We are in the midst of a battle for our attention. Our devices have affected our brains and destroyed our collective ability to concentrate. Journalist Johann Hair’s new book, Stolen Focus, has just joined the voice s complaining about the great influence of the digital age. His and other recent books reflect a public perception that our focus is under attack.
Indeed, in out new research, we found some clear concerns. We surveyed a nationally representative sample of 2,093 UK adults in 2021. Half of those surveyed felt their attention ans were shorter than they used to be, compared with a quarter who didn’t. And three quarters of participants agreed we’re living through a time when there’s non-stop competition for our attention between a variety of media channels and information outlets (渠道).
There has long been a worry about the threat to attention brought by new cultural forms, whether that’s social media or the cheap paperback sensation novels of the 19th century. Even as far back as ancient Greece, the philosopher Socrates complained that the written words created “forgetfulness in our souls”. There has always been a tendency to fear the effects that new media and technologies will have on our minds.
The reality is that we simply don’t have long-term studies that tell us whether our attention spans have actually shrunk. What we do know from our study is that people overestimate some of the problems. There’s no such thing as an average attention span. Our ability to focus varies hugely depending on the individual and the task at hand.
It’s also important not to ignore the many benefits that technology brings to our life. Much of the public surveyed recognized these, so while half thought big tech and social media were ruining young people’s attention spans, roughly another half felt that being easily distracted was more to do with people’s personalities than any negative influence that tech ho logy may or may not have. Also, half of the public believed multitasking at work and switching frequently between emails, phone calls, and other tasks can create a more efficient and satisfactory work experience.
1. What might be the theme of the books mentioned in Paragraph 1?| A．The main focus of social media. |
| B．The great influence of public opinion. |
| C．The attention crisis in the digital age. |
| D．The fierce competition in the digital age. |
| A．They were frequently disturbed by digital devices. |
| B．They felt it hard to acquire useful information online. |
| C．They had shorter attention spans than average people. |
| D．They felt challenged by fierce competition from others. |
| A．To stress new cultural forms have limitations. |
| B．To show worry about attention is an age-old problem. |
| C．To prove the important role he played in literary history |
| D．To explain cultural differences between the past and the present. |
| A．People tend to overestimate their ability es. |
| B．Digital distractions might have potential benefits. |
| C．Technology’s benefits have been largely ignored. |
| D．Switching between different tasks frequently is difficult. |
| A．Digital devices can benefit our work. |
| B．We should say “No” to digital devices. |
| C．We should think highly of new cultural forms. |
| D．Digital distractions really affect us so much. |
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【推荐1】Scientists often complain that people are not rational (理性的) in their opposition to technologies such as nuclear power and genetically modified (GM) crops. From a statistical perspective, these are very safe, and so peopled fear can be explained only by emotion, strengthened by ignorance. Electricity from nuclear power has led to far fewer direct deaths than has coalfired power, yet many people are afraid of it, and hardly anyone is afraid of coal plants. Similar arguments can be made about GM crops, which studies have shown are generally safe for most people to eat.
Scientific illiteracy (无知) may be part of the problem. Most of us are afraid of things we don’t understand, and studies have shown that scientists tend to be more accepting of potentially risky technologies than laypeople. This suggests that when people know a lot about such technologies, they are usually reassured.
But there’s more to the issue than meets the eye. It is true that many of us fear the unknown, but it is also true that we don’t care enough about routine risks. Part of the explanation is complacency: we tend not to fear the familiar, and thus familiarity can lead us to underestimate risk. The investigation into the Deepwater Horizon blowout and oil spill (原油泄漏) in 2010 showed that complacency—among executives, among engineers and among government officials-was a major cause of that disaster. So the fact that experts are unworried about a threat is not necessarily reassuring.
Scientists also make a mistake when they assume that public concerns are wholly or even mostly about safety. Some people object to GM crops because these crops facilitate the increased use of chemicals. Others have a problem with the social impacts that switching to GM organisms can have on traditional farming communities or with the political implications of leaving a large share of the food supply in the hands of a few corporations.
