1 . Casting blame is natural: it is tempting to fault someone else for a mistake rather than taking responsibility yourself. But blame is also harmful. It makes it less likely that people will own up to mistakes, and thus less likely that organizations can learn from them. Research published in 2015 suggests that firms whose managers pointed to external factors to explain their failings underperformed companies that blamed themselves.
Blame culture can spread like a virus. Just as children fear mom and dad’s punishment if they admit to wrongdoing, in a blaming environment, employees are afraid of criticism and punishment if they acknowledge making a mistake at work. Blame culture asks, “who dropped the ball?” instead of “where did our systems and processes fail?” The focus is on the individuals, not the processes. It’s much easier to point fingers at a person or department instead of doing the harder, but the more beneficial, exercise of fixing the root cause, in which case the problem does not happen again.
The No Blame Culture was introduced to make sure errors and deficiencies (缺陷) were highlighted by employees as early as possible. It originated in organizations where tiny errors can have catastrophic (灾难性的) consequences. These are known as high reliability organizations (HROs) and include hospitals, submarines and airlines. Because errors can be so disastrous in these organizations, it’s dangerous to operate in an environment where employees don’t feel able to report errors that have been made or raise concerns about that deficiencies may turn into future errors. The No Blame Culture maximizes accountability because all contributions to the event occurring are identified and reviewed for possible change and improvement.
The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), which supervises air traffic across the United States, makes it clear that its role is not to assign blame or liability but to find out what went wrong and to issue recommendations to avoid a repeat. The proud record of the airline industry in reducing accidents partly reflects no-blame processes for investigating crashes and close calls. The motive to learn from errors also exist when the risks are lower. That is why software engineers and developers routinely investigate what went wrong if a website crashes or a server goes down.
There is an obvious worry about embracing blamelessness. What if the website keeps crashing and the same person is at fault? Sometimes, after all, blame is deserved. The idea of the “just culture”, a framework developed in the 1990s by James Reason, a psychologist, addresses the concern that the incompetent and the malevolent (恶意的) will be let off the hook. The line that Britain’s aviation regulator draws between honest errors and the other sort is a good starting-point. It promises a culture in which people “are not punished for actions or decisions taken by them that match with their experience and training”. That narrows room for blame but does not remove it entirely.
1. According to the research published in 2015, companies that ______ had better performance.| A．blamed external factors | B．admitted their mistakes |
| C．conducted investigations | D．punished the under performers |
| A．It encourages the early disclosure of errors. |
| B．It only exists in high reliability organizations. |
| C．It enables people to shift the blame onto others. |
| D．It prevents organizations from making any error. |
| A．Innocent people might take the blame by admitting their failure. |
| B．Being blamed for mistakes can destroy trust in employees. |
| C．The line between honest errors and the other sort is not clear. |
| D．People won’t learn their lessons if they aren’t blamed for failures. |
| A．Why We Fail to Learn from Our Own Mistakes |
| B．How to Avoid Disastrous Errors in Organizations |
| C．Why We Should Stop the Blame Game at Work |
| D．How to Deal with Workplace Blame Culture |
1. 你是否支持选秀类节目；
2. 你支持或者反对的原因及依据。
参考词汇：talent show
注意：
1. 词数：100左右；
2. 可以适当增加细节，使行文连贯。
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3 . If you are a fan of fast fashion, your choices may be narrowing in the near future. Recently, a large number of fast-fashion stores were closed worldwide.
A major reason is the shift in the mindset (心态) of consumers. Millennials, those who were born in the 1980s or 1990s, are now the largest consumer group.
Molly, 22, is one of them. Before she went to college, she used to frequent fast-fashion shops.
In order to survive in the competitive market, many fast-fashion brands are making changes as well.
| A．Millennials like brands with a long history. |
| B．It shows that fast fashion is slowing down. |
| C．Climate change should be blamed on the fashion industry. |
| D．Unlike their predecessors (前人), millennials hold different attitudes towards products. |
| E．Another factor is the growing concern over the fashion industry’s effect on the environment. |
| F．For example, some companies plan for all of their clothes to be sustainable in the future. |
| G．But after taking a class that focused on the environmental impact of clothing production, her preference changed. |
4 . “When I stopped in at our local tourism office in Montreal to ask where they would recommend visitors to go to smell, taste, and listen to the city, I just received blank stares. They only know about things to see, not about the city’s other sensory attractions, its soundmarks and smellmarks,” says Howes, the director of Sensory Studies, a growing field often referred to as “sensory urbanism”.
Around the world, researchers like Howes are investigating how non-visual information defines the character of a city and affects its livability. Using methods ranging from low-tech sound walks to data collecting, wearables (clothing or glasses that contain computer technology), and virtual reality, they’re fighting what they see as a limiting visual preference in urban planning.
