1 . It is reported that the sense of smell plays a dominant role in the social interactions of all land animals except humans. Then the question arises: Is this because humans don’t use their noses in social settings the way all other land animals do? Or is this behavior covert (隐蔽的), rather than overt, in humans?
In fact, this is exactly what Inbal Ravreby, a graduate student in Prof. Noam Sobel’s laboratory in Weizmann’s Brain Sciences Department, tried to answer. And as several lines of evidence suggest that humans are constantly, although mostly subconsciously, sniffing themselves and others, Ravreby supposed that the latter is the case.
To test her hypothesis, Ravreby conducted the study with pairs of click friends: same-sex nonromantic friends whose friendships had originally formed very rapidly. Because such friendships emerge prior to an in-depth acquaintance, they may be particularly influenced by physiological characteristics such as body smell. She then collected body smell samples from these click friends and conducted two sets of experiments to compare the samples with those collected from random pairs of individuals. In one set of experiments, she performed the comparison with a device known as an electronic nose, or eNose, which assessed the chemical signatures of the smells. In the other, she asked volunteers to smell the two groups of body smell samples in order to assess similarities measured by human perception. In both types of experiments, click friends were found to smell significantly more like each other than the individuals in the random pairs.
Next, to rule out the possibility that body smell similarity was a consequence of click friendships, rather than a contributing cause, Ravreby performed an additional set of experiments, in which she used the eNose to “smell” a number of volunteers who were complete strangers to one another, and then asked them to engage in nonverbal (非言语的) social interactions in pairs. After each such structured interaction, the participants rated the other individual in terms of how much they liked that person. Subsequent analysis revealed that the individuals who had more positive interactions indeed smelled more like each other, as determined by the eNose.
“These results imply that, as the saying goes, there is chemistry in social chemistry,” Ravreby concludes. However, Sobel offers words of caution, “This is not to say that we act like dogs or goats — humans likely rely on other, far more dominant signals in their social decision-making. Nevertheless, our study’s results do suggest that our nose plays a bigger role than previously thought in our choice of friends.”
1. What did Inbal Ravreby want to figure out?| A．Whether humans have a sharp sense of smell. |
| B．Whether humans’ noses can detect all types of smells. |
| C．Whether it is necessary for humans to sniff other people. |
| D．Whether the sense of smell plays a role in humans’ interaction. |
| A．The way to make comparisons. | B．The participation of random pairs. |
| C．The way volunteers used the eNose. | D．The number of pairs of click friends. |
| A．To determine the reliability of the finding. |
| B．To avoid interactions between click friends. |
| C．To make the experiments much more interesting. |
| D．To test the accuracy of the eNose in smell analysis. |
| A．Disapproving. | B．Doubtful. |
| C．Positive. | D．Indifferent. |
2 . “The comic waist challenge”, in which netizens try to imitate a comic character's pose with their legs on a chair and the upper body dropping to the ground, almost bending the waist in half, has become the latest craze to hit China's social media.
The topic has obtained hundreds of millions views on Weibo with many net users posting photos of the challenging pose to show how sexy and flexible they are.
Meanwhile some netizens argue that it is just an expansive gesture of yoga pose. So some people consult the doctors if the gesture is very dangerous. Medical experts have warned net users of the seemingly harmless yoga pose, as it may lead to damage to one's vertebrae by causing muscle strain and increasing the risk of lumbar degenerative disease.
The new challenge follows a series of similar controversial Chinese body image trends including the A4 waist challenge (measuring women's waists against a piece of A4 paper which is 21 centimeters wide), the belly button challenge (reaching one's belly button from behind), and the coin collarbone (balancing coins on people's collarbones for as long as they can) which faced heavy criticism worldwide on social media.
Women in China have long associated being beautiful with being skinny, but a desire to be thin is often taken to the extreme, with harmful effects on health and self-esteem - a situation not unique to China.
