Americans are buying more products and services than ever before through the Internet. And experts say the popularity of online sales is likely to spread to other countries. Online sales now represent as much as 10% of all retail sales in the United States. This has led traditional stores to seek new ways to keep their customers loyal.
Lynne used the Internet to buy everything she needed for her wedding and holiday gifts for her husband and stepdaughter. Other than food, 90% of her purchases were made on her home computer. “I find that, by being able to go online, choose the things that I need, and have them delivered to me right at my doorstep, I eliminate all the driving, all the crowds, all the noise of that, and I usually get a better selection.”
There are a lot of people like her. Experts say American online shopping hit records in both November and December. 57% of Americans have bought something electronically. Store owners worry that this growing amount of online sales will hurt their business. Cornell University marketing professor Ed Melaughlin says they can keep their customers by selling goods like clothing, which buyers may want to see and try on before purchasing. The stores could also offer things that are difficult to ship. Besides, some stores can please customers by offering to repair electronic products.
Bill Martin is the founder of Shopper Trak. His business helps stores learn about their customers. He said, “There is still a lot of emotion in the buying decision, you know, that takes place. Often you need that last sense of ‘Boy, this is exactly what I want’ before you are ready to part with money, and you can’t always get that online. It’s a rather cold process.”
While online shopping worries some business owners, the only worry for delivery services like FedEx and UPS is keeping up with the number of packages. UPS Manager Dana Kline says her company is very busy at this time of year. UPS is so busy that it has filled 55, 000 temporary worker positions during the holiday season.
1. The example of Lynne is mentioned in the passage to show ________.| A．online business has changed many Americans’ life |
| B．online sales will replace traditional sales sooner or later |
| C．traditional stores can't offer enough food to their customers |
| D．traditional stores find new ways to keep their customers loyal |
| A．include | B．decrease |
| C．discourage | D．avoid |
| A．UPS has filled more worker positions than FedEx |
| B．business owners are concerned about delivery services |
| C．FedEx is keeping up with UPS on the number of packages |
| D．delivery services are facing more and more pressure from online sales |
| A．the challenge online owners are faced with |
| B．the challenge ecommerce causes to traditional sales |
| C．the difference between online sales and traditional sales |
| D．the trouble that customers often meet when purchasing online |
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【推荐1】“But everyone has one,” begs my son as I tell him that he won’t get a smartphone. Despite my determination, it’s hard not to feel sorry for him. As the end of Year 6 draws closer, the weeks are filled with stories of new classmates whose parents have, as one friend texted recently, “cracked”. Apps are springing up so that friends going to different secondary schools can easily keep in touch. But it pains me to see the anxiety and effect that smartphones cause. So I stick to my decision.
There is research conducted by the Office of Communications (Ofcom) showing that school bullying (欺凌) is more likely to happen on a device rather than face to face. School bullies aren’t new, but their ability to reach the sanctuary (庇护) of the home is a recent development. Headteacher Jon Boyes of Herne Bay High School told parents that they’d have to sort out arguments between pupils that had occurred online.
According to the research, children who were given a phone later went on to experience better mental well-being in relation to their self-confidence and their ability to relate to others. However, those who received a phone at a younger age were more likely to experience sad thoughts, feelings of aggression towards others and the sense that they were separated from reality.
Parents should be willing to consider the idea that it’s possible to refuse to follow the herd (人群) at least until their children are old enough to judge what they find on the Internet. There is power in questioning the idea that a smartphone is the only way to keep a child safe and ensure they have access to important friendships.
My son is only 10. He’s nowhere near ready to deal with the confusing and harmful garbage that he will no doubt find on the Internet. He hasn’t developed the emotional maturity to skillfully avoid the litter along his route. As his parent, why would I believe he could deal with what many adults struggle to get a handle on? Instead, I believe that he can survive with his old-fashioned phone. It turned out that he agreed.
