1 . Many college students turn to ADHD（注意缺陷障碍）medicine during the exam week, which is regarded as “smart drugs” that will help their academic（学术的）performance. The thinking is that if the drugs help students with ADHD improve their focus, they should provide the same benefit for people who don’t have the disorder.
But a new study shows that drugs can actually damage brain function of healthy students who take the drug hoping to boost their intelligence. “It’s not a smart drug which will suddenly improve their ability to understand information they read,” said Lisa Weyandt, a professor at the University of Rhode Island.
To test whether this effect is real or not, researchers organized 13 students to take part in two five-hour study sessions（一段时间）in the lab. The students took the standard 30mg ADHD drugs before one session, and a sugar pill before the other. Students on ADHD drugs did experience an increase in their blood pressure and heart rates. “The medicine was having an effect on their brain,” Weyandt said. The students also showed an improvement in their ability to focus, the researchers found.
However, students on ADHD drugs experienced no improvement in reading comprehension, reading fluency or knowledge reviews, compared to when they’d taken a sugar pill. “We read aloud stories to them and asked them to recall information from the stories, ”she said. “That didn’t improve.”
Worse, the ADHD drug actually harms students’ memory. It’s often misused because people pull all-nighters and they’re tired, and they think it’s going to keep them awake. Maybe it does, but it’s certainly not going to help their academic work. The brain is still developing until the mid to late 20s. It’s important to keep it healthy. There’s also a chance that ADHD drugs could endanger a student’s heart health.
1. Why do some college students take ADHD drugs?| A．To improve their sleeping. | B．To get higher marks. |
| C．To make them feel relaxed. | D．To treat brain disorder. |
| A．Analyze. | B．Affect. |
| C．Improve. | D．Understand. |
| A．They became more focused. |
| B．Their blood pressure was reduced. |
| C．Their reading fluency was greatly raised. |
| D．They could remember better and more quickly. |
| A．In a drug instruction. | B．In a biology textbook. |
| C．In a travel magazine. | D．In a news report. |
2 . Home to 8.2 million people, 36 percent of whom were born outside the United State, New York, known as the Big Apple, is the biggest city in America. Nearly twenty times bigger than the capital, Washington DC, you might expect New York to be twenty times more dangerous, actually, it’s safer. Recent figures show that New York now has fewer crimes per 100,000 people than 193 other US cities. It's also healthier than it used to be. For example, the smoking rate has gone down from 21.5 percent a few years ago, to 16.9 percent today.
New Yorkers should be delighted, shouldn't they? In fact, many feel that New York is losing its identity. It used to be the city that never sleeps. These days it's the city that never smokes, drinks or does anything naughty (at least, not in public). The Big Apple is quickly turning into the Forbidden Apple.
If you decided to have a picnic in Central Park, you'd need to be careful—if you decided to feed the birds with your sandwich, you could be arrested. It's banned. In many countries a mobile phone going off in the cinema is annoying. In New York it's illegal. So is putting your bag on an empty seat in the subway. If you went to a bar for a drink and a cigarette, that would be OK, wouldn't it? Er ... no. You can't smoke in public in New York City. In fact, you can't smoke outdoors on the street or in parks either. The angry editor of Vanity Fair magazine, Gray don Carter, says, “Under New York City law it is acceptable to keep a gun in your place of work, but not an empty ashtray.” He should know. The police came to his office and took away his ashtray.
But not all of New York's citizens are complaining. Marcia Dugarry, seventy-two, said, "The city has changed for the better. If more cities had these laws, America would be a better place to live."
The new laws have helped turn the city into one of the healthiest—and most pleasant places to live in America—very different from its old image of a dirty and dangerous city. Its pavements are almost litter-free, its bars clean and its streets among America's safest. Not putting your bag on subway seats might be a small price to pay.