Geoengineering (地球工程学) to lessen the impacts of climate change is another example. Laypeople as well as scientists are more concerned about oversight (监管) than safety. Who will decide whether this is a good way to deal with climate change? If we undertake the project of setting the global temperature by controlling how much sunlight reaches Earth’s surface, who will be included in that “we” and by what process will the “right” global temperature be chosen?
Can we say which group’s view is closer to an accurate assessment?
1. The underlined word “complacency” in Paragraph 3 probably means ________.| A．overconfidence | B．prediction |
| C．underestimation | D．carelessness |
| A．safety is not the whole concern of the public |
| B．geoengineering is highly recognized by scientists |
| C．the public are unnecessarily troubled by climate change |
| D．lessening the impacts of climate change is a great challenge |
| A．Scientific illiteracy is a major cause of disasters. |
| B．The safety of technologies can be accurately assessed. |
| C．Scientists misjudge people’s opposition to technologies. |
| D．People are unworried about risks with proper oversight. |
| A．Ignorance or Safety |
| B．Who Is Rational About Risk |
| C．Why Can’t People Trust Technology |
| D．Should Scientists Have a Say in Risk |
【推荐2】Commuter trains are often stuffy and crowded, and they frequently fail to run on time. As if that were not bad enough, physicist Hondon published a paper that gave commuters yet another reason to feel uncomfortable.
Dr Hondon examined mobile phone usage in enclosed spaces such as railway carriages, buses and lifts, all of which are metal boxes. His model predicted that a large number of passengers crowded together, all talking, sending text messages, or browsing the web on their phones, could produce levels of electromagnetic radiation that exceed(超过）international safety standards. That is because the radio waves produced by each phone are reflected off the metal walls of the carriage, bus or lift. Enough radiation escapes to allow the phone to communicate with the network, but the rest fills the inside of the carriage with bouncing microwaves.
This sounds worrying. However,in a paper published recently, Jaime Ferrer and Lucas Fernández-Seivane from the University of Oviedo in Spain, question the truth of Dr Hondon’s findings. They conclude that the level of radiation is safe after all. In their opinion, while each phone produces radiation that bounces around the car, the passengers absorb some of it, which has the effect of reducing the overall intensity. Dr Hondon’s models, in short, was logical only in the case of a single passenger sitting in an empty carriage with an active mobile phone on every seat.
According to Dr Ferrer and his colleagues, Dr Hondon overestimated the level of electromagnetic radiation. When one is sitting on a train, they found, the most important sources of radiation are one’s own phone, and those of one’s immediate neighbors. The radiation from these sources far exceeds that from other phones or from waves bouncing around the carriage. And all these sources together produce a level of radiation within the limits defined by the ICNIRP, the international body that regulates such matters.
People concerned about the effects of mobile-phone radiation are unlikely to take much comfort from Dr Ferret’s results. Indeed, Dr Ferrer says he is surprised at how little research has been done in this area.
Yet both Dr Hondon’s results and Dr Ferrer are based on mathematical models. Their models make assumptions about the physical properties of train carriages and their passengers, and both assume that the radiation is regularly distributed rather than gathered into “hot spots”. But if the debate about the safely of mobile phone is to be resolved, there must be less focus on models, and more emphasis on physical experimental data.
1. Why does the paper published by Dr Hondon make the commuters worried?| A．Because he thinks that the radiation produced by all the mobile phones in the enclosed spaces will bounce around and be harmful. |
| B．Because he holds the view that commuter trains do not meet international radiation safety standards. |
| C．Because the commuters fear that the metal walls of the railway carriage will threaten their health. |
| D．Because the commuters are afraid that the time for banning the use of mobile phone in the railway carriage is approaching. |
| A．They don’t worry about the safety of mobile phone any more. |
| B．They expect Dr Ferrer to carry out more researches in this area. |
| C．They still have concerns over the mobile-phone radiation. |
| D．They find the results of all the researches boring. |
| A．their findings are developed from mathematical models. |
| B．their models are built in a way that the radiation in the enclosed spaces is regularly distributed. |
| C．the models are based on assumptions about the physical properties of train carriages and the passengers. |
| D．they focus on a single passenger in the empty railway carriage. |
| A．He is surprised that too little research has been carried out in this area. |
| B．He thinks researchers have to depend more on physical experiments. |
| C．He is satisfied with the progress made so far. |
| D．He thinks that the most important thing for the researcher is to perfect their models. |
【推荐3】Creativity is the ability to generate novel,useful ideas and innovation is the successful application of those ideas.With this in mind,it is easy to think that technology has made us more creative:the digital revolution(改革）has clearly produced a large number of innovative products and services.