1. What factor strengthens the author’s decision?| A．The text messages from a friend. |
| B．The poor relationship with her son. |
| C．The realization of smartphones’ disadvantages. |
| D．The exchange of class stories with other parents. |
| A．Students’ face-to-face disagreements. |
| B．Serious academic competition among students. |
| C．Teachers’ wrong way of handling arguments. |
| D．Students’ unpleasant communication on the Internet. |
| A．He may show better social skills. | B．He may have greater self-confidence. |
| C．He may have much mental suffering. | D．He may become quite ambitious. |
| A．He is very mature for his age. |
| B．He may continue using his old device |
| C．He is well prepared for life challenges. |
| D．He may strongly oppose his parents’ decision. |
【推荐2】
Researchers at Syracuse University in New York tried to answer that question. They came up with some surprising answers. People who post selfies and use editing software to make themselves look better show behavior connected to admiring themselves too much, the Syracuse researchers said.
Other findings from the study include: There are no major differences on how often men and women post selfies and how often they use editing software.
The Newhouse School's Associate Professor Makana Chock worked on the study. She said, posting selfies on social media is not all that different from what people have done for many years. On trips, our parents and grandparents used cameras to take photos. Before social media, people would bring back photos to show friends and family. You had no choice but to look at them. If you are a nice person, you commented about how nice everyone in the photos looked, especially children and the person showing the photos.
On social media, it is a different experience. People can decide not to look at photos of their friends and family even if they click "like" even "love" under the Facebook selfie.
| A．Why do people take "selfies?" |
| B．That was the old way of "clicking" like. |
| C．Different people have different opinions about it. |
| D．Such people think very highly of themselves, especially how they look. |
| E．Both cameras and phones are useful tools to record people's experiences. |
| F．But men desire to be seen as popular more than women when posting selfies. |
| G．There are other reasons, besides admiring themselves, why people post selfies. |
【推荐3】Not too long ago, one of my daughter’s middle-school teachers told me that my daughter was spending a lot of time on her phone during class. This didn’t surprise me. I am a filmmaker and I’m making documentary (纪录片) “Screenagers: Growing up in the Digital Age” carefully because I know how strongly technology attracts youth and how confused we are about what to do about that.
This month, the screenagers team and I completed a survey of people who were interested in the topic of our film to gather data on middle-school phone rules. More than 1,200 middle school parents in the United States responded. Two striking findings appeared:
●55% of the parents said their children’s middle schools now allow cell phone use, with public schools being more likely than private schools to allow it.
●More than 80% of parents do not want their kids to use cell phones during school.
Recently, France announced it is banning cell phones in school for all students age 15 and under, starting next fall. From our survey, it’s not only parents who support “away for the day” policies, which require students to leave their phones out of reach — so does science.
We know that the frontal lobe (脑叶) — the part of the brain responsible for impulse (冲动) control — is not fully developed in middle school-aged children. When we expect kids to learn how to handle phone use in places like classrooms, we are setting many of them up for failure.
Schools prohibiting (禁止) cell phones saw student test scores improve by 6.41%, according to a 2015 study from the United Kingdom. In the US, administrators of schools that have adopted “away for the day” policies have reported improvements in students’ emotional well-being too.
It is time we should follow France’s lead and do what is best for our middle-school students today.
1. Why did the author feel no surprise about her daughter’s behavior?| A．Her daughter didn’t work very hard. |
| B．The digital world is important to students. |
| C．Films have attracted students deeply. |
| D．Technology has influenced youth greatly. |
| A．Supportive. | B．Unclear. |
| C．Concerned. | D．Indifferent. |
| A．Banning phones in school gets scientific support. |
| B．Private schools have loosed control over phones. |
| C．Using phones frequently does harm to the brain. |
| D．Students are not allowed to use phones. |
| A．Smartphones aren’t a smart choice in middle schools. |
| B．Cell phones have a bad influence on students’ brain. |
| C．Western countries tend to ban the use of cell phones in school. |
| D．Students without cell phones make rapid progress in study. |
【推荐1】Can you name a famous elephant? Babar, perhaps? Or Dumbo? Though these names may be memorable to humans, they sound nothing like the names elephants give each other. “If you’re an elephant, your name is something more like a low, rumbling sound (隆隆的声音),” scientists say. Researchers have found that African elephants emit sounds in response to individuals in their social group, and the receivers respond accordingly.
