1 . Trying to make a big decision while you’re also preparing for a scary presentation? You might want to ______ doing that. Most people prefer to have sufficient time to analyze a situation and consider the ______. Feeling stressed changes how people ______ risk and reward. A new article published in Current Directions in Psychological Science reviews how, under stress, people pay more attention to the ______ of a possible outcome. Pressure can result in ______ attention and the use of unconscious reasoning. It can force a decision-maker to sort the relevant factors from the irrelevant, and can ______ clear thinking with specific priorities. 

It’s a bit ______ that stress makes people focus on the way things could go right, says Mara Mather of the University of Southern California. “This is sort of not what people would think,” Mather says, “Stress is usually associated with disagreeable experiences, so you’d think that maybe I’m going to be more focused on the ______ outcomes.” But researchers have found that when people are under stress — by being told to hold their hand in ice water for a few minutes, for example, or give a speech — they start paying more attention to positive information and ______ negative information. “Stress seems to worsen their learning from negative feedback,” Mather says. This means when people under stress are making a difficult decision, they may pay more attention to the upsides of the alternatives they’re considering and less to the downsides. So someone who’s deciding whether to take a new job and is feeling stressed by the ______ might weigh the increase in salary more heavily than the worse commute (通勤)。

The increased focus on the positive also helps explain why stress plays a role in ______, and people under stress have a harder time controlling their urges. “The compulsion to get the reward comes stronger and they’re less able to ______ it,” Mather says. So a person who’s under stress might think only about the good feelings they’ll get from negative things like a drug, while the ______ shrink to the distance.

Stress also ______ the differences in how men and women think about risk. When men are under stress, they become even more ______ to take risks; when women are stressed, they get more conservative. Mather links this to another research that finds, at difficult times, men tend to face the situation, while women are likely to be more conservative.

1.

A．try

B．delay

C．deny

D．forbid

2.

A．requirements

B．reasons

C．chances

D．alternatives

3.

A．weigh

B．overlook

C．confuse

D．classify

4.

A．imperfection

B．risk

C．advantage

D．uncertainty

5.

A．conflicted

B．focused

C．unexpected

D．separated

6.

A．break off

B．hold up

C．account for

D．bring out

7.

A．surprising

B．fortunate

C．reasonable

D．pleasant

8.

A．conscious

B．immediate

C．negative

D．favorable

9.

A．neglecting

B．enhancing

C．analyzing

D．evaluating

10.

A．position

B．decision

C．qualification

D．schedule

11.

A．judgement

B．progress

C．relationship

D．addiction

12.

A．value

B．adopt

C．resist

D．maintain

13.

A．downsides

B．desires

C．defeats

D．benefits

14.

A．declines

B．increases

C．eliminates

D．worsens

15.

A．reliable

B．reluctant

C．qualified

D．willing

2 . Directions: Fill in each blank with a proper word chosen from the box. Each word can be used only once. Note that there is one word more than you need.

A. grade       B. commercialized       C. demand       D. unproductive       E. sampled F. protected       G. process       H. contributor       I. transport       J. cultivation K. consumption

Eco-friendly, lab-grown coffee is on the way

Heiko Rischer isn’t quite sure how to describe the taste of lab-grown coffee. This summer he     1     one of the first batches (批) in the world produced from cell cultures (细胞培养) rather than coffee beans.

“To describe it is difficult but, for me, it was in between a coffee and a black tea,” said Rischer, head of plant biotechnology at the VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland, which developed the coffee. “It depends really on the roasting     2    , and this was a bit of a lighter roast, so it had a little bit more of a tea-like feeling.”

People have to wait before they can taste the coffee, as this cellular agriculture innovation is not yet approved for public     3    . Rischer predicts that VTT’s lab-grown coffee could get approval from the governments in Europe and the US in about four years’ time, paving the way for a     4     product that could have a much lower climate impact than conventional coffee.

