1 . Choosing a hotel, restaurant or new product can be a difficult task. There’s so much on offer, and making a mistake can be expensive. This is why many people turn to online reviews—opinions and information written by people who have used a service or bought a product. But can we trust them?
About 70% of Americans say they believe online user reviews. According to experts, this is because when we read a review by another consumer, we feel like we’re getting a personal recommendation from a friend. But a recent study shows that about one third of online reviews are fake. Apparently, companies are so desperate for good reviews that they’ve started to “play” the system. So, how do they do it?
One trick is to give positive reviews to your own product or service. Best-selling writer RJ Ellory was recently caught writing 5- starreviewso fhisownbooksonAmazon.com. Using a pen name, he called one of his books a “modern masterpiece (杰作)” and said another would “touch people’s hearts”. RJ also wrote negative reviews of his competitors’ books.
Another trick is to “buy” good reviews. Last year, the Cove Hotel in Cornwall was caught giving guests discounts if they wrote “honest but positive” reviews on TripAdvisor. The trick worked—one guest called The Cove “a dream comes true”. Some people are even making a living by writing favourable reviews. In 2010, American Todd Rutherford started GettingBookReviews.com. For $99, Todd would write a positive review of your book on Amazon.com; and for $999, he’d write 50 reviews.
So, how can you tell a fake review? First, if the reviewer uses lots of highly positive language, it’s probably fake, Secondly, if the review reads like an advertisement, it probably is an ad. And finally, if the review is negative but also speaks highly of a competitor, it might have been written by that competitor.
1. The author introduces the topic of the text in paragraph 1 by ______.| A．discussing some questions | B．describing a common situation |
| C．presenting different opinions | D．analyzing a specific example |
| A．False. | B．Fair. | C．Honest. | D．Disappointing. |
| A．Positive reviews can touch people’s hearts. |
| B．Companies use the reviewing system to their advantage. |
| C．Many hotels pay guests to write positive reviews for them. |
| D．Writing reviews is a major source of income for Internet users. |
| A．Features of some types of online reviews. |
| B．Reasons behind choices of online reviews. |
| C．Suggestions on how to judge online reviews. |
| D．Ways to tell positive online views from negative ones. |
2 . The road to a Nobel Prize, the most respected scientific award in the world, is growing ever longer, with almost half of winners now waiting more than 20 years from making a Nobel-worthy discovery to receiving the prize.
One analysis shows that the average time between publishing the work and receiving one of the science prizes has nearly doubled in the past 60 years. Across the three science prizes, chemistry now has the longest “Nobel lag”- an average of 30 years over the past decade- and physiology or medicine has the shortest, at 26 years.
Alfred Nobel’s will stated that the prizes should be awarded “to those who, during the previous year, shall have given the greatest benefit to mankind.” In reality this has only happened a few times. But in the first half of the twentieth century, it was common for Nobel prize winners to be in their 30s and that is unheard of now, says Santo Fortunato, now a computational social scientist at Indiana University.
There are a number of possible reasons for this, says Yian Yin, a computational social scientist at Cornell University. It could be that the overall number of breakthroughs is increasing each year, so awards cannot keep up with the number of people who deserve to be recognized, he says. It is also the case that the importance of some works, which Yin describes as “sleeping beauties” are only realized years or decades later. Besides, the lengthening gap could be a sign that there has been a decrease in “disruptive” science -important studies or discoveries that change the paradigm (范式) of their field. This could be causing the Nobel committees to focus more on the past.
Fortunato points out that, if the gap continues to grow, outstanding scientists could miss out on the award owing to the Nobel Committee’s rule banning posthumous prizes (追授奖项). “It has to stop at some point,” he says, adding that a rethink of the posthumous-awarding ban would allow more people’s work to get the recognition that it deserves.
1. Why does the writer mention the numbers in the first two paragraphs?| A．To explain a rule. | B．To present a fact. |
| C．To give an opinion. | D．To make a prediction. |
| A．Experts who are in their thirties. |
| B．Teachers who study computer science. |
| C．Researchers whose name has not been heard of. |
| D．Scientists whose discovery benefits humans most. |
| A．The change in standards. | B．The requirement of the award. |
| C．The increase in breakthroughs. | D．The tradition of the committees. |
| A．Reconsidering the current rule. | B．Establishing a better committee. |
| C．Stopping the award presentation. | D．Recognizing more people’s work. |
3 . Travel is like a box of chocolates: you never know what you’re going to get, especially when using a mystery box plane ticket. Earlier this year, mystery box travel purchases increased and became trendy among China’s young people. In normal trips, people often plan their vacations well in advance. After buying a mystery box at a low price — usually 100 or 200 yuan — however, the travelers using this method will select their departure airport and receive several destination options to choose from. After the destination is decided, their trip begins.