Researchers recorded 527 elephant calls in northern Kenya and 98 calls in southern Kenya. They then distinguished which members were separated from the herd at the time of each call, or which members were close to the herd. Researchers correctly identified the receivers of 20.3% of the 625 recorded calls. This marks a step forward in understanding how these highly intelligent animals communicate.
“There’s a contact rumble, an anti-predator rumble and a greeting rumble. If you look at a spectrogram (声谱图) with your eyes, they all look almost exactly the same,” said Caitlin O’Connell-Rodwell, an elephant biologist at Harvard Medical School. “That’s why artificial intelligence(AI)has been exciting. It allows us to really figure out what the elephants are saying.”
As it turned out, the calls were distinct to the receivers. Even calls from different callers to the same receiver were similar. The pattern was less obvious than it was between a single caller and his or her receiver. This may be because rumbles encode multiple messages at the same time, so the AI system in computer model may not have been able to pick out the “name” used in each call. “It just highlights the complexity of what’s going on. And we’re not skilled enough in these measurements to figure out what’s going on,” said Caitlin.
However, the research shows how elephants are navigating through a large landscape and can still keep in touch with specific individuals. It allows them to spread out much further and still have very close tabs on individuals, not just the group.
1. What can we infer from paragraph 1?| A．Elephants seem to have their own names. |
| B．Elephants’ sounds differ from other species. |
| C．Elephants’ names sound exactly like humans’. |
| D．Elephants’ names sound different from each other. |
| A．By grouping the elephants based on intelligence. |
| B．By observing the elephants’ reactions to the calls. |
| C．By analyzing the relationship within the elephants. |
| D．By copying the elephants’ voice to call their names. |
| A．Simplifying the process. | B．Creating a spectrogram. |
| C．Letting out various rumbles. | D．Making out each rumble. |
| A．How do elephants contact each other? | B．Why do elephants make their voice? |
| C．Do elephants name one another? | D．Do elephants like to be called? |
【推荐2】Chinese physicists say they have built a quantum computer one trillion times faster than the most powerful computer, with potential for some real-life applications. The researchers said their Jiuzhang prototype quantum computer took a little over three minutes to complete a task that the world's fastest conventional machine would not be able to complete in 600 million years.
The Jiuzhang used light particles called photons to perform calculations. The photons must be generated in their purest possible form, because even a small physical discrepancy could lead to errors. And they must be produced one after another, a technical challenge that pushes optical precision to the limit.
“It is easy for us to have one sip of water each time, but it is difficult to drink just a water molecule each time,” said Pan, a lead scientist in China's national quantum research programme with the University of Science and Technology of China in Hefei, Anhui province.
Quantum computers rely on some counter-intuitive physics of the subatomic world, and are extremely fragile and difficult to maintain. However, conventional computers struggle to cope with problems that involve uncertainty, such as predicting the rise and fall of the stock market, tracing the origin of a new-found virus, or guessing a bank account password. The Jiuzhang was built to find clues in this kind of chaos. For instance, a database may contain many smaller data sets, some of which could have an unknown relation to the other. The Jiuzhang could quickly find out which data sets were related, a daunting task to traditional computers if the database contained a large amount of random information.
This unique calculation capability has a wide range of potential applications such as data mining, bioinformatics and finance, according to the researchers. However, it cannot be used immediately in real-life applications at present. It will need to work with a programmable chip to perform various calculations, so your bank accounts are still safe.
1. What can we know about Jiuzhang?| A．It is faster than any conventional computer. | B．It has found various applications in real life. |
| C．It needs to use water molecules for calculation. | D．It has little requirement for the purity of photons. |
| A．It can keep working in a stable manner. |
| B．It is good at dealing with problems about prediction. |
| C．It depends on physic rules that are easy to understand. |
| D．It can find relevance in chaotic and random information quickly. |
| A．Collecting traffic data. | B．Forecasting weather. |
| C．Writing poems for loved ones. | D．Calculating the distance between two cities. |
| A．China claims the lead in quantum computing in the world with Jiuzhang. |
| B．Quantum computing is becoming an area of study with great potentials. |
| C．Chinese scientists built Jiuzhang, a super powerful calculating machine. |
| D．China’s new quantum computer has outperformed all traditional computers. |
【推荐3】In American schools there is something called Homecoming Day. Many high schools and colleges with a football team have a homecoming game. This can be the most important event of the year except graduation day. Students plan Homecoming Day for many weeks in advance.
