Lots of animals play. But the behavior is best known in mammals (哺乳动物) and birds. Now the scientists at London’s Queen Mary University report that bumblebees (大黄蜂) know the same thing. But before this, there were no reports of insects playing.
Dr. Lars Chittka began to wonder if bumblebees played during an earlier test. In that test, Chittka guided bumblebees to move balls into a goal for food. He noticed that some bees were rolling (滚动) balls even when they weren’t given food. He wondered if they were playing.
To test the idea, the scientists at his lab set up a new test. First, they numbered 45 young bumblebees between one and 23 days old. The numbers let them follow bumblebees’ behavior. Then, they set up a clear pathway from the bumblebees’ home to a feeding area. On either side of the open pathway, the researchers placed small colored wooden balls. On one side of the path, the balls couldn’t move. On the other side, the balls could roll around. For three hours a day, over 18 days, the scientists opened the pathway between the home and the feeding area. The bumblebees never had to leave the pathway to find food, but they left anyway. They weren’t interested in the side where the balls didn’t move, but they made lots of visits to the side with the rolling balls.
Catching the balls with their legs, the bees would move their wings to pull on the balls, causing them to roll. The 45 numbered bumblebees did this 910 times during the test. Though some only did it once, others did it a lot. The younger ones liked to spend more time rolling balls while the older ones showed less interest in it. One bee was recorded rolling balls 44 times in a single day. One was seen rolling balls 117 times over the whole test.
The test raises important questions about how the insects’ minds work and whether they have feelings.
1. What did Chittka want to do about bumblebees in the earlier test?| A．Discover if they played. | B．Train them to move balls. |
| C．Make them learn to relax. | D．Find out if they’d share food. |
| A．They named each of them. | B．They let them interested in balls. |
| C．They had all of them go hungry. | D．They marked them one by one. |
| A．They held their attention for longer. | B．They understood simpler numbers. |
| C．They were less active in rolling balls. | D．They helped the young pull on balls. |
| A．Bumblebees Are First Insects Known to Play |
| B．Two Tests Prove Bumblebees Expect to Play |
| C．Bumblebees Are the World’s Smartest Insects |
| D．Scientists Make Bumblebees Work for Them |
相似题推荐
【推荐1】It is easy for us to know the difference between our friends and our enemies. But can other animals do the same? Elephants can! They can use their sense of vision and smell to tell the difference between people who pose a threat and those who do not. In Kenya, researchers find that elephants react differently to clothing worn by men of the Maasai and Kamba ethnic groups. Young Maasai men spear(刺)animals and thus pose a threat to elephants; Kamba men arc mainly farmers and are not a danger to elephants.
In an experiment conducted by animal scientists, elephants were first presented with clean clothing or clothing that had been worn for five days by either a Maasai or a Kamba man. When the elephants noticed the smell of clothing worn by a Maasai man, they moved away from the smell faster and took longer to relax than when they noticed the smells of either clothing worn by Kamba men or clothing that had not been worn at all.
Clothing color also plays a role. In the same study, when the elephants saw red clothing not worn before, they reacted angrily, as red is typically worn by Maasai men. Rather than running away as they did with the smell, the elephants acted aggressively toward the red clothing.
The researchers believe that the elephants’ emotional reactions are due to their different senses of the smells and the sights. Smelling a potential danger means that a threat is nearby and the best thing to do is run away and hide. Seeing a potential threat without its smell means that risk is low. Therefore, instead of showing fear and running away, the elephants express their anger and become aggressive.
1. What character does the author want to express about elephant?| A．Friendly. | B．Clever. | C．Dangerous. | D．Naughty. |
| A．The color of Kamba men’s clothes. |
| B．The smell of Kamba men’s clothes. |
| C．The red clothes not worn before. |
| D．The smell of Maasai men’s clothes. |
| A．Elephants learn from their experience. |
| B．Elephants have sharper sense of smell than sight. |
| C．Elephants are more intelligent than other animals. |
| D．Elephants tend to attack rather than escape when in minor danger. |
| A．Nature | B．Business Weekly | C．Fashion | D．News Week |
1. Where can you most probably see this?
| A．In a nature park. | B．In a zoo. | C．In a museum. |
| A．not to watch the birds |
| B．not to feed the birds |
| C．not to bite the birds |
| A．The birds might hurt you. |
| B．Feeding grapes can make the birds ill. |
| C．You may feed the birds with small bread. |
【推荐3】Owning a pet is a fun and rewarding experience. But every animal and their needs are different, so how can you make sure that you choose the right one for you? Here are some tips．
·Do your research.
