【推荐2】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.

2. What does the underlined word “stable” in paragraph 3 mean?

A．not easily upset.	B．easy to change.
C．not likely to change.	D．difficult to destroy.

3. How does the writer support his idea?

A．By giving examples.	B．By stating arguments.
C．By explaining causes.	D．By providing research results.

4. Which of the following can be a suitable title for the text?

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.

【推荐3】Forget spending the whole night studying for the exam. There’s another way to cram (突击式学习) for tests. New research by scientists at Northwestern University in Chicago shows people can actually learn while they’re asleep.

In the new study, published in the journal Nature Neuroscience, participants were given diagrams that showed them how to play two simple piano melodies, each 12 notes long. They spent an equal amount of time practicing playing each tune, and then took a 90-minute nap (小睡). While they slept, one of the melodies was quietly played on repeat for four minutes. As a result, upon awakening, the participants could accurately play the melody 4 percent more often than the melody that was not played while they slept, considering it resulted from just four minutes of “sleep-learning.”

“The re-activation (重新激活) process in the experiment is thought to affect a naturally occurring memory consolidation (巩固) process that normally happens over months (possibly years),” said Paul Reber, a psychologist at Northwestern and co-author of the study. So, besides piano songs, what kinds of information can you “cram” while asleep?

Clearly, resting your textbook near your dreaming head won’t do any good. “As long as the memory is tied to a specific type of sound, it looks like the sound can re-activate and strengthen the previously learned information,” Reber said. “It is possible that this effect would help with strengthening memories from a lecture and that it could even help speed up second-language learning.”

In other words, if you’re learning a foreign language, it may help to put on recordings of the language while you sleep. If you need to memorize information presented in a classroom lecture, it might also help to record the lecture and play it quietly at night.

1. The first paragraph serves as a(n) _____.

A．introduction

B．background

C．comment

D．conclusion

2. In the new study, _____.

A．the participants had learned to write the piano melodies

B．the participants played each melody for about 90 minutes

C．the two melodies were basically of the same level of difficulty

D．the two melodies were played in turn while the participants slept

3. What’s the author’s aim in giving the example of the study?

A．To tell us the importance of sleep.

B．To prove sleep-learning is possible.

C．To recommend a way for us to learn music.

D．To show that music can improve our memory.

4. What did Paul Reber advise us to do when sleeping?

A．Study music carefully.	B．Record the sound of sleeping.
C．Put a book beside our head.	D．Play recordings quietly.

【推荐2】There are few more sobering online activities than entering data college-tuition calculators and gasping as the Web spits back a six-figure sum. But economists say families about to go into debt to fund four years of partying, as well as studying, can comfort themselves with the knowledge that college is an investment that, unlike many bank stocks, should yield huge dividends.

A 2008 study by two Harvard economists notes that the “labor-market premium to skill”— to the amount college graduates earned—decreased for much of the 20th century, but he come back with a vengeance since the 1980s. In 2005, the typical full-time year-round U. S. worker with a four-year college degree earned $50,900, 62% more than $31,500 earned by a worker with only a high-school diploma.

There’s no question that going to college is a smart economic choice. But a look at the strange variations in tuition reveals that the choice about which college to attend doesn’t come down merely to dollars and cents. Does going to Columbia University (tuition, room and board $49,260 in 2007-2008) yield a 40% greater return than attending the University of Colorado at Boulder as an out-of-state student ($35,542)? Probably not. does being an out-of-state student at the University of Colorado at Boulder yield twice the amount of income as being an in-state student ($17,380) there? Not likely.

No, in this consumerist age, most buyers aren’t evaluating college as an investment, but rather as a consumer product —like a car or clothes or a house. And with such purchases, price is only one of many crucial factors to consider.

As with automobiles, consumers in today’s college marketplace have vast choices, and people search for the one that gives them the most comfort and satisfaction in line with their budgets. This accounts for the willingness of people to pay more for different types of experiences (such as attending a private liberal - arts college or going to an out-of-state public school that has a great marine - biology program). And just as two auto purchasers might spend an equal amount of money on very different cars, college students (or, more accurately, their parents) often show a willingness to pay essentially the same price for vastly different products. So which is it? Is college an investment product like a stock or a consumer product like a car? In keeping with automotive world’s hottest consumer trend, maybe it’s best to characterize it as a hybrid; an expensive sunburned product that, over time, will pay rich dividends.

1. What’s the opinion of economists about going to college?

A．Huge amounts of money is being wasted on campus socializing.

B．It doesn’t pay to run into debt to receive a college education.

C．College education is rewarding in spite of the shocking costs.

D．Going to college doesn’t necessarily bring the expected returns.

2. The two Harvard economists note in their study that, for much of the 20^th century. _______.

A．enrollment kept decreasing in virtually all American colleges and universities

B．the labor market preferred high-school to college graduates

C．competition for university admissions was far more fierce than today

D．the gap between the earnings of college and high-school graduates narrowed

3. Students who attend an in-state college or university can _______.

A．save more on tuition	B．receive a better education
C．take more liberal-arts courses	D．avoid traveling long distances

4. What is the chief consideration when students choose a college today?

A．Their employment prospects after graduation.	B．A satisfying experience within their budgets .
C．Its facilities and learning environment.	D．Its ranking among similar institutions.

【推荐3】Stan Lee, co-founder of the Marvel Universe(漫威宇宙) and co-creator of many of its most popular superheroes, died at the age of 95.

Lee was born Stanley Martin Lieber in New York in 1922. As a son of working-class Jewish immigrants from Romania, times were hard and he lived with his family in a shabby single-bedroom apartment. After graduating from high school at 16, Lieber landed a job as an assistant at Timely Comics. By the early 1940s, he was a temporary editor for the company. It was at this time that he began using his pen name---Stan Lee. In 1947, two years after returning from serving for the U.S. Army, Lee married his wife, Joan. The two began their 70-year marriage and had two children.

In the late 1950s, DC Comics breathed new life into its classic superhero and experienced a significant success with its updated version of the Flash, and later with super-team the Justice League of America.

To compete against DC Comics, Lee was given the task of creating their own group of superheroes. In 1961, Timely Comics changed its name into Marvel Comics after Atlas Comics, and that November saw the debut(首次亮相) of the Fantastic Four. Lee’s later famous and lasting creations of comic-book superheroes included Spider-Man, the Hulk, Thor, Iron Man and the X-Men.

Over the course of his career, Lee was an icon of Marvel Comics. As a writer and editor and, at various points, both the publisher and vice president of Marvel Comics, Lee not only introduced interesting characters to the industry, but changed the way that comic books came together. He also created a cooperative workflow between writers and artists, which became known as the “Marvel Method”. Lee received a National Medal of Arts in 2008 for his innovations that revolutionized American comic books.

1. What do we know about Lee from Paragraph 2?

A．He served for the U.S. Army for two years.

B．He suffered from an unfortunate marriage.

C．He had a tough and struggling childhood.

D．He adopted his pen name at the age of 16.

2. What was the company called when Spider-Man was created?

A．Timely Comics	B．Marvel Comics
C．Atlas Comics	D．DC Comics

3. What does the underlined word “icon” in the last paragraph mean?

A．Statue.	B．Agent.
C．Assistant.	D．Symbol.

4. What can be the best title for the text?

A．Stan Lee, the Godfather of Marvel Comics.

B．The Development of Marvel Comics.

C．Stan Lee, a Superhero in Comic Books.

D．The Popular Superheroes of Marvel Comics.