1 . First impressions can set a lasting tone, but there is often something doubtful. Psychologists have documented a phenomenon known as the liking gap, by which two people meeting for the first time routinely underestimate how much their counterparts (对应方) like them. A new study finds that the liking gap occurs in group settings too and hinders how well groups function.

In one experiment, the researchers divided 159 participants into groups of three and asked them to have a conversation. They then surveyed the participants individually about how much they liked each of their partners, how much they thought each partner liked them, and how much they thought their partners liked each other. On average, people liked their partners more than they believed their partners liked them, and thought themselves to be the least liked in the group.

In a subsequent experiment, the researchers asked similar questions of engineering students who had worked together in design competitions for varying lengths of time. Here, too, people tended to underestimate the degree to which they were liked, regardless of how long they had known their teammates — and their dim views of their own likability reduced their willingness to ask others for help, give honest feedback, and work together in the future.

A final experiment involving a broad sample of workers showed that the misperceptions (误解) were strongest among teammates and that they decreased team effectiveness and job satisfaction. It also found a possible explanation for the liking gap: People tend to focus on positive thoughts when reflecting on how much they like someone else (“I’m happy that she got a promotion”) but fall victim to more negative ones when considering how others view them (“I got a promotion, so she might be green with envy”).

Managers should think carefully not just about how teammates regard one another but about how team members think they themselves are regarded, the researchers say; correcting misperceptions could boost team satisfaction and performance. “If only people knew how positively their teammates actually felt about them, they might communicate better, feel more included on their teams, and be happier overall with their jobs,” they write.

3 . Culdesac, which describes itself as “the first car-free neighborhood built from scratch in the US”, admitted its first 36 residents in Tempe, Arizona, US, earlier this year. In a country as car-dependent as the US, Culdesac is nothing short of visionary. The $170 million (about 1.24 billion yuan) neighborhood, with its white buildings and narrow walkways, is expected to hold around 1,000 people when the full 760 units are completed by 2025, according to The Guardian. Similar projects in Charlotte, North Carolina, and Houston, Texas, are also underway, said Bloomberg.

Although some densely populated coastal US cities like Boston and New York City are walkable and have adequate public transportation options like bus and light rail, the vast majority of Americans are entirely dependent on cars to get around. In the 2018 US Census, it was found that roughly 85 percent of Americans relied on a car to get to work.

This reliance on cars doesn’t come cheap, unfortunately. In a 2023 study, the American Automobile Association said that it costs an average of about 89,000 yuan per year to own and maintain a car in the US.

So, what is stopping Americans from deserting cars and embracing relatively cheaper alternatives like e-bikes? In a word, unsafe roads that prioritize cars over people. According to a 2018 report by the World Health Organization, the US traffic death rate is 12.4 deaths per 100,000. At the same time, pedestrians and cyclists in the US are often blamed for being hit by drivers rather than the other way around.

Still, there’s hope. By embracing a new car-free way of living, US projects like Culdesac can provide an alternative way of living that’s both healthier and more affordable and, in turn, influence others to live a better way as well. As Vanessa Fox, a 32-year-old resident of Culdesac, said, “For some, cars equal freedom, but for me, it’s a restriction. Freedom is being able to just simply walk out and access places.”

5 . In general, the society is becoming one of giant enterprises directed by a bureaucratic (官僚主义的) management in which man becomes a small, well-oiled cog in the machinery. The oiling is done with higher wages, well-equipped factories and piped music, and by psychologists and “human-relations” experts; yet all this oiling does not change the fact that man has become powerless, that he does not wholeheartedly participate in his work and he is bored with it. In fact, the blue-collar and the white-collar workers have become economic puppets who dance to the tune of automated machines and bureaucratic management.

The worker and employee are anxious, seemingly because they might find themselves out of a job or they would say that they are unable to acquire any real satisfaction or interest in life. In fact, they feel desperate as they live and die without ever having confronted the fundamental realities of human existence as emotionally and intellectually independent and productive human beings.

Those higher up on the social ladder are no less anxious. Their lives are no less empty than those of their subordinates. They are even more insecure in some respects. They are in a highly competitive race. To be promoted or to fall behind is not a matter of salary but even more a matter of self-respect. When they apply for their first job, they are tested for intelligence as well as for the right mixture of submissiveness and independence. From the moment on they are tested again and again by the psychologists, for whom testing is a big business, and by their superiors, who judge their behavior, sociability, capacity to get along, etc. This constant need to prove that one is as good as or better than one’s fellow-competitor creates constant anxiety and stress, the very causes of unhappiness and illness.

Am I suggesting a return to the pre-industrial mode of production or to nineteenth-century “free enterprise” capitalism? Certainly not. Problems are never solved by returning to a stage which one has already outgrown. I suggest transforming the social system from a bureaucratically managed industrialism in which maximal production and consumption are ends in themselves into a humanist industrialism in which man and full development of his potentialities — those of all love and of reason — are the aims of social arrangements. Production and consumption should serve as means to this end, and should be prevented from ruling man.

In the coming era of budget cuts to education, distance learning could become the norm.

The temptation for those in charge of education budgets to trade teachers     1     technology could be so strong that they ignore the disadvantages of distance learning. School facilities are expensive     2    (build). Online classes do not require buildings and each class can host hundreds of people at the same time,     3    (result) in greater savings. But moving away from a traditional classroom     4     a living, breathing human being teaches and interacts with students daily is a disaster.     5    (physical) attending school has hidden benefits: getting up     6    (early), interacting more with peers, and building better relationships with teachers. Moreover, schools should be more than simple institutions of traditional learning. They are places where students     7    (offer) counseling(咨询) and other support.

Those policy-makers are often fascinated by the latest technology in education and its potential to transform education overnight.     8    , online education does not allow a teacher to keep a struggling student after class and offer help. Educational videos are unable to make eye contact or assess a student’s level of     9    (engage). Given these expectations, schools should not become permanently “remote”. Technology, however     10    (advance), should simply be a tool of a good teacher.

Since July 2019, China’s online food-delivery platform Eleme     1     (carry) out a new service of picking up garbage from its users in Shanghai.

The service comes after     2     recently-released regulation on waste management in Shanghai. Individuals that throw away their garbage     3     being sorted out can be fined up to 200 yuan, while companies and     4     (organize) can face fines up to 50,000 yuan.

The trash takeaway service requires residents to sort     5     (they) own garbage before it is picked up by workers from Eleme,     6     will definitely dispose of the waste in the correct garbage bins.

It’s obvious that this service is convenient to the old,     7     (especial) to the disabled customers.     8    , many netizens on Sina Weibo don’t think Eleme is providing a wonderful service,     9    (complain) it just wants to make money. They think 12 yuan for an order is too much. Besides, many more people doubt     10     these collectors will wash their hands after dealing with the trash.