Question

 (10·北京C篇)

Pacing and Pausing

       Sara tried to befriend her old friend Steve's new wife, but Betty never seemed to have anything to say. While Sara felt Betty didn't hold up her end of the conversation, Betty complained to Steve that Sara never gave her a chance to talk. The problem had to do with expectations about pacing and pausing.

       Conversation is a turn-taking game. When our habits are similar, there's no problem. But if our habits are different, you may start to talk before I'm finished or fail to take your turn when I'm finished. That's what was happening with Betty and Sara.

       It may not be coincidental that Betty, who expected relatively longer pauses between turns, is British, and Sara, who expected relatively shorter pauses, is American. Betty often felt interrupted by Sara. But Betty herself became an interrupter and found herself doing most of the talking when she met a visitor from Finland. And Sara had a hard time cutting in on some speakers from Latin America or Israel.

       The general phenomenon, then, is that the small conversation techniques, like pacing and pausing, lead people to draw conclusions not about conversational style but about personality and abilities. These habitual differences are often the basis for dangerous stereotyping (思维定式). And these social phenomena can have very personal consequences. For example, a woman from the southwestern part of the US went to live in an eastern city to take up a job in personnel. When the Personnel Department got together for meetings, she kept searching for the right time to break in--and never found it. Although back home she was considered outgoing and confident, in Washington she was viewed as shy and retiring. When she was evaluated at the end of the year, she was told to take a training course because of her inability to speak up.

        That's why slight differences in conversational style--tiny little things like microseconds of pause-can have a great effect on one's life. The result in this case was a judgment of psychological problems---even in the mind of the woman herself, who really wondered what was wrong with her and registered for assertiveness training.

64. What did Sara think of Betty when talking with her?

      A. Betty was talkative.

      B. Betty was an interrupter.

      C. Betty did not take her turn.

      D. Betty paid no attention to Sara.

65. According to the passage, who are likely to expect the shortest pauses between turns?

      A. Americans.    B. Israelis.        C. The British.     D. The Finns.

66. We can learn from the passage that __

      A. communication breakdown results from short pauses and fast pacing

B. women are unfavorably stereotyped in eastern cities of the US

      C. one's inability to speak up is culturally determined sometimes

D. one should receive training to build up one's confidence

67. The underlined word "assertiveness" in the last paragraph probably means __

      A. being willing to speak one's mind

B. being able to increase one's power

C. being ready to make one's own judgment

      D. being quick to express one's ideas confidently

  

Answer 1

答案：

　　64.C

细节题，难题。难在弄不清谁是S谁是B，耐心读，动笔划，从第一段得出正确答案并不难：Sara felt Betty didn't hold up her end of the conversation

65.B

　　细节排序题，难题。还是耐心读，动笔划。S代表美国人，B代表英国人（加起来？），S比B期待谈话间隙时间更短，又在以色列人(Israelis)说话时插不上嘴，故答案选说话嗒嗒嗒嗒的以色列人。

　　66.C

　　变态细节题，较难题。A不符原文，B无中生有，D无中生有，C关键要理解culturally determined，由文化决定或者受文化影响。

　　67.A

词义猜测题，较难。难点在于A选项的干扰作用。原文说那位MM的inability to speak up注意别人认为她没能力，不是说她不愿意。所以D比A好，此处用反义对比方法。