The coffee industry is both a     5     to the climate crisis and very vulnerable (脆弱的) to its effects. Rising     6     for coffee has been linked to deforestation (砍伐森林) in developing nations, damaging biodiversity and releasing carbon emissions. At the same time, coffee producers are struggling with the impacts of more extreme weather, from frosts to droughts. It’s estimated that half of the land used to grow coffee could be     7     by 2050 due to the climate crisis.

In response to the industry’s challenges, companies and scientists are trying to develop and commercialize coffee made without coffee beans.

VTT’s coffee is grown by floating cell cultures in bioreactors (生物反应堆) filled with a nutrient. The     8     requires no pesticides and has a much lower water footprint, said Rischer, and because the coffee can be produced in local markets, it cuts     9     emissions. The company is working on a life cycle analysis of the process. “Once we have those figures, we will be able to show that the environmental impact will be much lower than what we have with traditional     10    ,” Rischer said.

3 . 听下面一段较长对话，回答以下小题。
1.

A．He found the best budget hotel ever.	B．He ended up at an unexpected destination.
C．He lost his way to the booked hotel.	D．It took him long to find the booked hotel.

2.

A．Background information isn’t necessary.

B．Information should be more vividly written.

C．Travelers don’t read the information carefully.

D．Information should be revised more often.

3.

A．Because it allows him to save time and expense.

B．Because he can get free advice from the local people.

C．Because it helps him discover some unusual things to do.

D．Because he can meet more travelers and share experiences.

4.

A．The limitation of guidebooks.	B．The importance of guidebook usage.
C．How to choose a right guidebook.	D．The real value of traveling.

4 . Directions: After reading the passage below, fill in the blanks to make the passage coherent and grammatically correct. For the blanks with a given word, fill in each blank with the proper form of the given word; for the other blanks, use one word that best fits each blank.

The UK government recently has made a plan to reduce waste that shifts the responsibility for disposal (处置) from the state to the companies that make it.

The legislation (法律条文) requires waste producers to pay into the system     1     or through their suppliers. That is     2     the government called a Polluter Pays Principle. Simply     3     (state), the Polluter Pays Principle implies that the costs associated with pollution are to be paid by polluters, not by government or society. Businesses will have to change their waste processing before the tax comes into effect. This is similar to the anti-waste legislation passed in France in February 2020     4     forbids the producers to destruct the unsold clothing, cosmetics, and electrical products. Companies will have to reuse or recycle the items.

The demand for legislation like the tough attitude the UK     5     (take) has been increasing according to Positive News. And it is not just environmental groups calling for the changes. This is a consumer driven movement and people are willing to pay more for sustainable brands. In the past year alone, sales of consumer goods from brands with a demonstrated commitment to sustainability have grown more than 4% globally,     6    those without grew less than 1%.

What is absolutely certain is that local governments will save a lot of money as the responsibility shifts to the polluters. That could be     7     (good) invested in things like social care or parks or libraries. Other countries have already made great progress in reducing waste. So far, Sweden’s anti-waste program is so efficient that the whole country is running out of trash. The     8     (recycle) rate is almost 99 percent and they are rapidly approaching zero waste.

In many countries, kitchen and gardening waste makes up of the biggest part of waste. This type of waste,     9     collected separately, can be turned into an energy source or fertilizer.

    10     the differences in policies and regulations, one thing is clear: governments are sharing a common concept that the prevention of environmental damage should be based on concrete principles and solid actions.

5 . 听下面一段独白，回答以下小题。
1.

A．Convenience.	B．Flexibility.
C．Light weight.	D．Security.

2.

A．A picture of the thief.	B．A text message.
C．The track of the thief.	D．A voice message.

3.

A．Distance alarm.	B．GPS tracking.
C．Digital payment.	D．Power supply.

6 . 听下面一段独白，回答以下小题。
1.

A．Peter Evans.

B．Jim Carson.

C．Gio Santos.

D．Kiren Nadar.

2.