“Just being able to close your eyes for 10 minutes gives you a totally different feeling about a place,” says Oguz Öner, an academic and musician. He has spent years organizing sound walks in Istanbul where participants describe what they hear at different spots with their eyes covered. His research has identified locations where a wave organ could be constructed to strengthen the sounds of the sea, something he was surprised to realize people could hardly hear, even along the waterfront.
Although his findings have not been considered into local urban plans yet, this kind of individual feedback (反馈) about the sensory environment is already being put to use in Berlin, where quiet areas identified by citizens using a free mobile app have been included in the city’s latest noise action plan.
The best way to determine how people react to different sensory environments is a subject of some debate within the field. Howes and his colleagues are using observation and interviews to develop a set of best practices for good sensory design in public spaces. Other researchers are going more high-tech, using wearables to track biological data like heart-rate variability to reveal different sensory experiences.
As data collection about people’s sensory experiences becomes more widespread, many of these experts warn that concerns about privacy and surveillance (监视) need to be taken into account. Issues of fairness and inclusion also come into play when determining whose sensory experiences are factored into planning. “Sensory awareness is not independent or simply biological; whether we find something pleasant or not has been shaped culturally and socially,” says Monica Degen, an urban cultural sociologist at Brunel University London.
Degen cites the example of a London neighborhood where inexpensive restaurants for local youth were replaced by trendy cafes. “It used to smell like fried chicken,” she says, but newer residents found that smell annoying rather than welcoming. “Now it smells like the popular Italian coffee, cappuccinos.”
1. The underlined phrase “blank stares” in Paragraph 1 implies that______.| A．Montreal is lacking in visual appeal |
| B．Montreal’s non-visual information is ignored |
| C．the tourism officers object to sensory urbanism |
| D．there are too many tourist attractions to recommend |
| A．Many methods are used to limit the visual preference. |
| B．Potential concerns about collecting data can be relieved. |
| C．People may fail to notice sound attractions even in better locations. |
| D．Individual feedback restricts the development of sensory environment. |
| A．People’s perceptions of their sensory surroundings are subjective. |
| B．Sensory urbanism needs to focus on developing sensory facilities. |
| C．Sensory experience is dominant in shaping the character of a city. |
| D．Choices of sensory attractions in urban planning depend on tourists. |
Gather a couple of friends and take a leisurely walk through the streets—this is
If you feel like you may be a people-pleaser, you’re not alone. In today’s highly-connected world, we have a growing obsession (痴迷) with being liked and needing to please others. People seek to please others for various reasons, including avoiding conflicts, securing feelings of being needed, and reducing fears of abandonment. And they are forced to use agreeableness as self-defense.
People-pleasing behavior can lead to mental and physical health problems such as fear of rejection, frustration, anger, addictions, headaches, stomach problems, and high blood pressure. It can also result in weak boundaries, problems with decision-making and dependency. Therefore, it’s important to recognize and overcome your own people-pleasing behaviors. Here are some simple exercises that you can start working on today.
Learn to love your own company. Trust that people will not abandon you, even if you don’t drop everything for them. Believing you are lovable for who you are, not what you do, means knowing that people will still be there for you even if you do not always search for ways to please them. Practice this by going to a movie or restaurant alone.
Value the plans made with yourself. They are as important as plans you make with other people. Otherwise, you are sending a message to your brain that a plan you make with yourself does not hold as much value. Don’t break long-or short-term plans you make with yourself, whether it’s going to the gym or studying for an exam.
Say “no” when necessary. If you’re a people-pleaser, you may find it hard to say “no” because you feel it comes across as cruel or uncaring. But it absolutely does not have to. Be clear, be direct, and use “I” statements. Try statements like: “I would really love to be able to help you, but unfortunately, I’m already committed at that time.” By consistently integrating these strategies into your life, you’ll break your people-pleasing habits and develop more healthy, interdependent relationships.
1. What is a people-pleaser like?2. Besides mental and physical problems, what other problems may a people-pleaser suffer from?
3. Please decide which part is false in the following statement, then underline it and explain why.
If you don’t want to be a people-pleaser, you should love being with others, value the plans made with yourself, and decline others’requests when necessary.
4. What do you think of the behavior of pleasing others? (In about 40 words)
7 . Demanding days seem designed to test our self-control. We all need to rely on willpower to avoid short-term temptations and override unwanted thoughts or impulses (冲动). The prevailing psychological theory proposed that willpower resembled a kind of battery. With each exercise of self-control, you exhausted this resource. Without a chance to recharge, that resource ran low, making it harder to maintain self-control. This process was known as “ego depletion”.
