upper airways during sleep, as loud as a passing truck. That' s the sound many people fall asleep to, Men over 50 years old, especially snore. As many as 60 to 80 Percent in this age group are affected.
Now there's a revolutionary helper that immediately improves nasal( 鼻的)breathing and can thereby prevent snoring. It is called the SilentSnore, and its the first small and easy-to-use device for combating bothersome snoring noises. Tens of thousands of people have already used this little wonder to sleep better and more peacefully at night. And indeed-snoring can easily be combated with this method!
The SilentSnore gently widens the nostril(鼻孔) to reduce respiratory(呼吸系统) resistance in the nose in other words, air can flow better into the lungs through the nose. As soon as the body registers that nasal breathing is working without restriction again, it unconsciously switches to (much healthier)nasal breathing. In contrast to things like chinstraps, SilentSnore does not disturb you while you sleep.
This ingenious little device controls snoring when sleeping without interfering the normal sleep cycle. A normal and healthy sleep cycle should include at least 25% at deep sleep, by relieving snoring effectively, stop disturbing your sleeping partner immediately, and/ guarantee your body rest and regenerate well. You can place your order online through the official website in China. Your SilentSnore will be delivered to your doorstep.
1. Why should we try to prevent snoring?| A．Because loud breathing noises occur in the upper airways during sleep. |
| B．Because it's the number one annoyance in the bedroom at night and it can be life threatening. |
| C．Because as many as 60 to 80 percent in this age group are affected by snoring |
| D．Because snoring was recognized as a serious sleep and health disorder |
| A．12 | B．6 |
| C．8 | D．We don't know |
| A．promoting better breathing | B．reducing and stopping snoring. |
| C．interfering the normal sleep cycle | D．Being small and easy to use |
【推荐3】Fall is finally here! This is the most glorious time of the year. Leaves are turning yellow, and the weather is cool enough to wear your favorite sweaters. But for some, the changing of the seasons is vexing, and can lead to a sudden dip in energy, making many people wonder why they get more tired in the fall.
“It’s the weather.” is something teachers would say when you come into the classroom at the beginning of the school year, complaining about sleepiness and a runny nose. It always seems like a throwaway answer. However, it turns out there is something in it because many studies show that some viruses causing the common cold are more active in cooler weather, which may further lead to fall fatigue(疲劳).
However, the cold weather isn’t the only reason you may be feeling run-down this fall. Check out some of the other explanations not widely recognized.
With fall come cooler weather and shorter days, and the lack of sunlight can have a significant impact on how energetic we feel. “There’s a special circuit from your eyeballs that goes directly to your brain that picks up sunlight, and the most important signal is sunlight in the morning. That sunlight in the morning helps wake you up, and also helps keep you awake all day long.” said Dr. Michael Howell, a sleep specialist. So, sleepiness is unavoidable in a season without much sunlight. When people’s exposure to sunlight is increasingly limited, some people may suffer from Seasonal Affective Disorder, or SAD. Too often, SAD is treated as a punchline, but for the estimated 10 million Americans who suffer from it. it’s not a joke. SAD is a form of depression that is related to the change in seasons, which makes people feel tired easily. Symptoms can include high pressure, feelings of depression and a heavy feeling in arms and legs, etc. And most people experience them during the fall and winter.
While the fall is a beautiful season, the disorder it can bring to your body and mind is no joke. Be sure to put your health and wellness first as you head into fall. It’s an ideal time to cook soup and stew, clean out your room, take a walk outside, or relax with a good book. Sleep tight, my friends.
1. What does the underlined word “vexing" mean in paragraph 1?| A．Annoying. | B．Shocking. | C．Enjoyable. | D．Important. |
| A．Creating more energy. | B．Keeping people awake. |
| C．Helping people sleep tight. | D．Showing the change of seasons. |
| A．It depends on temperatures. |
| B．It strikes people in sunny seasons. |
| C．It is clearly understood by most people. |
| D．It has both physical and mental impacts. |
| A．How you keep awake in the fall? |
| B．Why you are more tired in the fall? |
| C．What you should do to stay energetic in the fall? |
| D．Who you can turn to for tips on SAD in the fall? |