Although the opinions of the issue vary, maybe the change of the attitudes towards it is just over the horizon. Rejecting body anxiety is more than just a slogan. Many workout-obsessed women are increasingly realizing that no matter how hard they try, they won't be supermodels, and acknowledging that figures can vary due to a number of factors. This is an important step on their path to self-acceptance. Being healthy and maintaining the spiritual well-being have become the new pursuits for many.
1. According to paragraphs 1 and 2, what do you know about the comic waist challenge?| A．It leads a trend among netizens. | B．It's an easy comic character's pose. |
| C．It's a harmless yoga pose. | D．It's a symbol of the beauty of body image. |
| A．The A4 waist challenge. | B．The belly button challenge. |
| C．The coin collarbone. | D．The finely chiseled nose. |
| A．women in China prefer following trends |
| B．all women in China are desperate to be thin |
| C．the pursuit of beauty has nothing to do with our health |
| D．many women in China care more about their health than beauty now |
| A．The body image trends — a pursuit of Chinese women |
| B．The comic waist challenge — a slap in the face |
| C．The attitudes of Chinese towards beauty |
| D．The body anxiety nowadays |
增加：在缺词处加一个漏字符号（∧），并在其下面写出该加的词。
删除：把多余的词用斜线（\）划掉。
修改：在错的词下划一横线，并在该词下面写出修改后的词。
注意：
1. 每处错误及修改均仅限一词；
2. 只允许修改10处，多者（从第11处起）不计分。
Senses play important role in our daily lives. Sometimes, the five senses that we have effect one another. When one of the senses fails, other senses become more stronger. For example, blind people can read and write by Braille, a system with patterns of six raised dots represent each letter. Besides, they could get across the road without help in a foggy day.
In fact, scientists have observed what we are more possible to be healthier if we make the most of our senses. Fortunately, our sense of sight is used too much while our senses of touch and smell have been ignored. So it is strongly suggested that one develops his all five senses.
4 . A study published Monday found that people who sleep less tend to be fat，and experts said it’s time to find out if more sleep will fight fatness.
“We’ve put so much emphasis on diet and exercise that we’ve failed to recognize the value of good sleep，”said Fred Turek，a physician at Northwestern University.
Monday’s study from Eastern Virgnia Medical School in Norfolk covered 1,000 people and found that total sleep time decreased as body mass index－a measure of weight based on height increased.
“Men slept an average of 27 minutes less than women and overweight and fat patients slept less than patients with normal weights，”it said.In general the fatter subjects slept about 1.8 hours a week less than those with normal weights.
“Americans experience insufficient sleep and fat bodies.Clinicians are aware of the burden of fatness on patients，”the study said.
“Our findings suggest that major extensions of sleep time may not be necessary，as an extra 20 minutes of sleep per night seems to be associated with a lower body mass index，”it added.
“We caution that this study does not set up a causeandeffect relationship between restricted sleep and fatness，but investigations indicating success in weight loss via extensions of sleep would help greatly to set up such a relationship.”
The study was published in the Archives of Internal Medicine along with an editorial by Turek and Northwestern colleague Joseph Bass commenting on it and related research.
Inan interview，Turek said some studies have shown the lack of sleep causes declines in an appetiteholding back protein hormone，and increases in another hormone that cause a longing for food.“In addition neuropathies(神经疗法)in the brain governing sleep and fatness appear to overlap(部分重叠)，”he said.
“Fatness has been rising dramatically in developed countries and reached epidemic(流行病)levels in the United States，”it added，“leading to a variety of health problems.”
| A new study having been | |||
| in the past | diet and | ||
| this time | sleep | ||
| A study from Eastern Virginia Medical School | People | 1,000 were | |
| difference | Men slept 27ms less than women on | ||
| Americans' problem | |||
| conclusion | Weight loss set up | ||
| Reason | Less sleep causes protein hormone to | ||
| concern | developing countries | rising with | |
| in the USA | quite | ||