However,it would be naive(幼稚的）to imply that these activities are truly indicative of creativity,even if quantity does eventually lead to quality.For instance,the probability of taking a great photograph does increase when there are millions of Instagram pictures taken every day,and when 500 million tweets are generated(严生）daily,it is highly probable that one or two will be funny.
Yet,much of the content people generate is unimportant and unoriginal.Before the Internet it would have stayed in the minds of their authors,but our thoughts can now be broadcasted to the. world as if they were worthy creations.The only thing that appears to have increased,rather greatly,is people's self-perceived(自认为的）creativity.From the use of emoji(表情符号）instead of words,to the use of pre-determined functions to express our views-liking,sharing and disliking,these new forms human interaction promote efficient-but lazy-behaviors so that we can devote more time to consuming more content.
Although user-generated content has been growing rapidly in the past decade,much of it is noise and the result is that valuable and trustworthy information is now harder to find.In an age of information glut(过剩），everything is freely available but knowledge is hard to gain.This paradox highlights the importance of the"less is more"philosophy of life.
Curiosity evolved to make sense of the world and help us master our environments.Our ancestors must have benefited from taking on as much information from their surroundings as they could paying attention to everything and turning into the learning machine.Yet in an age of information glut,the curious mind is forced to ignore as much of the available data as it can,in order to consume only what is valuable.
1. Why are the examples of great pictures and funny tweets mentioned in Paragraph 2?| A．To show quantity will lead to quality. |
| B．To explain creativity is something impressive. |
| C．To show technology hasn't made us more creative. |
| D．To explain innovative products come from creativity. |
| A．They are worthy creations. |
| B．They kill people's creativity actually. |
| C．They prevent effective communication. |
| D．They help people consume more useful content. |
| A．There' re more resources for knowledge but few people are willing to use them. |
| B．Too much information has generated material wealth but not spiritual wealth. |
| C．We live in an age of information explosion but we find it difficult to get knowledge. |
| D．Many people stick to the"less is more"philosophy with large amounts of information at hand. |
| A．Much of it is original information about the real world: |
| B．It is the fruit of our ancestors' mastering our environments.. |
| C．It gives the public quick and easy access to the required information. |
| D．It presents us with the challenge of telling valuable information from worthless content. |
【推荐1】If your in-box is currently reporting unread messages in the hundreds or thousands, you might have a hard time believing the news: e-mail is on the decline.
At first thought, that might seem to be the case. The incoming generation, after all, doesn’t do e-mail. Oh, they might have an account. They use it only as we would use a fax machine: as a means to communicate with old-school folks like their parents or to fulfill the sign-up requirements of Web sites. They rarely check it, though.
Today’s instant electronic memos—such as texting and Facebook and Twitter messages—are more direct, more concentrated, more efficient. They go without the salutation (称呼语) and the signoff (签收); we already know the “to” and “from”. Many corporations are moving to messaging networks for exactly that reason: more signals, less noise and less time. This trend is further evidence that store-and-forward systems such as e-mail and voicemail are outdated. Instead of my leaving you a lengthy message that you pick up later, I can now send you an easily-read message that you can read—and respond to—on the go.
The coming of the mobile era is responsible for the decline of e-mail. Instant messages bring great convenience to people. They can deal with them at about any time: before a movie, in a taxi, waiting for lunch. And because these notes are very brief, they’re a natural for smart phone typing.
