Believe it or not, optical illusion(错觉) can cut highway crashes.

Japan is a case in point. It has reduced automobile crashes on some roads by nearly 75 percent using a simple optical illusion. But stripes, called chevrons(人字形), painted on the roads make drivers think that they are driving faster than they really are, and thus drivers slow down.

Now the American Automobile Association Foundation(基金会) for Traffic Safety in Washington D.C. is planning to repeat Japan’s success. Starting next year, the foundation will paint chevrons and other patterns of stripes on selected roads around the country to test how well the patterns reduce highway crashes.

Excessive (too great) speed plays a major role in as much as one fifth of all fatal traffic accidents, according to the foundation. To help reduce those accidents, the foundation will conduct its tests in areas where speed-related hazards (danger) are the greatest curves, exit slopes, traffic circles, and bridges.

Some studies suggest that straight, horizontal bars painted across roads can initially cut the average speed of drivers in half. However, traffic often returns to full speed within months as drivers become used to seeing the painted bars.

Chevrons, scientists say, not only give drivers the impression that they are driving faster than they really are but also make a lane appear to be narrower. The result is a longer lasting reduction in highway speed and the number of traffic accidents.

1. The passage mainly discusses ________.

A. a new way of highway speed control

B. a new pattern for painting highways

C. a new way of training drivers

D. a new type of optical illusion

2. On roads painted with chevrons, drivers tend to feel that ________.

A. they should avoid speed-related hazards

B. they are driving in the wrong lane

C. they should slow down their speed

D. they are coming near to the speed limit

3. The advantage of chevrons over straight, horizontal bars is that the former ________.

A. can keep drivers awake     B. can cut road accidents in half

C. will look more attractive   D. will have a longer effect on drivers

4. The American Automobile Association Foundation for Traffic Safety plans to ________.

A. try out the Japanese method in certain areas

B. change the road signs across the country

C. replace straight, horizontal bars with chevrons

D. repeat the Japanese road patterns

5. What does the author say about straight, horizontal bars painted across roads?

A. They are suitable only on broad roads.   

B. They are falling out of use in the United States.

C. They are ignored in a long period of time.

D. They cannot be used successfully to traffic circles.

Baby girls make their way directly for dolls as soon as they can crawl, while boys will head for the toy cars,  a study has shown. The findings, the first to show differences in very young babies, suggest there is a biological basis to their preferences.
Psychologists Dr Brenda Todd from City University London carried out an experiment involving 90 infants aged nine months to 36 months. The babies were allowed to choose from seven toys. Some were stereotypically boys' toys - a car, a digger, a ball and a blue teddy.  The rest were girls’ toys: a pink teddy, a doll and a cooking set. They were placed a meter away from the toys, and could pick whichever toy they liked. Their choice and the amount of time they spent playing with each toy were recorded.
Of the youngest children (nine to 14 months), girls spent significantly longer playing with the doll than boys, and boys spent much more time with the car and ball than the girls did. Among the two-and three-year-olds, girls spent 50 percent of the time playing with the doll while only two boys briefly touched it. The boys spent almost 90 percent of their time playing with cars, which the girls barely touched. There was no link between the parents’ view on which toys were more appropriate for boys or girls, and the children’s choice.
Dr Brenda Todd said: “Children of this age are already exposed to much socialization. Boys may be given ‘toys that go’ while girls get toys they can care for, which may help shape their preference. But these findings agree with the former idea that children show natural interests in particular kinds of toys. There could be a biological basis for their choices. Males through evolution have been adapted to prefer moving objects, probably through hunting instincts(本能), while girls prefer warmer colors such as pink, the color of a newborn baby.”
【小题1】Baby boys and girls have different toy preferences probably because         .

A.baby boys are much more active
B.baby girls like bright colors more
C.their parents treat them differently
D.there is a natural difference between them
【小题2】Both baby boys and baby girls like to play with       according to the study.
A.a ballB.a teddyC.a carD.a doll
【小题3】What can we infer from Paragraph 3 ?
A.Nine-month-old baby boys don’t play with dolls at all.
B.Two-year-old baby girls sometimes play with cars and balls.
C.The older the babies are, the more obvious their preference is.
D.Parents should teach their babies to share each other’s toys.
【小题4】What conclusion did Dr. Brenda Todd draw from the results of the study?
A.Adults purposely influence their babies preference.
B.Babies’ preference isn’t affected by social surroundings.
C.Baby boys preferring to moving toys will be good at hunting.
D.Baby girls preferring warmer colors will be warm-hearted.
【小题5】We may read this article in a        section of a newspaper.
A.scienceB.healthC.educationD.entertainment

Baby girls make their way directly for dolls as soon as they can crawl, while boys will head for the toy cars, a study has shown. The findings, the first to show differences in very young babies, suggest there is a biological(生物学的) basis to their preferences(偏爱).

