Communication technologies are far from equal when it comes to conveying the truth.The first study to compare honesty across a range of communications media has found that people are twice as likely to tell lies in phone conversations as they are in emails.The fact that emails are automatically recorded—and can come back to haunt(困扰) you—appears to be the key to the finding.

       Jeff Hancock of Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, asked 30 students to keep a communications diary for a week.In it they noted the number of conversations or email exchanges they had lasting more than 10 minutes, and confessed to how many lies they told.Hancock then worked out the number of lies per conversation for each medium.He found that lies made up 14 percent of emails, 21 percent of instant messages, 27 percent of face-to-face interactions and an astonishing 37 percent of phone calls.

       His results, to be presented at the conference on human-computer interaction in Vienna, Austria, in April, have surprised psychologists.Some expected emailers to be the biggest liars, reasoning that because deception makes people uncomfortable, the detachment(非直接接触) of emailing would make it easier to lie.Others expected people to lie more in face-to-face exchanges because we are most practiced at that form of communication.

       But Hancock says it is also crucial whether a conversation is being recorded and could be reread, and whether it occurs in real time.People appear to be afraid to lie when they know the communication could later be used to hold them to account, he says.This is why fewer lies appear in email than on the phone.

       People are also more likely to lie in real time—in an instant message or phone call, say—than if they have time to think of a response, says Hancock.He found many lies are spontaneous(脱口而出的) responses to an unexpected demand, such as: “Do you like my dress?”

       Hancock hopes his research will help companies work out the best ways for their employees to communicate.For instance, the phone might be the best medium for sales where employees are encouraged to stretch the truth.But given his result, work assessment, where honesty is a priority, might be best done using email.

57.Hancock’s study focuses on ________.

       A.the consequences of lying in various communications media

       B.the success of communications technologies in conveying ideas

       C.people’s preference in selecting communications technologies

       D.people’s honesty levels across a range of communications media

58.Hancock’s research finding surprised those who believed that ________.

       A.people are less likely to lie in instant messages

       B.people are unlikely to lie in face-to-face interactions

       C.people are most likely to lie in email communication

       D.people are twice as likely to lie in phone conversations

59.According to the passage, why are people more likely to tell the truth through certain media of communication?

       A.They are afraid of leaving behind traces of their lies

       B.They believe that honesty is the best policy

       C.They tend to be relaxed when using those media

       D.They are most practiced at those forms of communication

60.According to Hancock, the telephone is a preferable medium for promoting sales because ________.

       A.salesmen can talk directly to their customers

       B.salesmen may feel less restrained to exaggerate

       C.salesmen can impress customers as being trustworthy

       D.salesmen may pass on instant messages effectively

    Technology today has stolen away our voices and robbed our children of memories. I’ve been keeping count of how often people sing around the house these days. The fact is, they don’t.

My earliest memories are of my mother crooning lullabies(催眠曲) in a gentle low voice as she rocked each infant in turn. She said she “didn’t have a singing voice,” but her low, wavering alto will always mean comfort to me. Every time I have sat through the night with a feverish body or held a pre – schooler through a nightmare, the melodies returned, words appearing and disappearing like fragments of a dream but held together by the hum (低声吟唱)of love.

Today, young mothers are routinely presented with lullaby tapes at the baby shower. When baby cries, the idea goes, they will be able to switch on the high-tech audio system and the little one will drift off with the voices of strangers in his ears, perfectly on pitch. If I had my way, new parents would learn the songs themselves, throw out their stereos, and give their child the gift of their own sleepy voices through the midnight hours.

These days, when we go on a trip, my daughters take along tiny personal stereos and headphones. They are lost in their private worlds, and I can’t help wishing that at least here, in the car my girls would be forced to listen to their mother’s voice raised in lost – the – words again, sure I’m out-of-tune songs that they might then pass down to another generation. Those sophisticated earphones have robbed them of something I think every kid should carry from childhood car trips into adulthood.

I drove away from that party humming, and all the way home the good old songs kept tumbling out. Dammit (该死), I thought, why did I ever stop singing in the car and start turning on the radio instead? Why don’t I sign anymore while I’m doing the dishes? I’m going to yank those stereo wires right out of the wall when I get home. We’re going to sing grace before meals, sing coals around the piano, sing in the shower instead of switching on that waterproof radio that stol away our voices and our souls.

63.The author hates today’s technology because________

      A.driving a car requires high concentration

       B.children are learning pop songs from tapes

       C.children have lost touch with good old songs

       D.high – tech systems do not record the voices of aged people

64.The underlined sentence “the little one will drift off” in Paragraph 3 means that “________ ”.

       A.the play of the high – tech system is of little use

       B.the high – tech system will play on and on

       C.the low voice will delight the baby

       D.the baby will slowly go to sleep

65.To the author, the voices of strangers ________       .

       A.are not familiar to the baby

       B.lack the motherly love the baby needs

       C.work better to stop the baby’s cry

       D.surely sound more pleasant

66.What the author wishes to make her girls do is to________          .

       A.help memorize the words while she is singing

       B.take off their well – designed earphones

       C.listen and learn the old songs from her

       D.remember their childhood car trips

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