A．Frightened.

B．Excited.

C．Desperate.

D．Quiet.

3.

A．He won the grand prize of the year.	B．He takes pictures of endangered animals.
C．He shots images of common creatures.	D．He loves to observe animal behaviors.

7 . The MacArthur Foundation late last month announced its latest crop of “genius grants”, and once again you thought maybe, just maybe, this was your year.

And why not? These days, we’re all geniuses. We might be “marketing geniuses” or “cooking geniuses” or “TV geniuses”. We have so weakened “genius” that it’s fast joining the company of “natural” and “mindful” (留心), words left inactive through overuse and misuse.

Admittedly, the word is tough to nail down. Sometimes we assume genius equivalent to raw intelligence. But many of humanity’s greatest breakthroughs were achieved by those with only modest IQs.

Sometimes we think of the genius as someone extremely knowledgeable, but that definition also falls short. During Albert Einstein’s time, other scientists knew more physics than Einstein did, but history doesn’t remember them. That’s because they didn’t make use of that knowledge the way Einstein did. They weren’t able to, as he put it, “regard old questions from a new angle”.

The genius is not a know-it-all but a see-it-all, someone who, working with the material available to all of us, is able to make surprising and useful connections. True genius involves not merely an extra advance, but a conceptual leap. As philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer put it: Talent hits the target no one else can hit; genius hits the target no one else can see.

We’ve lost sight of this truth, and too often grant the title of genius on talented people hitting visible targets. A good example is the much-boasted announcement earlier this year that scientists had, for the first time, recorded the sound of two black holes bumping, a billion light-years away. It was a remarkable discovery, no doubt, but it did not represent a dramatic shift in how we understand the universe. It merely confirmed Einstein’s general theory of relativity.

As Plato observed, “What is honored in a country is cultivated there.” What do we honor? Digital technology, and the convenience it represents, so naturally we get a Steve Jobs or a Mark Zuckerberg as our “geniuses”, which, in point of fact, they aren’t.

The iPhone and Facebook are wonderful inventions. In many ways, they make our lives a bit easier, a bit more convenient. If anything, though, a true genius makes our lives more difficult, more unsettled. William Shakespeare’s words provide more anxiety than relief, and the world felt a bit more secure before Charles Darwin came along. Zuckerberg and Jobs may have changed our world, but they haven’t yet changed our worldview.

We need to recover genius, and a good place to start is by putting the brakes on Genius Flooding.

1. The key factor that sets geniuses and talents apart is that ________.

A．geniuses have a larger range of knowledge	B．geniuses have access to far more resources
C．geniuses can see visible targets	D．geniuses approach things differently

2. The reasons why people naturally regard Steve Jobs & Mark Zuckerberg as geniuses include all the following EXCEPT that ________.

A．their achievements bring people convenience

B．they have extraordinary intelligence

C．they are native to the country where digital technology is highly valued

D．they satisfy people’s needs in the age of high technology

3. What can we infer from the passage?

A．We should stop the improper use of “natural” and “mindful”.

B．The first recording of two black holes bumping each other is a genius breakthrough.

C．Charles Darwin is hardly a genius.

D．More geniuses remain to be found in our life.

4. What is the best title for the passage?

A．Get a new word, genius	B．Learn from a new model, genius
C．Join in a new group, genius	D．Make a new friend, genius

8 . Too much work, too little money and not enough opportunity for promotion, .or growth are stressing us out on the job, according to a new survey from the American Psychological Association.

We all know that stress reduces all of the things that help productivity— mental clarity (清晰), short-term memory, decision-making and moods. One-third of employees experience lasting stress related to work, the survey found. Fifty-four percent of the 1,501 employed adults surveyed say they feel they are paid too little for their contributions, and 61% said their jobs don’t offer adequate opportunities to advance. Only half of the adults surveyed said they feel valued at work.