Does this mean e-mail is on its way to the dustbin of digital history? Not necessarily. E-mail still has certain advantages. On the other hand, tweets and texts feel ephemeral—you read them, then they’re gone, into an endless string, but e-mail still feels like something you have and that you can file, search and return to later. It’s easy to imagine that it will continue to feel more appropriate for formal communications: agreements, important news, longer explanations.
So, e-mail won’t go away completely. Remember, we’ve been through a transition like this not so long ago: when e-mail was on the rise, people said that postal mail was dead. That’s not how it works. Postal mail found its smaller niche, and so will e-mail. Technology rarely replaces an institution completely; it just adds new alternatives.
1. What would the incoming generation like to do with their e-mail accounts?| A．Contact close friends | B．Send long messages |
| C．Fill in some forms | D．Communicate with their colleagues |
| A．illustrate the preferences of the young generation |
| B．explain the possible reasons behind the decline of e-mail |
| C．reveal the rapid development of e-communication channels |
| D．offer evidence about the uncertain future of easily-consumed messages |
| A．Conveniently-sent | B．Randomly-written | C．Hardly readable | D．Short-lived |
| A．It’s too early to determine the decline of e-mail. | B．E-mail has reasons to exist on its own advantages. |
| C．E-mail, just like postal mail has come to its end. | D．We should feel sorry for the decline of e-mail. |
【推荐2】As athletes get stronger and faster, the pace of play continues to increase. The burden of making sure games are played according to the rules and that the officiating (裁判) is accurate is now being taken out of human hands and falling more and more into the lap of technology. It’s called the video replay.
The National Football League is expanding its replay system this upcoming season to include pass interference (传球干扰). Major League Baseball now relies on it for safe-or-out and home run calls. If you’ve been watching the FIFA World Cup, you may have noticed that the Video Assistant Referee (VAR) played a key role in almost every game. And in the Kentucky Derby, a horse was disqualified for knocking another horse. No one knew why until a video replay confirmed the call and controversy was avoided.
However, many purists—those who want people to follow rules carefully and do things in the traditional way—especially in soccer, argue it’s not the way the game was invented, and that the video replay is tainting the sport. But don’t you want to see the proper application of the rules throughout the games? I know I do. Yes, it can slow the game down, but I feel it is worth it. If technological advancements allow fans watching from home to spot mistakes instantly, those same views need to be available to the officiating crews. Another example occurred in the most recent National Football Conference (NFC) Championship Game between the Los Angeles Rams and the New Orleans Saints. When obvious pass interference was committed by the Los Angeles Rams player Nickell Robey-Coleman, with just 109 seconds to play, no flag was raised on the field. It weakened the New Orleans Saints spirits. The Los Angeles Rams won a 26-23 overtime victory. The no-call deeply angered the public. The video replay showed the referees had just missed one of the most apparent pass interference calls.
There are no easy answers regarding replay technology and whether it is a curse (魔咒). But for me, keeping the officiating honest and on task is the right step in limiting controversy.
1. What trend in sports can be observed in paragraph 2?| A．The video replay has been widely used. |
| B．League games have become competitive. |
| C．Rules of professional games are becoming stricter. |
| D．People are showing more interest in sports than before. |
| A．Tricking. | B．Promoting. | C．Damaging. | D．Restoring. |
| A．They relied a lot on the video replay. |
| B．They cared too much about details. |
| C．They were definitely stressed out. |
| D．They were terribly disqualified. |
| A．Video replays: high-end technology in sports |
| B．Is technology like VAR a blessing in sports? |
| C．Officiating: a duty that requires honesty |
| D．What do qualified referees really mean? |
【推荐3】How to Cultivate Confidence?
When faced with a big challenge where potential failure seems to appear at every corner maybe you'll hear this advice: "Be more confident.".
Practicing failure is a must. Failure happens.
| A．But what is confidence? |
| B．So can confidence be easily cultivated? |
| C．Everyone is possible to encounter failure. |
| D．Being a talented person is quite necessary. |
| E．They learn to try different strategies and persevere |
| F．Believing in your abilities to improve is the first step. |
| G．t also turns out that people with a growth mindset are better at dealing with challenges |