Several days before Homecoming, students start to decorate the school. There are signs to wish luck to the team, and many other signs to welcome all the graduates. The members of school clubs build booths (摊位) and sell lemonade, apples and sandwiches. Some clubs help to welcome visitors.
During the day alumni will gather at the school. They like to look for teachers that they remember. Often they see old friends and they talk together about those happy years in school. Many people still come to Homecoming twenty or thirty years after their graduation.
Everyone soon comes to watch the football game. When the game is half over, a band comes onto the field and plays school songs. Another important moment is when the Homecoming Queen or King appears. All the students vote the most popular student Homecoming Queen or King. It is a great honor to be chosen.
Homecoming is a happy day, but it is not perfect unless the football team wins the game. Even if the game loses, the students still enjoy Homecoming. Some stay at the school to dance and others go to a party. For everyone it is a day worth remembering.
1. What are students busy doing before Homecoming Day?| A．Making a football team. | B．Decorating the school. |
| C．Taking their exams. | D．Preparing for graduation. |
| A．Parents. | B．Teachers. | C．Managers. | D．Graduates. |
| A．To join in a football match. | B．To see their old friends. |
| C．To watch the football game. | D．To visit teachers they remember. |
| A．Voted by all the parents. | B．Chosen from the best teachers. |
| C．Elected by all the students. | D．Given to the best football player. |
【推荐1】There’s no shortage of web sites offering deals-everything from daily deals to members-only private sales. But when it comes to real jaw-dropping deals, there’s one company that seems to have figured out a way to really deliver.
The company is called Quibids and they auction the hottest, in-demand electronics like Apple ipads and ipods, as well as other items like gift cards from the top retailers. Unlike other sites, the prices people pay are nowhere near retail. How low are the prices?
$ 33.84 for a new Apple ipad 32 GB(retail $ 600)
$ 22.10 for a new Nikon D90 Digital SLR Camera(retail $ 1070)
Our first reaction on seeing these prices was disbelief. After all, how could Quibids possibly afford to sell these items for so little — surely they must be losing a lot of money.
That’s where its unique business model comes into play. You see, for every bid a buyer places for an item on Quibids, the company collects a small fee from the bidder. The fee to bid is only about 60 cents, but based on the volume of sales and bids, the company is able to collect enough to make up for the ridiculous prices the items sell for.
But best of all, participating in the Quibids auction is incredibly fun. Because each bid costs a little to place, shoppers can strategize when to place their bids. Each auction has a strict time limit. When you place your bid, the system adds a little time to the auction to see if any other bids come in. If you have the winning bid when the clock runs out — you win the item for that price.
But the best part of Quibids may be the “Buy-It-Now” feature. This allows bidders who did not win an auction to still buy the product they want and apply the cost of the bids they placed as a discount on the regular product price. So you still get the item and the bids you placed previously in the auction don’t cost you anything!
1. According to the passage, the success of Quibids mainly lies in ________.| A．their willingness to risk losing money | B．the change in people’s shopping model |
| C．the quality of the goods and service | D．how its buying and selling is conducted |
| A．other retailers will be out of business | B．the prices on Quibids are the lowest |
| C．Quibids only sell popular electronics | D．winning a bid is not just a matter of luck |
| A．$ 21.2 | B．$ 20 | C．$ 19.4 | D．$ 18.8 |
| A．The Most Successful Shopping Website | B．How to Buy New Must–have Electronics |
| C．Buy Products for Next to Nothing | D．Tips on Shopping Online |
【推荐2】It’s easier than ever to buy things online. It’s so easy that Ryan Cassata sometimes does it in his sleep. Casata, a 24-year-old singer, recently was informed by Amazon that a package had been shipped to his apartment, but he didn’t remember buying anything. When he logged onto his account and saw that some socks were on the way, he remembered: A few nights back, he had woken up in the middle of the night to browse-and apparently shop-on Amazon.
Casata shops when he’s awake, too, buying little gadgets like an onion chopper, discounted gums, and decorations like a Himalayan salt lamp. The other day, he almost bought a pizza pool float, until he remembered that he doesn’t have a pool.