Liao Liangyu, 16, has turned his eagerness to go on a mystery box trip into reality. He took a mystery box trip to Changsha with a couple of friends months ago. Right before their departure, a friend told Liao that Changsha was a super hyped-up (被炒作的) Internet sensation (网红). But he still decided to go and see it for himself.
“My biggest discovery is that Changsha is a city full of contrasts,” Liao explained to China Daily. “You can see skyscraper (摩天大楼) and old houses in the same view.”
Since the destination options include many less popular cities, travel mystery boxes also bring energy and economic benefits to these destinations. For example, Dehong city is a beautiful city in Yunnan province, yet has few visitors due to a lack of promotion. Following its inclusion as a mystery box travel destination, however, it has gained a lot of attention and is now thought of as a solid location for tourism.
But even so, a large number of people feel disappointed with travel mystery boxes because they can encounter many problems after purchasing one, such as inappropriate travel time, sudden flight cancellations, or even challenges with refunds. Su Weili from Ctrip suggested in an interview with Haibao News that visitors should choose reliable platforms and sign contracts to guarantee their interests.
1. What is the appeal of mystery box travel?| A．Traveling with like-minded strangers. |
| B．Unplanned traveling at a low cost. |
| C．Fixed routes to choose from. |
| D．Popular destinations to visit. |
| A．He regretted traveling with his friends. |
| B．He felt Changsha didn’t deserve its fame. |
| C．He disliked the unpredictability. |
| D．He discovered something unexpected. |
| A．They help these places better known. |
| B．They often cause overcrowding. |
| C．They lead to environmental problems. |
| D．They enrich local people’s lives. |
| A．Reliable platforms to buy travel mystery boxes. |
| B．Various mystery box travel options available. |
| C．Potential issues related to travel mystery boxes. |
| D．Mystery box travel regulations and policies. |
4 . Everywhere I look, there are new buildings under construction. The neighborhoods that I knew as a boy, filled with beautiful old buildings, have mostly disappeared, and in their place, modern, high-rise buildings have appeared. There is good reason for this. Residents want all the conveniences of modern living. However, how can our children understand and maintain their cultural identity if we erase so much of the physical evidence of it?
The arguments for preserving historic buildings are not simply about an emotional attachment to the past. There are also good economic arguments in favour of preservation. The renovation (修缮) and preservation of historic districts can become an economic engine, drawing tourists and small businesses to the area. For example, in Dubai, the historic Al Bastikiya district draws thousands of tourists every year from all over the world. It also attracts local residents, eager to learn about their city's past.
Some have argued that historic preservation is too expensive, but many recent projects have demonstrated that this is not necessarily the case. In fact, renovation of an existing structure for adaptive reuse can cost about £40 per square metre less than even the most basic new construction, while preserving the beauty of the original building. And, although it is often claimed that old buildings have a more significant environmental footprint than new construction because they aren’t very energy efficient, architects and environmental experts maintain that the greenest building is the one that is already built. New construction almost always has a more serious environmental impact (影响) because it requires the use of all-new materials that must be transported, often over long distances, instead of recycled materials that are already on site. We recycle so many other things. We can and should recycle buildings, too.
Historic preservation is an option that opens many possibilities; demolition (拆毁), in contrast, is irreversible. Once these treasures are lost, they are lost forever, an important link in our heritage that can never be recovered.
1. What drives people to replace old buildings with new ones?| A．Their dislike of old buildings. | B．Their pride in cultural identity. |
| C．Their concern about young generations. | D．Their desire for modern comforts. |
| A．Historic renovation costs much money. |
| B．Local governments support small businesses. |
| C．Historic preservation brings economic benefits. |
| D．International tourism promises economic recovery. |
| A．It uses green materials. | B．It damages architectural beauty. |
| C．It reduces enviromental impact. | D．It worries environmental experts. |
| A．Positive. | B．Doubtful. | C．Disapproving. | D．Objective. |
5 . How good are you at maths? Some people love the challenge of algebra (代数) or enjoy working out number puzzles. Maths is all around us, from working out the bill after a meal, to calculating your daily bills. But many are confused about the moment when they have to deal with numbers and figures.