Besides, women’s stress is rising as families rely more on women’s earnings. An employed wife’s contribution to family earnings has reached, on average, 47% since 2009, so women feel especially stuck and tense. Thirty-two percent of women said their employers don’t provide sufficient opportunities for internal advancement, compared with 30% of men. Women are more likely to feel tense during a typical workday, reporting more often that their employer doesn’t appreciate what they do.

Physically, the body responds to stress by secreting hormones into the bloodstream that stimulate accelerated (加速的) heart rate and breathing and tensing of muscles. People who experience stress as a positive often have increased blood flow to the brain, muscles and limbs, similar to the effects of aerobic exercise. Those who feel frightened or threatened, however, often have an unstable heart rate and constricting wood vessels (血管). Their blood pressure rises and hands and feet may grow cold. They may become agitated, speak more loudly or experience errors in judgment.

Emotional responses to stress often divide along gender lines, with men more likely to have a “fight or flight” reaction while women are more likely to have a tend and befriend” response, seeking comfort in relationships and care of loved ones, according to the research.

Women tend to “internalize”, which contributes to their stress. Many women hesitate to speak up for themselves or challenge behavior they see as unfair. Kay Keaney, interior designer, 40, rose fast at a California medical group, taking on responsibility for interior and facility planning. With her 60-hour workweeks, plus early-morning and late-night meetings and a 1.5-hour commute each way, she seldom had time with her two small children. Whether stuck in traffic on her way to a 6 p.m. pickup at day care, or tom between her children and urgent work emails, “I just wanted to crawl out of my skin,” she says. “I was overwhelmed.” Yet she hesitated to complain. “There was too much work to be done, and playing the Mommy card was bad form.” But the experts suggest that women should give themselves a voice.

1. The underlined word “agitated” in Paragraph 4 is closest in meaning to ________.

A．fearful

B．optimistic

C．anxious

D．ambitious

2. Which of the following statements is TRUE according to the passage?

A．Everyone has a painful sense of being under-appreciated or under-paid.

B．An increasing number of people feel satisfied with work-life balance.

C．An improving job market is making some people’s work lives easier.

D．Most women have higher levels of work stress than the opposite sex.

3. We can learn from the example of Kay Keaney that ________.

A．relieving oneself from stress involves being frank as well as brave

B．experiencing symptoms of lasting stress causes communication barriers

C．seeking comfort from friends or relatives has little to do with office stress

D．being challenged or devalued by others leads to numerous health problems

4. What is most probably to be discussed in the following paragraphs?

A．Other aspects in life affected by stress in work.

B．Tips to help women handle their hard times properly.

C．Examples to show the different gender responses to stress.

D．Reasons why people are likely to feel tense when working.

9 . Beijing is hardly alone in its air pollution problems. The world Health Organization has said that roughly half of the world’s urban population is exposed to pollution at least 2.5 times higher than it recommends.

While it may take years to fix this global problem, innovative minds in the Asia region have come up with creative solutions for living with air pollution.

DIY Purifier

Thomas Talhelm started worrying about the air inside his Beijing home during “airpocalypse” in 2013 when Beijing’s air quality index skyrocketed to a terrifying 755.

The scholar couldn’t afford the luxury of an expensive air purifier. “Fillers are actually very simple— a high efficient filter is all you need to get over 96% of the PM2.5,” he said.

With three of his friends, Talhelm created Smart Air, an air purifier consisting of a basic household fan with a high efficient filter attached to it.

It works as efficiently as the big brands selling for thousands of dollars, removing more than 90 percent of PM 2.5 in your room, according to Talhelm’s research.

Invisible Mask

Infipure’s “nose mask” claims to cut 99% of PM2.5 without the trouble of a surgical face mask.

The filters, made from special materials, are inserted into your nose and aim to be undetectable.

“People care about their health, but don’t want all the downsides that come with a traditional face mask.” Infipure co-founder Francis Law explained.

Plant Backpack

Taiwanese artist Chui Chih has designed a survival device for an apocalyptic world.