1. The author writes Paragraph 1 mainly to tell the reader that New York is________.| A．bigger than Washington D.C. | B．the best place in the world |
| C．safer and healthier | D．the most dangerous city |
| A．quite popular | B．not allowed in law | C．very impolite | D．quite common |
| A．Some of New York's new laws are not reasonable. |
| B．A gun is much easier to get than an ashtray. |
| C．The police had no right to take away his ashtray |
| D．there should be a law to keep guns away from people. |
| A．The writer supports them. | B．The writer is against them. |
| C．The writer is not interested in them. | D．The writer's attitude is not clear. |
3 . Malaria(疟疾) is a mosquito-borne disease caused by a parasite (寄生虫). People with malaria often experience fever, and flu-like illness. Left untreated, they may die. A new study suggests that some homemade soups might help fight malaria.
Jake Baum of Imperial College London led the research. He asked children at a London school to bring in home-made clear soups that their families would make to treat a fever. The children were from many different cultural backgrounds. And the soups were then given to the parasite that created 99.7 percent of malaria cases in Africa.
Of the 56 soups tested, five were more than 50 percent effective in containing the growth of the parasite. Two were as effective as one drug now used to treat malaria. And four soups were more than 50 percent effective in preventing parasites from aging to the point when they could infect (感染) mosquitoes that spread the disease. The soups came from families from different places, including Europe, North Africa and the Middle East. They had several main ingredients (成分), including chicken, beef and green vegetables. Baum said the vegetarian soups showed similar results to the soups with meat.
Baum and his team reported their results recently in the publication Archives of Disease in Childhood. “When we started getting soups that worked - in the lab under very limited conditions - we were really happy and excited,” Baum said. Baum also added that it was unclear which foods made the soups effective against malaria. “If we were serious about going back and finding the ingredients, like good scientists, we’d have to do it in a better way,” he said.
Baum said his aim was in part to show children that scientific research can turn a herbal (草本的) cure into a man-made medicine. Now the drugs that treat the disease are becoming useless for more and more people, and about 400,000 people are killed by the disease every year. That means scientists will have to find new drugs.
1. What can we learn about malaria from the passage?| A．It can be easily recognized. |
| B．It can be a very serious disease. |
| C．It doesn’t always require treatment. |
| D．It is a big problem in many countries. |
| A．To figure out their ingredients. |
| B．To learn about different cultures. |
| C．To see if they could help cure fevers. |
| D．To see if they could help fight malaria. |
| A．Improving. | B．Proving. | C．Preventing. | D．Showing. |
| A．They can be harmful to people’s health. |
| B．They have no effect on many people. |
| C．They just work in certain countries. |
| D．They are very difficult to get. |
4 . Killer whales, or orcas, are known for their severe attacks on sea animals but they have never posed a threat to humans. However, since late July, the normally social animals have been intentionally attacking sailboats off the coasts of Spain and Portugal.
The strange behavior first surfaced on July 29, 2020, when a 46-foot boat was repeatedly attacked for almost an hour by nine orcas, causing the boat to rotate(旋转) 180 degrees and having its engine switched off. Since then, over 30 more similar incidents have been reported. On September 23, 2020, Spain's government banned boats of less than 50 feet in length from sailing in the 60-mile stretch of the Atlantic coastline between Ferrol and the Estaca de Bares Cape, where the attacks have been occurring.
Researchers across the world are trying to explain the orcas' behavior. Some believe it could be a result of the overfishing of the bluefish tuna - the orcas' primary food source -which has left the area's killer whales starving and unable to feed their babies. "I saw them look at boats carrying fish. I think they know humans are somehow related to food shortages, "says Ken Balcomb, senior scientist at the Center for Whale Research in Washington, USA. The environmentalists believe the sudden increase in boat traffic and fishing activities, after months of absence due to restrictions on human activity last spring, could also be contributing to the agitation.
However, Alfredo López, a biology professor in Galicia, Spain, thinks the attacks are defensive measures the orcas adopted to protect themselves against boat injuries. The researcher came to this conclusion after looking at the of the videos of a few incidents and noticing that two of the young killer whales involved had serious injuries. Hopefully, the experts will be able to find a way to restore the harmony between the animals and the humans soon.
