1 . Many people find when they are overly familiar with their routines, their excitement will be replaced with boredom quickly. A study shows that finding unusual ways to interact with familiar people, places and things can make everyday experiences feel exciting.
While you are working
Spending too much time in the same environment can keep us from achieving “flow”— being immersed in an activity with full energy and enjoyment.
“Boredom is an emotional state and happens when couples stop taking the opportunity to grow and deeply connect with each other,” says Venus Nicolino, host of Reality Stars. Look for new challenges to take on together. Try mixing up different sets of friends to do something creative, such as a group cooking lesson, or an old-fashioned tea party.
With other people we care about
Instead of “How was your day”, try asking “What are you looking forward to today?” Our curiosity can remind people that we’re interested in who they are, and that’s the key to maintaining intimacy (亲密关系).
During your commute
If you walk or use public transportation, greet a stranger or put away your phone and do some people watching. “Simply observing one’s surroundings may seem boring.
| A．With your significant other |
| B．With people you are familiar with |
| C．Changes don’t have to be big to make an impact |
| D．Interacting with other people often brings you much fun |
| E．In other words, sometimes you’ve just got to shake things up |
| F．Sometimes being curious about others can make us more pleasant to be around too |
| G．However, if done mindfully, it can become interesting and even more meaningful |
2 . The spotlight（聚光灯） effect refers to the tendency of individuals to overestimate the level of attention they believe they get. They think that they are noticed by everyone, everywhere, and at every point of time. This is surprisingly common, but not at all a fact.
Suppose it’s your friend’s birthday, and you have planned to give her a surprise. You are just about to burst into her house at midnight with a delicious cake and an exciting gift. But as your friend opens the door, she just asks you to get inside the house! How would you feel? Exactly that! You have been struck with the spotlight effect! That simply means that you think you did a great job, and people should value your genius ideas on “how to surprise your dear friend on her birthday”. Not really, as your friend was already expecting you to be there! So, your efforts didn’t get as much attention as you had probably expected.
It is often the case. For example, something like a social gaffe（失态）at a ceremony, a stupid error while making a speech, or having a stain on the clothes when facing a bunch of people. These events become unforgettable memories for us, but are often unnoticed by many. Of course, we still feel they are the biggest mistakes of our lives!
On the contrary, sometimes, it happens that actions like a well-prepared presentation, a brilliant argument in a discussion, or the best throw in a football match are extraordinary efforts for us, which just remain totally overlooked. And you think, “Did anyone just see what I did?” or “Was I the only one present there?” No point losing heart, because that was probably just your perception（认识）—— the spotlight effect.
1. Which of the following best explains the spotlight effect?| A．You are too sensitive to others’ remarks. |
| B．You always think you are being observed. |
| C．You try to keep off strong light from the sun. |
| D．You feel you are noticed more than you actually are. |
| A．They will become selfish in life. |
| B．They will doubt others’ good purposes. |
| C．They will forget unpleasant things easily. |
| D．They will have trouble letting go of their errors. |
| A．Disappointed. | B．Lucky. | C．Nervous. | D．Confident. |
| A．By listing experiments. | B．By analyzing statistics. |
| C．By providing examples. | D．By making comparisons. |
3 . How to Live in Peace with Yourself and Others
Life is all about being balanced and at peace.
Seek to love, not to control other people
If you want to have inner peace with others, you must understand that you are there to help and to express your love toward others.
Practice tolerance
Sometimes, it is better to just get away from a tense situation. When two or more people with different opinions try to gain control of the situation, conflicts can occur. Never let this happen by walking away. Take a break or go and get something to eat. Then you will discover new solutions and start to understand what other people are trying to say, because you are at peace with yourself.
Live in the moment
| A．Walk away |
| B．Have a break |
| C．It’s easy for people to get tolerant |
| D．If you can’t find inner peace within yourself and with others |
| E．Tolerance is all you need to create peace between you and others |
| F．When you try to gain too much control in your relationship with others |
| G．One of the most effective ways is to learn to live at the present moment |
4 . Bread making is a survival skill. With very few simple things—such as flour, salt and yeast—you can bake a fresh loaf of bread for your family, neighbors or coworkers. Baking is not just a useful survival skill.
Julie Ohana, a social worker, offers what she calls culinary therapy to her patients in New York City to help them overcome many kinds of issues.
Baking requires mindfulness.