In 2010, however, psychologist Veronika Job published a study that questioned the foundations of “ego depletion” theory, with some interesting evidence that ego depletion depended on people’s underlying beliefs. In the study, Job divided participants into two categories: those with a “limited” view of willpower and those with a “non-limited” view of willpower, based on a prior questionnaire. She then gave the participants some standard laboratory tests examining mental focus, which was considered to depend on the reserves of willpower. The study found that people with a limited mindset tended to perform exactly as ego depletion theory would predict but the non-limited individuals did not, which indicated that people’s beliefs about willpower could be self-fulfilling prophecies (预言). Those who believed willpower was easily depleted saw their self-control decrease, while those who believed in “mental stamina (耐力)” experienced no ego depletion.
Subsequent debates about the reliability of the laboratory tests of ego depletion emerged, but Job’s work demonstrated that mindset significantly impacted real-life outcomes. Her follow-up study revealed that after completing demanding tasks, most participants recovered to some degree overnight, but those with non-limited mindsets actually experienced an increase in their productivity the following day, as if energized by the extra pressure.
If you already have a non-limited mindset about willpower, these findings might be a cause for self-satisfaction. For those with limited mindsets, hope is not lost. Learning about this science can help shift beliefs. Sharing this knowledge with others can further consolidate this shift. Moreover, recollecting times of engaging in taxing yet enjoyable tasks naturally shifts people’s beliefs toward non-limited mindsets, as they see proof of their own men tal stamina. To provide yourself with further evidence, you can conduct small self-control tests. As you realize your willpower’s growth, you’ll find resisting temptations and distractions easier.
While immediate miracles aren’t guaranteed, perseverance will lead to a changed mindset and increased self-control, propelling actions toward personal goals.
1. “Ego depletion” theory shows that willpower ________.| A．helps control our impulses | B．reduces after exercising self-control |
| C．is a test of your character | D．is like a chargeable battery |
| A．Extra pressure boosts mental focus. |
| B．Demanding tasks reduce mental focus. |
| C．Reserves of willpower depend on mental focus. |
| D．The change of mental focus relies on one’s mindset. |
| A．Picturing your ideal university. |
| B．Doing homework in front of a TV. |
| C．Sharing science knowledge with friends. |
| D．Recalling mastering a challenging piano piece. |
8 . Would you turn down the chance to become a smart cookie? We’ve been longing for quick fixes that could increase our intelligence (智力). Today, people’s hopes lie in brain training apps as a speedy “digital pill”. The more you play, the smarter you will get—or so some apps tell us. But is this digital-shortcut all that it seems to be?
The use of games for serious purposes has become widespread with the development of the Internet and smartphones. Brain training apps are typical, frequently featured by Apple and Google’s app stores. Many of such apps say that they are backed by “science”. Even if there were agreement around what makes general intelligence, the idea that increasing it would be as simple as practising a few mini-games every day goes against our current discovery about thinking and learning.
Several major studies, surveying users across a wide variety of apps, have found that they have little effect on users’ performance. A 2021 study by researchers discovered brain training has no significant effect on cognitive (认知的) functioning in the “real world”. The positive effects reported are limited to the very specific mini-games and tasks, such as memorizing lists of words or numbers, or performing mental calculation (心算). So, if your job or your calling in life needs summing quickly or remembering all your friends’ phone numbers, these apps will do. But if you are expecting them to improve your ability to write a novel or form a complex (复杂的) spreadsheet, you have to look elsewhere. Yet, despite the fact that they hardly work, brain training apps play a leading role, partly because they are regarded to be scientific and partly because users think they are fun.
As a co-creator of one of the most popular forms of gamification (游戏化) noted, what is especially disappointing about these apps is that they just aren’t that fun—at least, not compared with the various thoughtful board games and video games coming out every day. Puzzle video games, such as Baba Is You and detective games like Return of the Obra Dinn, see players apply their skill at reasoning, memory and concentration in a far more challenging and engaging (吸引人的) way.
If you aren’t into games, simply go for a walk or learn how to dance. They are likely to be more effective than a brain training app in sharpening your mind. These activities might not lead to an increased IQ, but they are sure to engage your brain deeply while having fun—something I can by no means say of brain training apps.
1. Which of the following would the author probably agree with?| A．Brain training apps help to cure diseases. |
| B．Creativity can be improved with brain training apps. |
| C．Gamification has little to do with increasing intelligence. |
| D．Increasing IQ is as simple as practising a few mini-games every day. |
| A．be moved | B．be opposed | C．be misunderstood | D．be supported |
| A．they turn mental exercises into quick games |
| B．they are considered both scientific and interesting |
| C．they are more effective in shaping our minds than other games |
| D．they have significant effects on the cognitive functioning in the “real world” |
| A．A Smart Cookie or Not? | B．There’s No App for That |
| C．What will Games Lead Us to? | D．A Digital Pill for Intelligence |
You are watching your favorite TV show when a commercial break starts. First you see an ad for candy. Then there is one for fast food. Your stomach growls. Suddenly, all you can think about is how much you need a snack.