1. What do we know about orcas in paragraph 1?| A．They are friendly to humans. | B．They have changed their behavior. |
| C．They are famous for hunting skills | D．They have met tough living conditions. |
| A．Ken Balcomb. | B．The environmentalists. |
| C．Alfredo López. | D．Spain's government. |
| A．The attacks. | B．Food shortages. | C．The overfishing. | D．Human activities. |
| A．How do killer whales attack humans? |
| B．Why Are Killer Whales attacking Boats? |
| C．How can we live in harmony with animals? |
| D．Why are boats banned from sailing on the sea? |
5 . Greenland is the biggest island in the world. And the ice sheet that sits atop it is massive. “The pile of ice being so thick, it extends more than 10, 000 feet above the ocean. And if all that ice were to melt and go into the ocean, global sea levels would rise by 24 feet everywhere around the world,” said Jason Briner, a geologist at the University at Buffalo. The ice sheet is melting, of course. But just how much, compared to the past?
Briner’s team did a computer simulation（模拟)of the southwest of the Greenland ice sheet, which he says is a good proxy for ice melt across the entire ice sheet. The researchers plugged past climate data into that model to “hindcast”, rather than forecast, the past activity of the ice sheet. They then checked the model’s predictions of the past shape and size of the ice sheet by looking at piles of rocks and dirt on Greenland today, which outline the edges of ancient ice. And the simulation was in good agreement with the actual situation.
Using that reconstruction of the ice sheet over time, the team could compare the ice sheet’s historic losses to those happening today under human-caused global warming. And they determined that Greenland is on track to lose more ice this century than during any century in the past 12, 000 years — possibly four times as much. The results appear in the journal Nature.
Ultimately it’s up to us how much ice actually melts. “Humanity has the button — the carbon button — and that button is going to influence the rates of ice loss from the Greenland ice sheet.” If the world goes net carbon zero by 2100, for example, Briner says ice loss could stop, entirely at the end of the century, according to one model. “That was what kept me from being completely depressed about our study. ” Dozens of countries have already announced goals to go net carbon zero by the middle of this century — so far the U. S. is not one of them.
1. What does the underlined word “proxy” in Paragraph 2 refer to?| A．Combination. | B．Example. |
| C．Recommendation. | D．Interpretation. |
| A．It is conducted by predicting the activity of the ice sheet. |
| B．It centers on ice melt throughout the entire ice sheet. |
| C．It shows the ice sheet’s losses are in decline. |
| D．It consists with the ice sheet’s actual circumstance. |
| A．Greenland Is Melting Faster |
| B．Global Sea Levels Are Rising |
| C．America Causes the Ice Sheet to Melt |
| D．Man Can Conquer Nature |
6 . Saving Money
Where you save your money often depends on what you are saving for. If you are saving to buy a dictionary or to go to a concert, then you probably keep your money somewhere in your room.
If you are saving for a big purchase like a mountain bike or a school trip, where would you save your money?
One place to save money is the bank. Putting your money in a savings account will help your money earn more money. If you put your money in a piggy bank (猪形储蓄罐子), one year later you'll still have the same amount of money you put in. If you put your money in a savings account, one year later, you'll have more money than you put in. Why?
When you keep your money in a bank, your money earns interest. Interest is the amount of money a bank pays you to use your money. The bank uses your money (and the money of other people, too) to loan money to people and businesses.
The bank will send you a statement several times a year. A bank statement tells you how much money there is in your account. It also tells you how much interest you have earned. If you leave your money in the bank, you can watch it grow!
Another way you can save money is to buy a certificate of deposit or CD. If you have some money that you don't need to use for a long time, this is a good way to make your money grow.
You can buy a CD at a bank. You agree not to use the money for a certain period of time. That period might be from six months to five years. You can't touch your money during that time. If you do, you must pay a penalty, or fee.
Since the bank is using your money for that time period, it will pay you interest. You will earn more interest with a CD than in a savings account. Can you guess why? It's because you promise to leave your money in the bank for a certain period of time. Banks pay different rates of interest. So, you may want to compare rates in newspaper ads before buying a CD.