Psychologists Dr. Brenda Todd from City University London carried out an experiment involving 90 infants(婴儿) aged nine months to 36 months. The babies were allowed to choose from seven toys. Some were stereotypically boys' toys - a car, a digger, a ball and a blue teddy.  The rest were girls’ toys: a pink teddy, a doll and a cooking set. They were placed a meter away from the toys, and could pick whichever toy they liked. Their choice and the amount of time they spent playing with each toy were recorded.

Of the youngest children (nine to 14 months), girls spent significantly longer playing with the doll than boys, and boys spent much more time with the car and ball than the girls did. Among the two-and three-year-olds, girls spent 50 percent of the time playing with the doll while only two boys briefly touched it. The boys spent almost 90 percent of their time playing with cars, which the girls barely touched. There was no link between the parents’ view on which toys were more appropriate for boys or girls, and the children’s choice.

Dr Brenda Todd said: “Children of this age are already exposed to much socialization(社会化). Boys may be given ‘toys that go’ while girls get toys they can care for, which may help shape their preference. But these findings agree with the former idea that children show natural interests in particular kinds of toys. There could be a biological basis for their choices. Males through evolution have been adapted to prefer moving objects, probably through hunting instincts(本能), while girls prefer warmer colours such as pink, the colour of a newborn baby.”

1.Baby boys and girls have different toy preferences probably because__________.    

A.baby boys are much more active

B.baby girls like bright colours more

C.there is a natural difference between them

D.their parents treat them differently

2.What can we infer from Paragraph 3?

A.Nine-month-old baby boys don’t play with dolls at all.

B.Two-year-old baby girls sometimes play with cars and balls.

C.Parents should teach their babies to share each other’s toys.

D.The older the babies are, the more obvious their preference is.

3.What conclusion did Dr. Brenda Todd draw from the results of the study?

A.Babies’ preference isn’t affected by social surroundings.

B.Adults purposely(故意地) influence their babies preference.

C.Baby boys preferring to moving toys will be good at hunting.

D.Baby girls preferring warmer colors will be warm-hearted.

4.We may read this article in a_________ section of a newspaper.

A.health            B.science           C.education         D.entertainment

 

I am a German by birth and descent. My name is Schmidt. But by education I am quite as much an Englishman as a 'Deutscher', and by affection much more the former. My life has been spent pretty equally between the two countries, and I flatter myself I speak both languages without any foreign accent.

I count England my headquarters now: it is “home” to me. But a few years ago I was resident in Germany, only going over to London now and then on business. I will not mention the town where I lived. It is unnecessary to do so, and in the peculiar experience I am about to relate I think real names of people and places are just as well, or better avoided.

I was connected with a large and important firm of engineers. I had been bred up to the profession, and was credited with a certain amount of “talent”; and I was considered—and, with all modesty, I think I deserved the opinion—steady and reliable, so that I had already attained a fair position in the house, and was looked upon as a “rising man”. But I was still young, and not quite so wise as I thought myself. I came close once to making a great mess of a certain affair. It is this story which I am going to tell.

Our house went in largely for patents—rather too largely, some thought. But the head partner's son was a bit of a genius in his way, and his father was growing old, and let Herr Wilhelm - Moritz we will call the family name—do pretty much as he chose. And on the whole Herr Wilhelm did well. He was cautious, and he had the benefit of the still greater caution and larger experience of Herr Gerhardt, the second partner in the firm.

Patents and the laws which regulate them are strange things to have to do with. No one who has not had personal experience of the complications that arise could believe how far these spread and how involved they become. Great acuteness as well as caution is called for if you would guide your patent bark safely to port—and perhaps more than anything, a power of holding your tongue. I was no chatterbox, nor, when on a mission of importance, did I go about looking as if I were bursting with secrets, which is, in my opinion, almost as dangerous as revealing them. No one, to meet me on the journeys which it often fell to my lot to undertake, would have guessed that I had anything on my mind but an easy-going young fellow's natural interest in his surroundings, though many a time I have stayed awake through a whole night of railway travel if at all doubtful about my fellow-passengers, or not dared to go to sleep in a hotel without a ready-loaded gun by my pillow. For now and then - though not through me - our secrets did ooze out. And if, as has happened, they were secrets connected with Government orders or contracts, there was, or but for the exertion of the greatest energy and tact on the part of my superiors, there would have been, to put it plainly, the devil to pay.

1. The writer preferred to be called ________.

A. a German                         B. an Englishman

C. both a German and an Englishman      D. neither a German nor an Englishman

2.Which of the following words cannot be used to describe the writer?

A. Talented         B. Modest       C. Reliable             D. Wise

3.The head of the company where the writer works is ________.

A. Schmidt          B. Moritz       C. Wilhelm’s father        D. Gerhardt

4. The writer often stayed awake on the train or kept a ready-loaded gun in the hotel, because  ________.

A. some people sometimes let out the secrets of his company

B. the writer occasionally didn’t keep the secrets of his company

C. patents and the laws are strange things to have to do with

D. the secrets were connected with Government orders or contracts

 

 

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