·Think about your lifestyle.
For example, if you want to own a cat, will they have access to outside space while you’re out during the day?
·Do your sums.
From everyday things like insurance, food and toys to unexpected vet bills, having a pet is certainly a financial commitment.
·Think about a rescue pet.
·Find a reliable breeder(培育者).
If you do want to buy a dog or cat, ask your local vet (兽医) or breed club to recommend a responsible breeder. Ask the breeder for all the relevant paperwork and see the pet’s parents, relatives, brothers and sisters to observe their nature and general health and welfare.
| A．Owning a pet gives you a sense of responsibility. |
| B．Don’t purchase animals online or from dealers. |
| C．Thousands of homeless pets are desperate for a good home. |
| D．If you work full time and want a dog, who will walk them during the day? |
| E．Long hours at work and small flats mean it's just not practical for you to own a pet. |
| F．You may like the look of a particular pet, but that doesn’t mean they’re right for you. |
| G．Make sure that you calculate how much your new pet will cost before you choose them. |
【推荐1】Among the more practical advice that can be offered to international travelers is wisdom of the toilet. I do not mean those squats (下蹲) you see at the gym. No, strong glutes (臀肌) will not save you here. I mean the deep squat. This position is so stable that people in China can hold it for minutes and perhaps even hours…
Of course, squat toilet is not unique to Asia, nor is the deep-squatting position. But so common is the position in Asia and so rare it is in the West that it’s been nicknamed the “Asian squat”. Bryan Ausinheiler, a physician in California said, “The squat is a great model for a multi-segmental movement pattern. You have to fold everything up underneath you.” There’s a lot going on.
But the key factor seems to be ankle flexibility. This is also in part. Ausinheiler says, why kids have no problem squatting. “I measured my daughter’s ankle flexibility when she was one day old,” says Ausinheiler. “She has 70 degrees of ankle dorsiflexion (背屈)! Normal in the West is like 30.” So humans are born squatters; some of us lose it when we stop trying. Body shape also seems to play a role. People with the longest legs have the worst squat.
Believe it or not, no one appears to have actually studied born ability in deep squatting across ethnic groups. “You would have to take kids from the time they’re born in China and never let them do any squats to be a control group, and it’ll never happen,” says Matt Hundson, a physiologist at the University of Delaware, humorously. And finally, it may not matter. Practice and training make the bigger difference.
Some believe America’s squat problems can be blamed on toilet seats. Yet this ability that comes so naturally has been lost ----- and it’s not so easy to get it back. But the position, while doable, is not very comfortable for me.
1. Why has the deep-squatting position been named “Asian squat” ?| A．It came from Asia | B．It is widely adopted by Asians |
| C．It can be performed only by Asians | D．It is completely invisible in the West |
| A．Flexible ankles. | B．Strong glutes. |
| C．Body shape. | D．Ethnic groups. |
| A．Studying deep squatting is not practical. |
| B．Asians have born ability in deep squatting. |
| C．It’s necessary to study newborn babies in China. |
| D．Everyone can do deep squatting through practice. |
| A．Because it comes so naturally. |
| B．Because it is never got back once lost. |
| C．Because they rely on toilet seats too much. |
| D．Because they feel it impossible and uncomfortable. |
【推荐2】If sales generally feel hard to to resist, the sale in front of Aarron Schurevich was the ultimate test: new Kia Soul just like the one he’d had and loved, at a dealership he trusted, at a moment when he really needed a car. And it was priced $4,000 off more than a 20% discount. However, after he sped through paperwork and drove the car off the lot, the deal turned soul. Schurevich now jokes that he paid a tax for being a fool.
This big-ticket example shows vividly all the dynamics that play out in a sale. The discount itself often registers as a win, delivering the joy of both getting the product and the reward that we discovered something, and we’ve earned this extra thing. Thus, spotting something we’d like to buy on sale activates our brain’s reward system. Then there’s the fight in the brain between what can be described as its emotional and rational(理性的)parts. A sale lands like the thumb that tips our mental scale toward buying.
Stores, of course, know all this and try to push our buttons.
Experts say we often subconsciously believe popular things to be more valuable or more rewarding. Plus, there’s our urge to avoid loses — the fear of missing out (FOMO). So stores appeal to our crowd mentality: It’s Black Friday, ana everyone’s shopping, buying that thing you’d like. They create urgency: Your favorite car is on sale today only! And they create scarcity: Shop now while supplies last!