1. Which way will help your money earn more money?| A．Putting your money in your room. | B．Putting your money in a piggy bank. |
| C．Putting your money in your pocket. | D．Putting your money in a savings account. |
| A．a bank lends to people | B．a bank loans to businesses |
| C．a bank pays you | D．a bank uses |
| A．the amount of money you have in the bank |
| B．the current rates of interest |
| C．the current rates of exchange |
| D．the best way to save your money |
| A．"deposit" | B．"borrow" |
| C．"use" | D．"cash" |
7 . What are dreams for? Sigmund Freud famously claimed that they reveal hidden truths and wishes. More recent research suggests that they may help us process intense emotions, or perhaps classify(分类) and consolidate(巩固) memories, or make sense of random neuron(神经) activity, or rehearse(排练) responses to threatening situations. Other believe that dreams have no evolutionary(进行的) function, but simply dramatize personal concerns.
Despite being largely unsupported by evidence, Freud’s view maintains a strong following around the world. Researchers found that students in the U.S., South Korea, and India were much more likely to say that dreams reveal hidden truths than to endorse better-substantiated(证实的) theories. In the same study, respondents said that dreaming about a plane crash would cause them more anxiety than an official warning about a terrorist attack.
Even if dreams can't foretell(预知) the future, they seem to expose our shared fascinations. The majority of dreams occur during REM sleep cycles(快速动眼期), of which the average person has four or five a night. A study of Canadian university students found the most common dream topics to be school, falling, being chased, and arriving too late for something.
For all the commonalities dreams exhibit, they vary across time—people who grew up watching black-and-white TV are more likely to dream in black and white—and culture. A 1958 study determined that compared with Japanese people, Americans dreamed more about being looked up, losing a loved one, finding money, being inappropriately dressed, or encountering an insane person. Japanese people were more likely to dream about school, trying repeatedly to do something, being paralyzed with fear, or "wild, violent beasts."
But even negative human dreams can have positive effects. In a study of students taking a French medical-school entrance exam, 60 percent of the dreams they had beforehand involved a problem with the exam, such as being late or leaving an answer blank. But those who reported dreams about the exam, even bad ones, did better on it than those who didn't.
So the next time you dream about an education-related experience in which you are both falling and being chased, don’t worry: It’s probably totally meaningless. Then again, your brain might be practicing so you’ll be ready if such an event ever comes to pass.
1. According to different theories mentioned in the passage, dreams may help people in various aspects EXCEPT ________.| A．healing the body | B．memory classification |
| C．preparation for a dangerous situation | D．understanding random neuron activity |
| A．check | B．advertise |
| C．support | D．measure |
| A．People all dream in black and white without any other color. |
| B．Humans have the longest REM sleep cycles among all animals. |
| C．Our dreams often reflect our emotions or anxieties in many forms. |
| D．People feel more stressed when encountering emergencies in reality than in dream. |
| A．what you experience in dreams usually turns out to be the opposite |
| B．bad dreams can help us prepare beforehand to perform better in reality |
| C．it is a kind of comfort and relief to think dreams are usually meaningless |
| D．dreaming about bad things enhances(提高) our bravery and helps to drive away our fears |
8 . Although Bertha Young was thirty she still had moments like this when she wanted to run instead of walk, to take dancing steps on and off the pavement, to throw something up in the air and catch it again, or to stand still and laugh at —nothing — at nothing, simply.
What can you do if you are thirty and, turning the corner of your own street, you suddenly feel happy — absolutely happy.
Oh, is there no way you can express it without being “drunk and disorderly"? How stupid civilization is! Why should you be given a body if you have to keep it shut up in a case like a rare, rare fiddle (小提琴)?
"No, that about the fiddle is not quite what I mean," she thought, running up the steps and feeling in her bag for the key—she'd forgotten it, as usual—and rattling the letter-box. "It's not what I mean, because—Thank you, Mary"— she went into the hall. “Is nurse back?”
“Yes, M’m."
"I'll go upstairs." And she ran upstairs to the nursery.