Named Voyage on the Planet, a potted plant is housed inside a clear backpack hooked up to two tubes to bring fresh to a face mask. It’s a bold, abstract idea from an oxygen tank.

Smog Vacuum

Daan Roosegaarde has been working on a smog vacuum that will suck pollutants from the sky to the ground like a vacuum, making way for clean air.

A byproduct of this smog vacuum, namely The Smog Free Tower, is the “smog ring”—a piece of jewelry made from smog particulates.

“The pollution we suck up, the small particulates, we don’t throw them away. We put them under pressure for a couple of weeks and they crystallize, creating something like a diamond,” Roosegaardc explains.

1. Thomas Talhelm invented Smart Air for all the following reasons except ________.

A．the high price of the big brands	B．the help from three of his friends
C．the poor quality of the indoor air	D．the simple principle behind the device

2. If someone wants to travel around in those polluted days, which product will he most probably choose for the sake of convenience?

A．Smart Air.	B．Infipure’s nose mask.
C．Voyage on the Planet.	D．The Smog Free Tower.

3. In which solution the inventor also makes use of the dust collected from the polluted air?

A．DIY Purifier.

B．Invisible Mask.

C．Plant Backpack.

D．Smog Vacuum.

10 . Do you find it hard to go a day without updating your micro blog? Do you feel out of the loop if you are not chatting on QQ?

For many teenagers around the world, social media has become a big part of their lives. They constantly tell us that communication has never been easier and that you can connect to friends with the click of a button. But is this a good thing?

A recent survey done by Common Sense Media, a non-profit organization in the US, has found that as many as 79 percent of 13- to 17-year-old teenagers feel the need to disconnect from social media sometimes. Surprisingly 36 percent said they wish they could go back to a time before social media existed. Why do they feel this way?

Yahoo reported that scientists have found that social networking sites are a way in which youngsters isolate (孤立) themselves; they tend to use the Internet to avoid human contact and escape from real problems. And the study by Common Sense Media has confirmed (确认) this. According to the organization, many teenagers believe that using social media takes away the time they spend face-to-face with friends. One participant in the study said: “Technology and social networking have absorbed (影响) some of my close friendships, and they’ve dwindled. I miss the times where we could just go hang out and laugh.”

The organization also reports that more than a third of US teenagers want to unplug (关机) in order to avoid overexposure to negative information. The Washington Post reports that 90 percent of teenagers in the country say they have witnessed their peers being bullied (欺负) on social networking sites. According to the newspaper, some teenagers present their “ alter ego (个性的另一面)” on social media, engaging in (参与) conversations with more bravado (逞强) and taking more risks than they do in person.

And some teenagers want to disconnect to enjoy being alone. One teenager said they disliked social media because sometimes being alone is important— It’s nice to just sit back and relax with no possible way to communicate with anyone in any way.”

1. What did the recent survey done by Common Sense Media find out about the US teenagers?

A．Over 30 percent of the teens would rather have no social media around them.

B．90 percent of the teens said their peers were once bullied on social networking sites.

C．More than a third of the teens believe their use of social media affects how they feel about themselves.

D．About three-fourths of the teens wished they could disconnect themselves from the Internet completely.

2. According to the article, many teenagers want to unplug ________.
a. to protect their privacy
b. to have more alone time
c. to spend more time with their friends
d. to escape from their real problems
e. to reduce their exposure to negative information

A．a, b, c

B．a, c, d

C．b, c, e

D．b, d，e

3. The underlined word “dwindled” in Paragraph 4 is closest in meaning to have ________.

A．been in danger

B．become weaker

C．been improved

D．remained firm

4. What can we infer from the fifth paragraph?

A．Some teenagers play a negative role in their real daily life.

B．Some teenagers admitted having bullied others on social networking sites.

C．Some teenagers tend to present a different personality on social networking sites.

D．Some teenagers agree that the advantages of social media outweigh their disadvantages.