1 . I was hungry because after a full day of exploring the German town, I ate only a pizza. I’m comfortable travelling through a country where I don’t speak the language, but I would almost rather go hungry than sit in a restaurant eating alone.

After wandering around the town for hours, I finally chose an Italian restaurant that seemed friendly enough. I know I like traditional German food, but a plate of spaghetti for only six euros (欧元) was not to miss. So I nervously entered. As I stood there, I noticed all the happy families and friends eating together. The hostess found a small table for me next to the front entrance.

“Great,” I thought, “now people can look at this friendless traveller as they enter.” Then I started to wonder how many of the customers might mistake me for the hostess and how much this would interrupt my meal. Then a woman, whose name is now lost to memory, invited me to have dinner with her and her family. I couldn’t believe it! This was the German friendliness I had read about.

I walked to their table. I can be quite shy when talking to new people. I also started to wonder how this would work. The meal began awkwardly. The woman’s two children mostly stared at me.

Fortunately, the parents spoke enough English and I knew a little German. I came into this restaurant afraid of eating alone and I ended up happily.

2 . Chocolate is good for your heart, skin and brain. Usually, people think that chocolate is bad for their health. They describe chocolate as “something to die for” or say “death by chocolate”. Now they should bite their tongues! Evidence(证据)is showing that some kinds of chocolate are actually good for you in the following ways: 

    1    

Scientists at Harvard University recently examined 136 studies on cocoa—the main ingredient(成分)in chocolate and found that it does seem to strengthen the heart.

Better blood pressure

Jeffrey Blumberg from Tufts University recently found that people with high blood pressure who ate 3.5 ounces(盎司) of dark chocolate per day for two weeks saw their blood pressure drop quickly.

Muscle magic

.    2    .In a small study at Indiana University, people who drank chocolate milk between workouts did better on a tiredness test than those who had some sports drinks. 

    3    

German researchers found that chocolate helped protect and increase blood flow to the skin, improving its appearance.

The Internet brings us many advantages.

    1     有了互联网，人们就可以收发电子邮件了。On the Internet, people can skim over news.Using the Telnet, the user anywhere on the Internet can log into any other machine on which he has an account. It is possible to use the FTP programme to copy files from one machine on the Internet to another.

    2     But the Internet also brings us troubles.

Internet use seems to cause a fall in psychological(心理的) health, according to research at Carnegie Mellon University.    3     Even people who spent just a few hours a week on the Internet experienced more depression and loneliness than those who logged on less often, the two-year study showed. And it wasn’t that people who were already feeling bad spent more time on the Internet, but that using the Net actually seemed to cause the bad feelings.

    4     Researchers are puzzled over the results, which were completely opposite to what they had expected. They expected that the Net would prove socially healthier than television, since the Net allows users to choose their information and to communicate with others.

The fact that Internet use reduces time used for family and friends may be the reason for the drop in health, researchers said. Faceless, bodiless “virtual(虚拟的)” communication may be less psychologically satisfying than actual conversations, and the relationships formed through it may not be so deep.    5     另一种可能性是，通过网络接触到更广泛的世界会让用户对自己的生活不太满意。

6 . Having an older brother comes with plenty of benefits. Big brothers tend to look after their younger brothers and sisters, and despite the occasional unpleasant moments here and there, many siblings(兄弟姐妹) enjoy life-long close relationships. However, a new study finds an interesting disadvantage. Children with older brothers take longer when it comes to developing language skills.

Researchers studied more than 1,000 children from birth to the age of five-and-a-half years old. Each child’s language skills were tested at ages 2, 3,and 5.5,using tests specially designed to measure lots of aspects of language development such as vocabulary, syntax(句法), and verbal(文字的)reasoning. What the research team discovered was significant. Children with an older brother had, on average, a two-month delay in their language development compared to studied children with an older sister.

As far as explaining this phenomenon(现象), researchers have proposed two assumptions. The first is that older sisters tend to talk more often than older brothers, which would compensate(补偿)for parents potentially being less present than they were for their first child. The second assumption is that older sisters usually compete with their siblings less than older brothers for their parents attention. The study’s authors say they can’t say for certain why children with older brothers have a harder time developing language skills. In the future they would like to study if culture or location impacts the prevalence(盛行)of these results.

The study is published in Psychological Science.