Nurse sat at a low table giving Little B her supper after her bath. The baby looked up when she saw her mother and began to jump.
“Now, my lovey, eat it up like a good girl," said nurse, setting her lips in a way that Bertha knew, and that meant she had come into the nursery at another wrong moment.
“Has she been good, Nanny?”
“She's been a little sweet all the afternoon," whispered Nanny. "We went to the park and I sat down on a chair and took her out of the pram(婴儿车) and a big dog came along and she pulled its ear. Oh, you should have seen her."
Bertha wanted to ask if it wasn't rather dangerous to let her pull a strange dog's ear. But she did not dare to. She stood watching them, her hands by her side. like the poor little girl in front of the rich girl with the doll.
The baby looked up at her again, stared, and then smiled so charmingly that Bertha couldn't help crying.
“Oh, Nanny, do let me finish giving her supper while you put the bath things away.
“Well, M’m, she oughtn't to be changed hands while she's eating,” said Nanny, still whispering. “It unsettles her, it's very likely to upset her.”
How absurd it was. Why have a baby if it has to be kept—not in a case like a rare, rare fiddle—but in another woman's arms?”
“Oh, I must!” said she.
Very offended, Nanny handed her over.
Now, don't excite her after her supper. You know you do, M'm. And I have such a time with her after!"
Thank heaven! Nanny went out of the room with the bath towels.
"Now I've got you to myself, my little precious," said Bertha, as the baby learned against her.
She ate delightfully, holding up her lips for the spoon and then waving her hands. Sometimes she wouldn't let the spoon go; and sometimes just as Bertha had filled it, she waved it away to the four winds.
When the soup was finished Bertha turned round to the fire. "You're nice—you're very nice!" said she, kissing her warm baby. "I'm fond of you. I like you."
And indeed, she loved Little B so much—her neck as she bent forward, her pretty toes as they shone transparent in the firelight that all her feeling of happiness came back again, and again she didn't know how to express it—what to do with it.
“You’re wanted on the telephone," said Nanny, coming back in victory and seizing her Little B.
1. In paragraph 3 and 15, a “rare, rare fiddle" is used to show that ______| A．Bertha is frustrated by not feeling free to express her musical talents |
| B．wealthy mothers are not allowed to look after their children |
| C．Bertha considers her baby girl an extraordinary child |
| D．people of a certain age are expected to follow a certain code of behavior |
| A．a vain attempt to hide her joy at seeing Bertha |
| B．fear of dismissal from her job for untidy nursery |
| C．dislike for Bertha's ill-timed visits to the nursery |
| D．a relief as she can at last eat her supper |
| A．Bertha wishes to have care-giving time with her baby. |
| B．Bertha lacks emotional and psychological strength. |
| C．Bertha desires a closer relationship with Nanny. |
| D．Bertha suffers from an unrealistic hope of having more babies. |
| A．Bertha feels that Nanny is a competent nurse and will do anything liberate her from chores. |
| B．Nanny considers herself the baby's primary caregiver and Bertha just an occasional visitor. |
| C．Bertha prefers to leave the child in Nanny's care so that she can fulfill her inappropriate fantasies. |
| D．Nanny is tired of working hard for Bertha and would like to find other pleasant employment. |
| A．She is a kind employer but a strict mother. |
| B．She is a thoughtless person and inexperienced mother. |
| C．She is excited and is always lost in her overactive imagination. |
| D．She is forgetful and has no sense of class distinctions in society. |
9 . Garbage often has negative associations with germs (细菌)，dirt and useless junk. However, a recent art exhibition proved that “useless” things can have practical significance.
Dear Pretty Rubbish, an art event organized by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWFN) and digital media art company Blackbow, was held in Beijing. It looked at wasteful consumption (消耗) and asked questions about the relationship between our lifestyles and our garbage.
“We hope that everyone who visited the show can think about how ‘useless things’ are produced, why they are tossed out (扔走), and whether ‘useless things’ are really useless,” said Cao Yujia, the design director of Blackbow.
The organizers said that all the raw materials for the exhibition were collected from community garbage cans.