When you’re in the kitchen, it really requires a certain level of mindfulness, of being present in the moment. And baking really requires step-by-step, following a recipe, being more precise. Kneading the dough (揉面团) or rolling something out, you really get the full benefit of being present in the moment and being able to relax and put aside all the other thoughts and just focus on the here-and-now.
Baking is a labor of love.
Baking is a process filled with love.
Often our food experiences are tied to family memories and stories. We remember meals our grandmothers made. We teach our children important recipes for family favorites.
Baking is a win-win.
Giving delicious, baked goods makes the giver feel as good as the receiver. To pass the baked goods on to someone else certainly can make the day for the person receiving it.
| A．Baking is rewarding. |
| B．Baking is emotional. |
| C．It not only makes you feel good, it produces something you can touch and eat! |
| D．But it’s also just as powerful for the person who’s giving them. |
| E．It can make you feel better at stressful times. |
| F．She explains that culinary therapy works on many levels. |
| G．And the receiver can benefit a lot from baking. |
5 . You’ve reached that special time — you are getting ready to leave your job and move on to the next step in your career. But the end of an employment relationship is not necessarily the end of the relationship — with either the leader or the company.
I learned this relatively early in my career. At first, I was concerned I might lose my relationship with my now former boss, as I truly liked him.
That isn’t to say it always goes like this. When I left another role, in spite of my desire to maintain communication, my former supervisor seemed indifferent and the relationship ended. Sometimes your boss was a nightmare and you want to end the relationship.
But for the good bosses and organizations, the ones that invested in your talent and celebrated your achievements, things are different.
| A．But it turned out I had no reason to fear. |
| B．So the way I left contributed to this breakup. |
| C．It’s completely understandable not to engage further. |
| D．It is normal to have mixed emotions when you leave a job. |
| E．Here are some ways to build a win-win with your former leader. |
| F．The concusion of the employment can start a new era of cooperation. |
| G．You can leave your company and keep the relationship at the same time. |
6 . When a Houston dad found out his eight-year-old son was being bullied (欺负), he didn’t get mad at the classmate who teased him. Instead, he talked with the so-called bully and realized that the boy was struggling, too.
Aubrey Fontenot’s son, Jordan, told him a boy named Tamarion was teasing him. Fontenot decided to sit down with his son and Tamarion to understand what was going on, and something unexpected happened.
Tamarion told Fontenot he was being teased at school, too. “I asked, ‘By who? You are big. You are huge. Who is teasing you?’” the father said. “He said, ‘Just all the other kids, man. They are making fun of me.” Fontenot learned that Tamarion was getting teased for his clothes and shoes—his clothes and shoes were old and dirty. Fontenot then spoke to the boy’s mother. “She kind of confirmed it,” Fontenot said. “And she said, ‘That’s the kind of situation.’”
He felt sympathetic to the young boy and wanted to help. So he asked Tamarion’s mom if he could take her son to do some shopping.
Fontenot posted videos of their trip to the mall on social media and they went viral. Tamarion eventually smiled, and then the two were laughing and singing together on their shopping trip. Just as if he were taking his own son to do some shopping, Fontenot got Tamarion new clothes and shoes, and shared words of wisdom with him.
Then, the dad united the two boys. He said it was awkward at first—just a day earlier, they didn’t get along well at school. But the two classmates started playing sports games together and soon became friends.
It was not just about the clothes and shoes. Tamarion gained a friend in Jordan, and a mentor in his dad. Fontenot said he was also bullied when he was a child, so he knew it was important to listen to Tamarion’s story. He chose kindness instead of anger and brought the two boys together. “I wouldn’t say that was the goal, but that was the reward,” Fontenot said.
1. What was Fontenot’s attitude toward his son’s being bullied?| A．Amazed and embarrassed. | B．Angry and impatient. | C．Calm and sensible. | D．Sad and discouraged. |
| A．Fontenot liked Tamarion instantly. | B．Tamarion bullied Jordan out of kindness. |
| C．Tamarion was also a victim of bullying. | D．Fontenot and Tamarion’s mother used to be friends. |
| A．He turned to the school for help. | B．He asked Tamarion’s mother to settle the problem. |
| C．He ordered his son never to play with Tamarion again. | D．He made the two boys united and join together. |
| A．Jordan’s being bullied arose from his clothes and shoes. |
| B．Jordan and Tamarion got along well in the beginning. |
| C．Tamarion’s mother paid little attention to Tamarion. |
| D．Fontenot communicated with Tamarion’s mother to know about him. |
7 . When romantic partners argue over things like finances, jealousy, or other interpersonal issues, they tend to employ their current feelings as fuel for a heated argument. But thinking about the future helps overcome relationship conflicts, according to a University of Waterloo study just published online in Social Psychological and Personality Science. Alex Huynh, a doctoral candidate in psychology is the lead author of the study, which he published with Igor Grossmann from the University of Waterloo, and Daniel Yang from Yale University.