Stores also try various pricing tricks. “How do we make more customers go to the more expensive option? We add a decoy,” says Savannah Wei Shi, who researches pricing and decision-making. For example, picture s store shelf where a medium bag of candy sits next to a larger bag of the same candy. The medium-sized bag is much smaller than the other bag, but only slightly cheaper. It makes the big bag look like the best deal, so shoppers buy that one-the most expensive option on the shelf.
1. Why is Aarron Schurevich’s story mentioned?| A．To illustrate why we fall for a sale. | B．To present how our brains are activated. |
| C．To stress the importance of rational decision. | D．To prove the flexibility of marketing strategies. |
| A．FOMO postpones decisions. | B．Sales play on people’s fears. |
| C．Subconsciousness determines everything. | D．Scarcity promotion leads to wise purchases. |
| A．Using Pricing tricks. | B．Dealing with emergencies. |
| C．Creating scarcity. | D．Appealing to crowd mentality. |
| A．A candy. | B．A shelf. | C．A larger bag. | D．A medium bag. |
【推荐3】“Buzz. Buzz. The queen is that way,” said one honey bee to another. “Pass it on.” Honey bees can’t speak, of course, but scientists have found that the insects combine teamwork and chemicals to relay the queen’s location to the rest of the community, revealing an extraordinary means of long distance, mass communication.
Individual honey bees communicate with the chemical called pheromones, which scientists have long known. But just how these individual signals work together to gather tens of thousands of bees around a queen has remained a mystery.
In the new study, Dieu My Nguyen, a scientist at the University of Colorado, and his colleagues focused on a colony of western honey bees, the most common honey bee species in the world. The researchers set up a flat, pizza box–size arena with a transparent ceiling, in which the bees could walk around, but not fly. They put the queen bee into a cage on one side and released the worker honey bees on the other. The scientists then recorded the insects’ movements from above with a camera and an AI software tracking bees that were releasing pheromones.
Once the first worker honey bees located the queen, they began to gather chains of evenly spaced bees that extended outward from the queen, with each bee sending out pheromones to its neighbor down the line. The findings are the first direct observations of this collective communication in honey bees. Like smelly bread crumbs, the branching communication lines guided far-off honey bees back to the queen’s location — a feat no single bee could achieve alone.
Mark Carroll, an insect biologist at the U.S. Department of Agriculture, cautions that the work was done in a closed, practically 2D space. In reality, he notes, honey bee colonies are 3D, and they often have to fight with elements like wind and rain, which make communicating more complicated. “The next step will be to observe natural honey bee swarms and see if they’re actually doing this.” he says.
1. What is the focus of the new study?| A．Why worker bees gather around a queen bee. |
| B．How pheromones function in a bee’s body. |
| C．Why insects’ mass communication is limited to short distances. |
| D．How the queen’s location is passed on to the rest of the colony. |
| A．The process of the experiment. | B．The equipment required for the experiment. |
| C．The technique used in the experiment. | D．The species chosen for the experiment. |
| A．Direction. | B．Movement. | C．Location. | D．Relay. |
| A．Doubtful. | B．Reliable. | C．Realistic. | D．Influential. |
【推荐1】Places to avoid travelling
India
The main distinction in wealth and class may explain some of the risk of crimes in this country. But according to John Gobbels, vice president and chief operating officer for Medjet (an international emergency service), it’s medical safety that actually makes India so dangerous. He explains that the U. S. State Department gives the country Level 2 travel advisory status. (Level 1 means you should exercise normal precautions（预防措施）；Level 4 is “ do not go ” .)
Hawaii
Considering this destination is a very hot spot for honeymooners, it might be surprising to see the Big Island of Hawaii as a dangerous place to visit. The eruption of a volcano has put Kilauea in a state of emergency, with poisonous gas, lava flows, and earthquakes all a risk. You’ll likely see special airline deals cancelled, so think twice before making this flight.
Acapulco
This beach resort town on Mexico’s Pacific coast isn’t exactly the white-sand party destination it once was. With a Level 4 travel advisory, Gobbels explains, it’s in the same category as places like Iran, Syria, and North Korea. It’s regarded as the murder capital of the country.
Cairo, Egypt
According to a recent report from the Thomson Reuters Foundation, Cairo is considered the most insecure city for women in the world. Even though the political tensions are easing in this area, according to Gobbels, sexual violence and cultural expectations make it extremely problematic, for both locals and visitors.