Thanks to a perfect storm of factors, Americans are accumulating a lot of stuff. Now, the Internet has made it possible for us to shop from anywhere, anytime. And because of the globalization of manufacturing, everything is cheaper than ever before — so cheap that we add them to our online shopping carts without a second thought. Shopping online also feels good. Humans get a dopamine hit (多巴胺刺激) from buying stuff, according to research, and then also experience delayed pleasure when the order arrives a few days later, which may make it more physiologically rewarding than shopping in stores.
Justine Montoya, a caregiver in Los Angeles, who buys all sorts of stuff online, said, “In the past few months alone, I bought an S18 smart watch from Wish.com that I’ll probably never use, a second Kindle because it was on sale and I am worried my first Kindle is going to die soon, and a pair of wireless ear buds that I had hoped would allow me to charge my iPhone and listen to music at the same time, but that instead just fall out of my ears whenever I put them on. I also bought, on Amazon, a book about hiking, only to find the exact same book in a box of my stuff in my parents’ basement.”
1. What do we know about Casata when he was informed of a package?| A．He went to sleep. | B．He forgot buying anything. |
| C．He waited for it until midnight. | D．He was happy to receive the socks. |
| A．He already had one. | B．It was not discounted. |
| C．It was poorly decorated. | D．He doesn’t have a pool at all. |
| A．Factors contributing to overbuying online. |
| B．Conveniences brought by online shopping. |
| C．Reasons explaining why everything is cheap online. |
| D．Good feelings one can get through online shopping. |
| A．The quality of products is a major public concern. |
| B．We have a wide choice of products in online stores. |
| C．People accumulate useless stuff by shopping online. |
| D．Today people depend on the Internet to do shopping. |
【推荐3】Online shoppers would rather receive an offer for a product or service than make their own offer, according to a study led by a Michigan State University scholar that has implications for the fast-growing e-commerce industry. The findings may come as a surprise given that shopping online is an anonymous (匿名的) process that seemingly can give consumers more confidence to drive a hard bargain, said Don Conlon, Professor of Management in MSU’s Broad College of Business.
But the study found that participants who made their own offers were less successful in sealing the deal and, when they were successful, worried they overpaid. Many shoppers found the process of researching an offer to be a hassle. “Americans are very busy, and it’s less time-consuming to be the one receiving the offer rather than the one proposing the offer,” Conlon said. “People tend to be happier when they’re in the receiver role.”
Online spending in the United States is expected to jump 45 percent in the next four years, from $226 billion this year to $327 billion in 2017, according to Forrester Research Inc. Nevertheless, researches into this prosperous market remain largely focused on the strategies of companies, rather than those of shoppers. Conlon’s study is, obviously, a rare exception.
Conlon got the idea for the study after considering the difference between two popular sites for hotels and airline flights, priceline.com, which takes bids, and hotwire.com, which provides offers. Using these two models, Conlon and his fellow researchers conducted a series of experiments with more than 850 people who were charged with booking a fictional hotel room and acquiring a fictional antique car. Not only did participants prefer to receive bids, Conlon said, but they also secured more deals in that receiver role. Further, when they had to make the bids, they were left more mentally taxed and regretful.
From an industry perspective, putting customers in the receiver role may help fill more hotel rooms and airplane seats. “If you're a business with a lot of product,” Conlon said, “you may want to be the one making the offers.” However, when selling single items, such as an antique car, accepting bids may be a better option since that typically drives up the price, he said.
1. What can we learn from Para.1?| A．The result of the study gives customers more confidence. |
| B．Scholars aren’t surprised at the findings of the study. |
| C．Online shoppers don’t bargain as much as expected. |
| D．E-commerce industry drives more hard bargains. |
| A．online shopping is time-consuming |
| B．given prices can promote online sales |
| C．online businesses provide a lot of products |
| D．receiving offers makes online shoppers regretful |
| A．burdened | B．numbed | C．relieved | D．challenged |
| A．the big advantages of online shopping |
| B．the rapid development of online shopping |
| C．online shoppers’ preference for taking offers |
| D．online companies’ strategies to improve service |