If that sounds familiar, you are not alone. Researchers from McMaster University in Canada studied the effects of junk food ad. The researchers examined the effects of advertising junk food on more than 6000kids through TV commercials and other types of media. They found that kids made unhealthy food and drink choicesas quickly as 30 minutes after seeing the ads.
“There is too much unhealthy food advertising out there,” Says Behnam Sadeghirad. He’s one of the researchers who led the study. “This is dangerous for younger children.”
Food and drink ads are everywhere from TV to the Internet. Companies want to make sure you know about their products. They spend nearly 1.8 billion a year on food ads aimed at kids according to a report.
The Nielsen Company tracked the number of food ads that kids saw in 2015. It found that kids watched nearly 12 food ads on TV each day. Most of these ads weren’t for health y foods. In fact, on average. kids saw only one ad per week for fruits and vegetables. Instead, most of the ads were for fast food, candy and sugary drinks.
Jennifer Harris, a professor at the University of Connecticut, says this is a big part of the problem. “Unhealthy foods are not things we should be encouraging kids to eat more often”. Harris says. “But unfortunately those are the products being advertised to them the most”.
Health experts say it’s OK to treat yourself to a cookie once in a while. But what can you do to keep from having an unhealthy snack every time you see an ad for junk food? Harris says it’s important to learn to spot the techniques companies use in their ads, tell their kids what is going on and help kids think about whether these products are good for them.
1. What did researchers from MaMaster University find?2. What do the findings of the Nielsen Company suggest?
3. Please decide which part is false in the following statement, then underline it and explain why.
To avoid negative impacts of advertisements for unhealthy food, parents should keep their kids from watching these kinds of advertisements.
4. Please briefly describe what you can do to reduce the negative impact of advertising on your life.
10 . In our information-driven society, shaping our worldview through the media is similar to forming an opinion about someone solely based on a picture of their foot. While the media might not deliberately deceive us, it often fails to provide a comprehensive view of reality.
Consequently, the question arises: Where, then, shall we get our information from if not from the media? Who can we trust? How about experts—people who devote their working lives to understanding their chosen slice of the world? However, even experts can fall prey to the allure of oversimplification, leading to the “single perspective instinct” that hampers(阻碍)our ability to grasp the intricacies of the world.
Simple ideas can be appealing because they offer a sense of understanding and certainty. And it is easy to take off down a slippery slope, from one attention-grabbing simple idea to a feeling that this idea beautifully explains, or is the beautiful solution for, lots of other things. The world becomes simple that way.
Yet, when we embrace a singular cause or solution for all problems, we risk oversimplifying complex issues. For instance, championing the concept of equality may lead us to view all problems through the lens of inequality and see resource distribution as the sole panacea. However, such rigidity prevents us from seeing the multidimensional nature of challenges and hinders true comprehension of reality. This “single perspective instinct” ultimately clouds our judgment and restricts our capacity to tackle complex issues effectively.
It saves a lot of time to think like this. You can have opinions and answers without having to learn about a problem from scratch and you can get on with using your brain for other tasks. But it’s not so useful if you like to understand the world. Being always in favor of or always against any particular idea makes you blind to information that doesn’t fit your perspective. This is usually a bad approach if you would like to understand reality.
Instead, constantly test your favorite ideas for weaknesses. Be humble about the extent of your expertise. Be curious about new information that doesn’t fit, and information from other fields. And rather than talking only to people who agree with you, or collecting examples that fit your ideas, consult people who contradict you, disagree with you, and put forward different ideas as a great resource for understanding the world. I have been wrong about the world so many times. Sometimes, coming up against reality is what helps me see my mistakes, but often it is talking to, and trying to understand, someone with different ideas.
If this means you don’t have time to form so many opinions, so what? Wouldn’t you rather have few opinions that are right than many that are wrong?
1. What does the underlined word “allure” in Para.2 probably mean?| A．Temptation. | B．Tradition. | C．Convenience. | D．Consequence. |
| A．They meet people’s demand for high efficiency. |
| B．They generate a sense of complete understanding. |
| C．They are raised and supported by multiple experts. |
| D．They reflect the opinions of like-minded individuals. |
| A．Simplifying matters releases energy for human brains. |
| B．Constant tests on our ideas help make up for our weakness. |
| C．A well-founded opinion counts more than many shallow ones. |
| D．People who disagree with us often have comprehensive views. |
| A．Embracing Disagreement: Refusing Overcomplexity |
| B．Simplifying Information: Enhancing Comprehension |
| C．Understanding Differences: Establishing Relationships |
| D．Navigating Complexity: Challenging Oversimplification |