Previous research has shown that third-perspective reasoning can be a positive strategy for reconciliation (调解) of interpersonal struggles. Huynh and his collaborators investigated whether similar benefit can be induced by simply thinking about the future. Study participants were instructed to reflect on a recent conflict with a romantic partner or a close friend. One group of participants were then asked to describe how they would feel about the conflict one year in the future, while another group was asked to describe how they feel in the present.
The team examined participants’ written responses through a text-analysis program for their use of pronouns — such as I, me, she, he. These choices of pronouns were used to capture participants’ focus on the feelings and behaviour of those involved in the conflict. Written responses were also examined for forgiveness and reinterpreting the conflict more positively, both of which implied the participants’ use of reasoning strategies.
The researchers found that envisioning future relationship affected both participants’ focus on their feelings, and their reasoning strategies. As a result, participants reported more positivity about their relationship altogether, especially when study participants extended their thinking about the relationship a year into the future.
“Our study demonstrates that adopting a future-oriented perspective in the context of a relationship conflict — reflecting on how one might feel a year from now — may be a valuable coping tool for one’s psychological happiness and relationship well-being,” said Huynh.
1. What do romantic partners do in face of most disagreements?| A．They lose faith in their future. | B．They focus on their present feelings. |
| C．They look forward to a fierce conflict. | D．They care more about financial problems. |
| A．Caused. | B．Explained. |
| C．Reduced. | D．Improved. |
| A．All the study participants described how they felt both in the present and in the future. |
| B．Study participants described their recent relationship with their romantic partners or friends. |
| C．A text-analysis program was employed to examine participants’ use of negative words. |
| D．The reasoning strategies in participants’ written responses were well worthy of note. |
| A．You have a year to solve your interpersonal problems! |
| B．Thinking about future is essential for relationship maintenance! |
| C．Your current feelings are the real cause of your heated arguments! |
| D．Beneficial reasoning is a positive strategy for reconciliation! |
8 . You might have ever noticed how some people can effortlessly talk to anyone they meet, no matter how different their backgrounds are. Or you may have seen that one person who always offends someone, no matter what the topic of conversation is. These two situations describe how we can differ in our abilities to interact, get along with, and relate to others around us. In the same way that we vary in traditional academic competencies, we can vary in how socially competent we are. After years of academic research and development, this social ability is now commonly referred to as “social intelligence.”
Social intelligence is the ability to understand other people, how they work, what motivates them, and how to work cooperatively with them. It is a relationship-based construct that centers on the way we understand others, interact with others, and present ourselves to others. As an example, you would not speak in the same way toward your 70-year-old mother as you would to your 16-year-old daughter. In our working lives, we come across different social groups including those from different countries, varying age groups and cultural identities. Being able to acknowledge and understand people’s different backgrounds is a key way to connect with them.
Our ability to navigate successfully through our lives relies heavily on our levels of social intelligence. It can affect the relationships we form with our partners and children, the friendship circles that we build, and our ability to progress in our careers and ambitions. Given the importance of social intelligence in multiple aspects of life, it is therefore in our best interest to better understand the concept of social intelligence and take the following ways to improve it.
1. What is the first paragraph intended to show?| A．Academic research varies from person to person. |
| B．Creative competencies are crucial to one’s research. |
| C．There are differences in people’s social intelligence. |
| D．People’s social abilities depend on their backgrounds. |
| A．To sincerely present a fact. | B．To further clarify a concept. |
| C．To clearly show an attitude. | D．To finally draw a conclusion. |
| A．Our relationship circles should be enlarged. |
| B．Better understanding a concept is important. |
| C．It is really difficult to achieve one’s ambition. |
| D．Social intelligence has great effects on our lives. |
| A．How to define social intelligence. | B．How to classify social intelligence. |
| C．How to improve social intelligence. | D．How to deal with social intelligence. |
9 . Deo had grown up barefoot in Burundi, but for a peasant boy he had done well. He was twenty-four. Until recently he had been a medical student, for three years at or near the top of his class. But he had spent the past six months on the run.
