The Barbie doll first appeared at the toy fair in New York in 1959. Its creator was Ruth Handler, an American businesswoman. She and her husband Elliott along with Harold Matt Matson started the toy company Mattel. She based the design of the new doll on a German doll named Bild Lilli and named her after their daughter Barbara.
The first Barbie wore a black and white swimsuit and had her hair in a ponytail(马尾辫). She looked very grown-up. But any concerns that parents would not want to buy it for little girls were soon proved wrong.
Mattel sold 300,000 Barbie dolls in the first year at a price of three dollars. Today, a fifty-year-old Barbie in good condition might cost more than 27,000 dollars.
Barbie dolls have represented 50 different nationalities and are sold in 150 countries. Mattel says 90% of girls in the United States between the ages of three and ten own at least one Barbie doll. It says girls between the ages of three and six own an average of about 12.
Barbie also faced her share of critics. A well-known example was when women’s education groups objected to a talking Barbie doll that declared, among other things, “Math class is tough!” Mattel agreed to change it. Saudi Arabia has banned Barbie dolls. And a lawmaker in the American state of West Virginia would like to do the same. Last month, he proposed banning sales of Barbie and other dolls that influence girls to put too much importance on physical beauty.
Some people say Barbie is an unhealthy role model for young girls. Robin Gerber disagrees. She wrote a book about Barbie. She points out dolls like scientist Barbie and race car driver Barbie. She says people who criticize Barbie should tell girls the story of the businesswoman who created her. She says Ruth Handler wanted the dolls to help girls think about what they wanted to do with their lives.
【小题1】The first Barbie doll might not be popular among little girls because _______.

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         .

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Today’s children are not satisfied with playing simple games with simple toys.   71   The electronic models are marketed. They can move and communicate. Children need toys that fit well into their renewed idea of playing pleasure.

     72   These toys are among the top ten “must haves” for every boy and girl. Their sales largely depend on the rapidly changing toy trade. Besides, the demand by parents and children for more advanced features can make a robot toy sell well.

   There are different types of robot toys in the market today.   73   However, video games are not considered as robot toys. While video games are just electronic role-playing mind games, robot toys are highly dependent on the interaction(互动) between the toy and the user. In a video game, the player has a specific goal or task that must be accomplished. The robot toy is a simulation(模仿) of an animal or human.

   There are a number of different types of robot toys in the world market today. They are all very costly. There are high-tech robot toy pets that have life-like actions and movements.   74    Not only children but even adults like robot toys and are now spending a lot of money on them in the market.

Robot toys are great educational toys that interact with and within their environment.   75   The robot toys have sensors that enable them to see, hear and feel, making them the ideal companions. And many robot toys are also designed to express emotions,

A. In fact, their demand today has changed.

B. Robot toys are popular with adults as well as children. 

C.   A robot toy is an electronic toy that is the gift of modern technology.

D. Video games are common in the world of games for children.

E. The toys enable the user to experiment and increase creativity.

F. Some of the robot toy pets can actually fetch and carry.

G. Now robot toys are playing an important part in the growth of children.

There seems never to have been a civilization without toys, but when and how they developed is unknown. They probably came about just to give children something to do .

In the ancient world , as is today ,most boys played with some kinds of toys and most girls with another .In societies where social roles are rigidly determined, boys pattern their play after the activities of their fathers and girls are being prepared, even in play , to step into the roles and responsibilities of the adult world .

What is remarkable about the history of toys is not so much how they changed over the centuries but how much they have remained the same . The changes have been mostly in terms of craftsmanship ,mechanics, and technology . It is the universality of toys with regard to their development in all parts of the world and their persistence to the present that is amazing .In Egypt ,America ,China ,Japan and among the Arctic (北极的)people, generally the same kinds of toys appeared. Variations depended on local customs and way of life because toys imitate their surrounding. Nearly every civilization had dolls, little weapons, toy soldiers, tiny animals and vehicles.

Because toys can be generally regarded as a kind of art form, they have not been subject to technological leaps that characterize inventions for adult use .The progress from the wheel to the cart to the automobile is a direct line of ways up. The progress from a rattle (拔浪鼓) used by a baby in 3000BCto one used by an infant today , however , is not characterized by inventiveness. Each rattle is the product of the artistic tastes of the times and subject to the limitations of available materials.

The reason why the toys most boys play with are different from those that girls play with is that       .

    A. their social roles are rigidly determined

B. they like challenging activities

C. most boys would like to follow their fathers’ professions

D. boys like to play with their fathers while girls with their mothers.

One aspect of “the universality of toys ”lies in the fact that          .

A. the basic characteristics of toys are the same all over the world

B. technological advances have greatly improved the durability of toys

C. the exploration of the universe has led to the creation of new kinds of toys

D. the improvement of craftsmanship in making toys depends on the efforts of universities

Which of the following is the author’s view on the historical development of toys?

A. Toys are playing an increasingly important role in shaping a child’s character.

B. The toy industry has witnessed great leaps in technology in recent years.

C. The craftsmanship in toy-making has remained essentially unchanged.

D. Toys have remained basically the same all through the centuries.

Regarded as a kind of art form, toys           .

A. reflect the pace of social progress

B. are not characterized by technological progress

C. follow a direct line of ascent

D. also appeal greatly to adults

Grown-ups know that people and objects are solid. At the movies, we know that if we reach out to touch Tom Cruise, all we will feel is air. But does a baby have this understanding?

To see whether babies know objects are solid. T. Bower designed a method for projecting an optical illusion (视觉影像) of a hanging ball. His plan was to first give babies a real ball, one they could be expected to show surprise in their faces and movements. All the 16 to 24-week-old babies tested were surprised when they reached for the illusion and found that the ball was not there.

Grown-ups also have a sense of object permanence. We know that if we put a box in a room and lock the door, the box will still be there when we come back. But does a baby realize that a ball that rolls under a chair does not disappear and go to never-never land (想像中的地方)?

Experiments done by Bower suggest that babies develop a sense of object permanence when they are about 18 weeks old. In his experiments, Bower used a toy train that went behind a screen. When 16-week-old and 22-week-old babies watched the toy train disappear behind the left side of the screen, they looked to the right, expecting it to re-appear. If the experiment took the train off the table and lifted the screen, all the babies seemed surprised not to see the train. This seems to show that all the babies had a sense of object permanence. But the second part of the experiment showed that this was not really the case. The researcher substituted (替换) a ball for the train when it went behind the screen. The 22-week-old babies seemed surprised and looked back to the left side for the train. But the 16-week-old babies did not seem to notice the switch (更换). Thus, the 16-week-old babies seemed to have a sense of “something permanence,” while the 22-week-old babies had a sense of object permanence related to a particular object.

1.The passage is mainly about ______.

2.. In Paragraph 3, “object permanence” means that when out of sight, “object ______”.

3.. What did Bower use in his experiments?

4. Which of the following statements is true?