Artists Zhou Yuxuan and Liu Yifan collected nylon cable ties (尼龙扎带), LED lights and beverage bottles from designers’ workshops to create a work where plastics, in the shape of cells, “grow” in a corner. There, the lights blink (闪烁) regularly to imitate (模仿) “breathing”. When people walk near it, the work responds by forming light patterns, as if communicating with the visitors.
Speaking about the work, Zhou said: “It’s like some kind of communication between humans and plastics.”
Plastic has a life longer than almost any creature, taking centuries to decompose. Though people blame plastics for damage to the environment, they are a big part of our daily lives.
“So we want to ask the question: Although the damage continues, whether there is a way for humans to reconcile (调和) with plastics,” said Zhou.
Liu said that plastic waste can be used to make clothes and ornaments (装饰品). “Re-use of plastics will be a future trend,” he said.
Cable ties are a useful and common material for fastening. Many people will buy a large bundle of them but only use a few pieces. The rest of cable ties could be re-used as a decoration in handicrafts.
“This exhibition calls for everyone to re-think their wasteful lifestyle full of single-use plastics and make changes,” said Cao.
1. What was the purpose of Dear Pretty Rubbish?| A．To call on people to reduce waste. |
| B．To remind people to live healthily. |
| C．To encourage people to use more plastic. |
| D．To teach people how to recycle different kinds of garbage. |
| A．dry up | B．break down |
| C．be discovered | D．be broken |
| A．Communication is important for everyone. |
| B．A community’s garbage is full of hidden treasures. |
| C．Creativity can change your life. |
| D．Plastics could be reused to reduce pollution. |
| A．An art exhibition held in Beijing. |
| B．The rise of a new lifestyle. |
| C．The many uses of plastics. |
| D．An introduction of two artists and their works. |
10 . While traditional wisdom tells us that we should eagerly catch every opportunity that comes our way, playing a little hard to get has its advantages. Studies have shown that opportunities are seen to be more valuable as they become less available, according to Robert Cialdini, a leading expert on influence, who said “What the scarcity principle says is that people are more attracted to rare opportunities.”
Appearing available can work against you, according to Jeremy Nicholson, a social psychologist. If you're excited about a work opportunity, it indicates that you are in low demand.
“Making something harder to get,” Dr. Nicholson said, “tends to increase at least the perception of value.” If you are meeting with hiring managers or potential clients, Dr. Nicholson recommends that responding in a way that respects their interest without being too eager. Dr. Nicholson advises, with responses like: “I do have a couple of other projects to deal with. However, I could do this for you if you want.”
“It's easy to become excited when an opportunity presents itself,” Ms. Ryan, founder of Human Workplace, said, “but remember that your power in any negotiation is related to your ability to walk away. Don't accept an offer before fully considering the opportunity.” Once you have interest, turn that into diligence. Ms. Ryan recommends reading up on the organization from third-party perspectives, and checking out job-search websites to see what employees and ex-employees say about it. Keep in mind: The goal is to approach any negotiation cautiously and with a clear head.
Appearing less available isn't about limiting our enthusiasm, but about trusting in our own self-worth so we can be proactive, experts say. This means mindfully transforming our excitement into strategy. “Emphasizing the uniqueness of your resources and your cooperative approach can help you more quickly advance your goals,” said Shirli Kopelman, a professor at the Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan.
1. Why is it necessary for us to appear scarce when we face opportunities?| A．Because we should strictly follow the principle about scarcity. |
| B．Because we should eagerly grasp opportunities coming our way. |
| C．Because we should value opportunities in the competitive society. |
| D．Because we should show rare opportunities to increase our advantages. |
| A．Accessible. | B．Strategic. | C．Enthusiastic. | D．Limited. |
| A．Being eager enough and ready. | B．Being cautious and clear headed. |
| C．Being confident and interested. | D．Being skillful and accomplished. |
| A．Not being too hard on our career. | B．Noting controlling our enthusiasm. |
| C．Applying excitement to negotiations. | D．Stressing scarcity and cooperation ways. |