1. According to John Gobbels, what should visitors pay special attention to in India?| A．Personal belongings. | B．Travel insurance. |
| C．Cultural difference. | D．Medical safety. |
| A．India. | B．Cairo. |
| C．Acapulco. | D．Hawaii. |
| A．Syria isn’t a risky destination where you’ll have a wonderful vacation. |
| B．The political unrest in Cairo is responsible for its insecurity at present. |
| C．A Level 3 travel advisory indicates you can go with normal precautions. |
| D．The flights to Hawaii may be changeable due to the eruption of the volcano. |
【推荐2】At the beginning of the 21st century China had no high-speed railways. Traveling on trains in China was slow and uncomfortable. With low average speeds, it would take a long time to travel between major cities like Shanghai and Beijing.
Today, China already has the world’s largest network of high-speed railways. No fewer than 37, 900 kilometers(about 23, 500 miles) of lines cross the country, linking all of its major mega-city clusters(特大城市群), and all have been completed since 2008, with a further 3, 700 kilometers due to open in the coming months of 2021. The network is expected to double in length again, to 70, 000 kilometers, by 2035.
With trains reaching speeds of up to 350 kph on many lines, intercity travel has been changed and the control of airlines has been broken on the busiest routes. By 2020, 75% of Chinese cities with a population of 500, 000 or more had a high-speed rail link.
In comparison, Spain has about 3, 218 kilometers of high-speed rail lines built for operation at over 250 kph. At the same time, the UK currently has just 107 kilometers while the United States has a 735. 5 kilometers railway line connecting highly developed areas.
As China seeks to grow its influence across Asia and into Europe and Africa through the significant “Belt and Road Initiative(一带一路倡议)”, rail is playing a key part in creating the new “Silk Road” it desires.
Although its trains are now among the fastest in the world, China is also spending significant funds on the development of maglev(磁悬浮) technology, which will allow it to operate passenger services at up to 620 kph －well beyond the current limits of steel wheel on steel rails.
1. How was China’s railway system at the beginning of the 21st century?| A．It was the world’s largest. |
| B．It covered its major cities. |
| C．It was fast and comfortable. |
| D．It was slow and uncomfortable. |
| A．About 3, 700 kilometers. | B．About 37, 900 kilometers. |
| C．About 41, 600 kilometers. | D．About 70, 000 kilometers. |
| A．China. | B．Spain. | C．The United Kingdom. | D．The United States. |
| A．Because it is much cheaper. |
| B．Because it is more environmentally friendly. |
| C．Because it is already widely used in other countries. |
| D．Because it can break through the current speed limit. |
【推荐3】The topic of China’s “slash youth” has fueled heated debate on social media recently, drawing attention to the diverse pursuits of the younger generation.
The slash youth, which could also be called slashers or slash-generation — means those who refuse to be defined or bound by just one personal identity. They are keen to present themselves as multiple and sometimes distinct identities, such as a nurse and model, a teacher and stand-up comedian, and an engineer and band player. Rather than material comforts, they pursue meaningful achievement.
A diverse career can enable them to develop new experiences and talents as well as social and professional networks, leading to greater flexibility in life and work, recognition and satisfaction.
A study on “slash youth” published in the China Youth Research magazine analyzes the background of this phenomenon: with part of modern society’s structured organization and stability norms (规范) are broken, flexible labor markets and structural unemployment has emerged, dispelling the sense of job security of the young people in employment. Young people also face the dilemma of self-actualization (自我实现), including the sense of powerlessness, lost sense of value and lack of self- identity in the profession, which forces them to re-find the meaning of work.
“The ‘slash life’ shows that our society is becoming more and more diversified and inclusive (包罗万象的), and it welcomes everyone’s self- fulfillment,” said Shi Yanrong, an associate researcher from Tianjin Academy of Social Sciences. “Young people no longer have to rely on work and money for their sense of self-worth. They tend to create their own identities.” The researcher added that against the background that people have multiple interests and are willing to pay for these interests nowadays, the “slash life” of the youth would drive the growth of a new economy, just as animation culture affected the market.
1. What attracts younger generation to pursue multiple identities?| A．Meaningful self-fulfillment. | B．Public concern. |
| C．Booming job market. | D．Material comforts. |
| A．Highlighting. | B．Stimulating. | C．Removing. | D．Increasing. |
| A．It enables young people to earn high incomes. |
| B．It inspires young people’s creativity at work. |
| C．It increases people’s confidence in young generation. |
| D．It reflects the increasing tolerance of the society. |
| A．Slash Life: A flexible labor market |
| B．Slash Life: A journey of hunting for jobs |
| C．Slash Youth: A generation with diverse identities |
| D．Slash Youth: A generation lacking the sense of job security |
