Two thirds of the singles looking for love in Britain turned to the Internet last year, according to figures made in public yesterday. Special sites offer introductions to smokers, to Roman Catholics, tall people, beautiful people, frequent flyers and vegans (素食者). Technology has brought about a great change in the dating game.
A survey by Parship, a British branch of Europe’s largest dating service with more than 1.5 million members, says that 65 percent of the 5.4 million Britons looking for a relationship used online dating services last year.
A spokeswoman for Relate, the relationship advisor, confirmed that a figure of two third feel it all right. “Doing it online allows people quite a lot of privacy, because they can do a bit of quiet research and look around from the comfort of their own home. You don’t have to meet a middleman or go to an actual dating agency office, which takes a lot of courage,” she said.
There are more than 100 independent online dating agencies in Britain. Parship says that 50 percent of single people believe they will meet a suitable partner through the Internet, up from 35 percent six months ago.
Mary Balfour, the founder, says that the Internet has changed the dating industry completely. “It’s like a return to old-fashioned love letters,” she said. “You don’t base your initial judgment on how someone looks or what his or her figure is like. You e-mail or talk before you actually see each other. Everybody you know who is single these days has at least had a good look at a dating website, introduction agency or personal ad. They have to, because all the old matchmaking institutions have gone. People work harder, settle down later and live more isolated lives. They’re much more likely to end the day with a DVD and a can of beer than by going to a village dance.”Singles in Britain can look for love online mainly because of ________.
| A．Parship | B．the help of go-betweens |
| C．technology | D．the revolution of dating game |
About ________ Britons tried to find love online last year according to this passage.
| A．1.5 million | B．3.5 million | C．5.4 million | D．65 million |
For those who want to look for love online, they _________.
| A．don’t need to do any research at all |
| B．have to meet first before they can e-mail each other |
| C．don’t have to find a go-between. |
| D．must go to an actual dating agency office first |
From this passage we can infer that ________.
| A．not all single people believe the Internet can help them find their partners |
| B．looking for love online needs a lot of courage |
| C．old-fashioned love letters become popular again |
| D．single people don’t like to look for their partners online. |
Good tool design is important in the prevention of overuse injuries. Well-designed tools and equipment will require less force to operate them and prevent awkward（别扭的）hand positions. They will allow the worker to keep the elbows（肘）next to the body to prevent damage to the shoulder and arm.
Overuse injuries can therefore be prevented or reduced if the employer provides, and workers use:
●power tools rather than having to use muscle（肌肉）power
●tools with specially designed handles that allow the wrist（手腕）to keep straight （See figure 1）. This means that hands and wrists are kept in the same position as they would be if they were hanging relaxed at a person’s side
 |
Figure1. Bend the tool, not the wrist
●tools with handles that can be held comfortably by the whole hand. This means having a selection of sizes—remember that tools that provide a comfortable firm Hold for a person with a very large hand may be awkward for someone with a very small hand. This is a particularly important consideration for women who may use tools originally designed for men.
●tools that do not press fingers (or flesh) between the handles, and whose handles do not have sharp edges or a small surface area.
60. What is the best title for the passage?
A. Good tool Design for Women B. Importance of Good Tool Design
C. Tool Design and Prevention of Injuries D. Overuse of Tools and Worker Protection
61. Which of the following describes a well-designed tool?
A. It’s kept close to the body. B. It fully uses muscle power.
C. It makes users feel relaxed. D. It’s operated with less force.
62. What is Figure 1 used to show?
A. The effective use of the tool. B. The way of operating the tool.
C. The proper design of the handle. D. The purpose of bending the wrist.
63. In choosing tools for women, _____of the handle is the most important.
A. the size B. the edge C. the shape D. the position
As any homemaker who has tried to keep order at the dinner table knows, there is far more to a family meal than food. Sociologist Michael Lewis has been studying 50 families to find out just how much more.
Lewis and his co-workers carried out their study by videotaping (录像) the families while they ate ordinary meals in their own homes. They found that parents with small families talk actively with each other and their children. But as the number of children gets larger, conversation gives way to the parents’ efforts to control the loud noise they make. That can have an important effect on the children. “In general the more question-asking the parents do, the higher the children’s IQ scores,” Lewis says. “And the more children there are, the less question-asking there is.”
The study also provides an explanation for why middle children often seem to have a harder time in life than their siblings (兄弟姐妹). Lewis found that in families with three or four children, dinner conversation is likely to center on the oldest child, who has the most to talk about, and the youngest, who needs the most attention. “Middle children are invisible,” says Lewis. “When you see someone get up from the table and walk around during dinner, chances are it’s the middle child.” There is, however, one thing that stops all conversation and prevents anyone from having attention: “When the TV is on,” Lewis says, “dinner is a non-event.”
66．The writer’s purpose in writing the text is to _________.
A．show the relationship between parents and children
B．teach parents ways to keep order at the dinner table
C．report on the findings of a study
D．give information about family problems
67．Parents with large families ask fewer questions at dinner because ____________.