He had one friend who had seen more of the world than East Central Africa, a fellow medical student named Jean. And it was Jean who had decided that New York was where he should go. Deo was traveling on a commercial visa. Jean’s French father had written a letter identifying Deo as an employee on a mission to America. He was supposed to be going to New York to sell coffee. Deo had read up on coffee beans in case he was questioned. Jean’s father had also paid for the plane tickets. A fat book let of tickets.
He had heard of French soldiers behaving badly in Rwanda, and had even caught glimpses of them training militiamen(民兵) in the camps, but waking up and seeing a white person in the next seat wasn’t alarming. No one called him a cockroach (蟑螂). No one held a machete (大砍刀).
A voice was speaking to him. He turned and saw a policeman who seemed friendly. Deo spoke to him in French, but the man shook his head and smiled. He asked a question in what Deo guessed was English. Then a woman who had been sitting nearby got up and walked over French, at long last French, coming out of her mouth. Perhaps she could help, the woman said in French. Deo thought: “God. I’m still in your hands.” She arranged to sit next to him on the flight to New York and asked him lots of questions. Deo wanted to pay her back for helping him. So he tried to answer her questions. They talked most of the way to New York. After such long solitude (独处), it felt wonderful to talk.
When he reached Immigration the agent stared at Deo’s documents, then started asking questions in what had to be English. There was nothing to do except smile. The agent went off and came back with another man. He introduced himself to Deo in French. His name was Muhammad. He said he came from Senegal. Muhammad asked Deo the agents’ questions and also some questions of his own. For the agents, he asked Deo, “Where are you coming from?” When Deo said he had come from Burundi, Muhammad made a pained face and said to him in French, “How did you get out?”
There was no time even to attempt an answer. The agents were asking another question: Deo’s visa said he was here on business. What business?
Selling coffee beans, Deo told them through Muhammad. Just keep smiling, Deo told himself.
How much money did he have?
Two hundred dollars, Deo said with pride. The cash had been a gift from Jean. Exchanged for Burundian francs, it could have bought a lot of cows. But neither Muhammad nor the agents looked impressed.
Where was he staying?
Jean had told him he’d be asked this. A hotel, he said.
The agents laughed. A week in a hotel on two hundred dollars?
In 1994, airport security wasn’t what it soon would be. Muhammad said something in English to the agents. His words must have been the right ones, because after a few more questions, the agents shrugged at each other and let him through, into America.
He had no idea what he’d do next. After six months on the run, he was in the habit of not looking ahead. And what was there to fear? What could the man in the booth up ahead do to him? Whatever it might be, he’d already seen worse. God had taken care of him so far. And still was taking care of him, it seemed. As this serious-looking stranger, Muhammad, walked him out of Customs, he said that Deo could stay with him in New York City. But Deo would have to wait here for three hours. Muhammad worked at the airport as a baggage handler. He had to finish his shift. Could Deo wait three hours?
Only three hours? said Deo. Of course!
1. Which of the following is the reason why Deo left his hometown?| A．Jean persuaded him to go to New York. |
| B．Jean’s father paid for the plane tickets for him. |
| C．He was an employee on a business mission to America. |
| D．He wanted to flee his home town to seek shelter in New York. |
| A．God is toying with him. | B．God is taking him under his wing. |
| C．He is at the mercy of God. | D．He can’t break away from God. |
| A．Selling coffee beans in New York. |
| B．Turning to Jean’s father for help. |
| C．Being reduced to a beggar in the street. |
| D．Making a living in New York with Muhammad’s help. |
10 . Four Qualities That Make You Attractive to Others
There is something many people gets wrong about attraction.
Have control over your emotions(情绪). It’s not easy to always have control over your emotions. And people who do are extremely attractive. Have control over your emotions so that your emotions don’t control you. Allow yourself to think about what you’re going to say.
Laugh at yourself. It’s not what happens to us that makes us feel stressed.
Give plenty of space. The secret to long-lasting relationships is space, because time apart helps each partner recharge and bring positive energy into the relationship.
| A．Be warm. |
| B．Controlling people are unattractive. |
| C．Don’t be too quick to show warmth. |
| D．It’s how we react to it that affects us. |
| E．They should develop a sense of humor. |
| F．Take your time to cool down and reorganize your thoughts. |
| G．They think they have to look beautiful to be accepted by others. |