Writing for BBC Future, David Robson says “
| A．There are many reasons for your fears. |
| B．Anyway, our worries and fears show our ability. |
| C．The problem really starts in childhood, at school. |
| D．Surprisingly, the percentage of this aspect reached up to 62%. |
| E．It’s unclear why maths arouses so much fear compared to geography. |
| F．It can seem challenging, but this “maths anxiety” is perfectly normal. |
6 . Younger generations of Chinese citizens have developed new methods to relieve stress, which include raising unconventional “pets”, hugging trees, watching stress relief videos and so on.
On social media platforms, a new toy called “mango dog” recently emerged.
Tree hugging has also become a new stress relief for young people. “You may think you are hugging the tree, but in fact, the tree is embracing you,” this is a feeling shared by a netizen. Many netizens with such experiences have expressed that their anxiety has been reduced, and they feel a sense of communication with nature.
“I came across the idea online. I tried it and felt truly relaxed,” said a young office worker. “In those brief seconds, it felt like the tree released a lot of pressure and stress from me.”
| A．Various “pets” are made to cater to different people. |
| B．It is claimed to bring a sense of calmness and give a healing effect. |
| C．This is not the first time that young people have raised novel “pets”. |
| D．A young media worker also finds the relief in watching short videos. |
| E．In some cities people have even organized “tree hugging interest groups”. |
| F．Other toys such as squeeze balls have also gained popularity as a way to relieve stress. |
| G．The popularity of these methods reflects an increasing need to release people’s pressure. |
7 . The Stanford marshmallow (棉花糖) test was originally conducted by psychologist Walter Mischel in the late 1960s. Children aged four to six at a nursery school were placed in a room. A single sugary treat, selected by the child, was placed on a table. Each child was told if they waited for 15 minutes before eating the treat, they would be given a second treat. Then they were left alone in the room. Follow-up studies with the children later in life showed a connection between an ability to wait long enough to obtain a second treat and various forms of success.
As adults we face a version of the marshmallow test every day. We’re not tempted by sugary treats, but by our computers, phones, and tablets — all the devices that connect us to the global delivery system for various types of information that do to us what marshmallows do to preschoolers.
We are tempted by sugary treats because our ancestors lived in a calorie-poor world, and our brains developed a response mechanism to these treats that reflected their value — a feeling of reward and satisfaction. But as we’ve reshaped the world around us, dramatically reducing the cost and effort involved in obtaining calories, we still have the same brains we had thousands of years ago, and this mismatch is at the heart of why so many of us struggle to resist tempting foods that we know we shouldn’t eat.
A similar process is at work in our response to information. Our formative environment as a species was information-poor, so our brains developed a mechanism that prized new information. But global connectivity has greatly changed our information environment. We are now ceaselessly bombarded (轰炸) with new information. Therefore, just as we need to be more thoughtful about our caloric consumption, we also need to be more thoughtful about our information consumption, resisting the temptation of the mental “junk food” in order to manage our time most effectively.
1. What did the children need to do to get a second treat in Mischel’s test?| A．Take an examination alone. | B．Share their treats with others. |
| C．Delay eating for fifteen minutes. | D．Show respect for the researchers. |
| A．the calorie-poor world and our good appetites | B．the shortage of sugar and our nutritional needs |
| C．the tempting foods and our efforts to keep fit | D．the rich food supply and our unchanged brains |
| A．Be selective information consumers. | B．Absorb new information readily. |
| C．Use diverse information sources. | D．Protect the information environment. |
| A．Eat Less, Read More | B．The Later, the Better |
| C．The Marshmallow Test for Grownups | D．The Bitter Truth about Early Humans |
8 . Does it ever seem like something is going on with our attention spans? Gloria Mark, an attention researcher at the university of California, says there is scientific evidence that attention spans have shrunk considerably. “We started studying attention span length over 20 years ago,” Mark said. “In 2003, we found that attention spans averaged about two-and-a-half minutes on any screen before people switched, In the past five, six years, they are averaging 47 seconds on the screen.”