A．they are busy serving food to their children
B．they are busy keeping order at the dinner table
C．they have to pay more attention to younger children
D．they are tired out having prepared food for the whole family
68．By saying “Middle children are invisible” in Paragraph 3, Lewis means that middle children _________.
A．have to help their parents to serve dinner
B．get the least attention from the family
C．are often kept away from the dinner table
D．find it hard to keep up with other children
69．Lewis’ research provides an answer to the question _________.
A．why TV is important in family life
B．why parents should keep good order
C．why children in small families seem to be quieter
D．why middle children seem to have more difficulties in life
70．Which of the following statements would the writer agree to?
A．It is important to have the right food for children.
B．It is a good idea to have the TV on during dinner.
C．Parents should talk to each of their children frequently.
D．Elder children should help the younger ones at dinner
Have you ever had the strange feeling that you were being watched? You turned around and, sure enough, someone was looking right at you!
Parapsychologists（灵学家）say that humans have a natural ability to sense when someone is looking at them. To research whether such a “sixth sense” really exists, Robert Baker, a psychologist（心理学家）at the University of Kentucky, performed two experiments.
In the first one, Baker sat behind unknowing people in public places and stared at the backs of their heads for 5 to 15 minutes. The subjects（受试者）were eating, drinking, reading studying, watching TV, or working at a computer. Baker made sure that the people could not tell that he was sitting behind them during those periods. Later, when he questioned the subjects, almost all of them said they had no sense that someone was staring at them.
For the second experiment, Baker told the subjects that they would be stared at from time to time from behind a two way mirror in a laboratory setting. The people had to write down when they felt they were being stared at and when they weren’t. Baker found that the subjects were no better at telling when they were stared at and when they weren’t. Baker found that the subjects were no better at telling when they were started at than if they had just guessed.
Baker concludes that people do not have the ability to sense when they’re being stared at. If people doubt the outcome of his two experiments, said Baker, “I suggest they repeat the experiments and see for themselves.”
68. The purpose of the two experiments is to .
A. explain when people can have a sixth sense
B. show how people act while being watched in the lab
C. study whether humans can sense when they are stared at
D. prove why humans have a sixth sense
69. In the first experiment, the subjects .
A. were not told that they would be stared at
B. lost their sense when they were stared at
C. were not sure when they would be stared at
D. were uncomfortable when they were stared at
70. The underlined word “outcome” in the last paragraph most probably means .
A. value B. result C. performance D. connection
71. What can be learned from the passage?
A. People are born with a sixth sense.
B. The experiments support parapsychologists’ idea.
C. The subjects do not have a sixth sense in the experiments.
D. People have a sixth sense in public places.
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 reach out and touch, and then to show them the illusion. If they knew that objects are solid and they reached out for the illusion and found empty air, 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?
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 reappear. If the experimenter 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.
68. The passage is mainly about _____.
A. babies’ sense of sight B. effects of experiments on babies
C. babies’ understanding of objects D. different tests on babies’ feelings
69. In Paragraph 3, “object permanence” means that when out of sight, an object ________.
A. still exists B. keeps its shape C. still stays solid D. is beyond reach
70. What did Bower use in his experiments?
A. A chair. B. A screen. C. A film. D. A box.
71. Which of the following statements is true?
A. The babies didn’t have a sense of direction.
B. The older babies preferred toy trains to balls.
C. The younger babies liked looking for missing objects.
D. The babies couldn’t tell a ball from its optical illusion.
It's not the flashiest car in the world. Not even close. But the 1971 Volkswagen named Helioscan do something most cars can't: nm on solar energy – energy from the sun's light and heat!
Joshua Bechtold, 14, and the other students at the Riverside School in Lyndonville, Vermont, worked many months to get Helios ready for the 1999 American Tour de Sol （"Sol" is the Latin word for "sun"）. They named their car after Helios, the sun god in Greek mythology（神话）.
The 4-year-old Tour de Sol encourages the use of "green", or environmentally friendly, cars to help reduce pollution and save energy. It’s not a race. Cars are judged on fuel efficiency（耗油量） rather than speed. In the week-long event, 44 cars took the 350-mile tour from Waterbury, Connecticut, to Lake George, New York. Of the 23 student cars, Helios was the only one built by middle school students.
A teacher drove Helios, but the children talked with people wherever they stopped along the mad. "That was my favorite part," says Anna Browne, 15. "We explained how the car runs.”
Due in part to old, inefficient batteries（电池）, Helios finished fourth - out of four - in its kind, the sun-powered class. "We were there for the fun of it," Anna says. "We're proud of Helios," says Ariel Gleicher, 14. "It's a car that's good for the environment."
64. What is special about the car Helios in the text?
A. It was built by middle school students.
B. It has an attractive design.
C. It was made in 1971.
D. It won the fourth prize.
65. How many sun-powered cars took part in the race?
A. 1. B. 4. C. 23. D. 44.
66. What would be the best title for the text.'?
A. The Making of Helios
B. 1999 American Tour de Sol
C. Sun-powered Cars on the Road
D. Use of Green Cars in Connecticut
67. The students felt proud of Helios because______.
A. it could run as far as 350 miles B. it was favored by many children
C. it had high-quality batteries D. it was driven by clean energy
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