Mark maintains that a shorter attention span has three downsides: The first is that people make more errors when they do attention shifting; second downside is that it takes longer to do something, because we have to adjust to every new task every time we shift; the third downside — maybe this is the worst of all — is that stress increases. When people are working on multiple tasks and they have to shift their attention, their blood pressure rises.
You don’t have to be a professor to guess at the cause of our great distract ability: It’s technology, of course-phones, social media, texting. It might be hard to think of the last time you even had a tech-free hour. So she offered a couple of tips for staying focused: First, when you feel the itch to change tasks, analyze why. If it’s just boredom or procrastination (拖延症), make a deal with yourself to work another 20 minutes, and then treat yourself to a reward.
Second, picture yourself at the end of the day. What do you want to have accomplished? What do you want to feel? “A concrete visualization of yourself sitting on the couch, you know, watching your favourite show is really good motivation,” she said.
The internet has this incredible resource available to us, so rather than be upset by it because it distracts us, how can we turn that around and instead find value from it? And how can we utilize our time best when we use the resources from the Internet without getting exhausted from it? These questions are what Gloria Mark will focus on in her subsequent research.
1. What is the second paragraph mainly about?| A．Negative effects of short attention spans. | B．Benefits of long attention spans. |
| C．Causes of short attention spans. | D．Ways to deal with short attention spans. |
| A．Necessity. | B．Courage. | C．Desire | D．Choice |
| A．Imagining what you will accomplish at the end of the day is a waste of time. |
| B．Multitasking is a good way to extend our attention span. |
| C．It is necessary to think twice before shifting your tasks. |
| D．We’d better say no to the internet sometimes as it distracts us. |
| A．Are Our Attention Spans Getting Shorter? | B．How Do We Live with the Internet? |
| C．Is Multitasking Possible? | D．What Can We Do to Make Our Attention Spans Longer? |
9 . Anxious thinker. Loner. Wallflower. These are some negative comments for “introvert” (内向者), showing a common mind-set in America. Actually they just interact differently; they do well when given time alone to think and prefer close conversations.
American society is ruled by the “Extrovert Ideal (外向理想型)”: successful people take risks and always voice their opinion, whether or not they know what they’re doing. The problem is that people value this ideal so much that they often ignore meaningful opinions from the quieter introverts. Isn’t there something problematic about having to get our thoughts out before we finish thinking about them?
Over-stressing the Extrovert Ideal can lead to unwise decisions. In one case, several introverts, who tend to be more careful and think more, pointed out warning signals before the economic downturn of 2008. But the decision makers — often the bold, risk-taking types —ignored their opinion. People say introverts often overthink every decision. Yes, maybe we think before we speak. But is that really so bad?
Of course, social skills are important for everyone. But the misunderstanding about how introverts work creates a cultural bias (偏见). Required class participation at school often leads to students shouting out whatever thoughts come to their mind, too pressured by their participation grade to take the time and think of a meaningful response. During the Covid-19quarantine, some of my classes started using Parlay, a website that allows for discussions through anonymous (匿名的) written comments. I saw that many of my classes were able to have deeper conversations this way, freed from the pressures of having to speak up on the spot. So encouraging a balanced variety of learning methods can reduce the existing bias.
Society seems to think only the loud and outgoing ones can make a difference. But Rosa Parks was known for being “soft spoken” and “timid.” Gandhi said, “In a gentle way, you can shake the world.” So please, give us introverts a chance to change the world in our own quiet way!
1. What is the author’s attitude towards the “Extrovert Ideal”?| A．Objective. | B．Doubtful. | C．Favorable. | D．Unclear. |
| A．The benefit of the Extrovert Ideal. | B．The introverts’ poor social skills. |
| C．The harm of over-valuing extroverts. | D．The extroverts’ ways of decision-making. |
| A．requiring no class participation | B．providing online learning platforms |
| C．allowing different learning styles | D．conducting free classroom discussions |
| A．Brave. | B．Lazy. | C．Easygoing. | D．Shy. |
Identity
The later generations of these waves of migration have shaped and been shaped by each of
For many of them, home tastes are like a mix of markedly Chinese foods and foods which are not
Many interviewees described their kitchens as windows into their true
Gabe Chan,
