Researchers found that people become happier and experience less worry after they reach the age of fifty. In fact, they say by the age of eighty-five, people are happier with their life than they were when they were eighteen years old.
The findings came from a survey of more than three hundred forty thousand adults in the United States. The Gallup Organization questioned them by telephone in two thousand eight. At that time, the people were between the ages of eighteen and eighty-five.
The researchers asked questions about emotions like happiness, sadness and worry. They also asked about mental or emotional stress.
Arthur Stone in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Science at Stony Brook University in New York led the study. His team found that levels of stress were highest among adults between the ages of twenty-two and twenty-five.
The findings showed that stress levels dropped sharply after people reached their fifties.
Happiness was highest among the youngest adults and those in their early seventies. The people least likely to report feeling negative emotions were those in their seventies and eighties.
The findings appeared in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Researchers say they do not know why happiness increases as people get older. One theory is that, as people grow older, they grow more thankful for what they have and have better control of their emotions. They also spend less time thinking about bad experiences.
Professor Stone says the emotional patterns could be linked to changes in how people see the world, or maybe even changes in brain chemistry.
The researchers also considered possible influences like having young children, being unemployed or being single. But they found that influences like these did not affect the levels of happiness and well-being related to age.
The study also showed that men and women have similar emotional patterns as they grow older. However, women at all ages reported more sadness, stress and worry than men.What is the best title of the passage?
| A．The older a person is, the happier he grows. |
| B．The more lighthearted a person is, the happier he is. |
| C．The older a person is, the more clever he grows. |
| D．The older a person is, the more stressed he feels. |
We can learn from the research that _________.
| A．only when people get older, will they feel happier |
| B．older people usually have no worries in their life |
| C．older people are more likely to be thankful in life |
| D．stress levels among the youngest are the highest of all |
According to the researchers, what is probably the reason why people grow happier when they get older?
| A．When people get older, they can’t remember bad experiences. |
| B．When people get older, they have no young children to care about. |
| C．When people get older, they don’t care about their feelings. |
| D．When people get older, they learn to adjust their feelings. |
What would the writer probably deal with in next paragraph?
| A．Advice to the young people on how to keep happy. |
| B．Why women at all ages are more sad, stressed and worried. |
| C．Advice to the old people on how to live longer. |
| D．Why people will grow happier with their ages. |
What do you think the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences is?
| A．A Gallup organization. | B．A university in New York. |
| C．A popular science magazine. | D．A research institution |
Transport Guide
The Brisbane City Council (BCC) is responsible for bus and ferry services with in the city limits and suburbs. Most buses will either arrive at the city or an interchange where connecting buses can be caught．BCC buses operate from 5:30 am to 11:00 pm Monday to Thursday and 5:30 am to 12:00 a m on Fridays. On weekends and public holidays buses operate less frequently Pre-paid bus tickets can be purchased from the QUT (Queensland University of Technology)bookshop, the campus news agency, most other news agencies and general stores, and any BCC Customer Service Centre. Short-term students at QUT cannot use their ID cards to gain a discount fare on BCC public transport. You will need to buy an adult ticket to travel. Bus fares are dependent on the number of zones you have to travel. There are several types of ticket:
| Zone |
Cost (AUD) |
|||||
| Single |
Daily |
Off-peak Daily |
Ten-Trip Saver |
Weekly |
Monthly |
|
| 1 |
2.50 |
4.20 |
3.50 |
16.80 |
16.80 |
67.20 |
| 2 |
2.90 |
5.00 |
4.10 |
20.00 |
20.00 |
80.00 |
| 3 |
3.30 |
5.80 |
4.70 |
23.20 |
23.20 |
92.80 |
Single: one way ticket to reach your destination, including transfers within 2 hours.
Daily: unlimited travel within the zones.
Off-peak Daily: discounted unlimited travel between 9:00 am and 3:30 pm and after
7:00 pm Monday to Friday, and all day on weekends and public holidays.
Weekly: unlimited travel within the zones for one week from the date of issue.
Monthly: unlimited travel within the zones for one calendar month from the date of issue.
Ten-trip Saver: 10 trips at any time within the zones on buses and ferries only.
Transport routes, timetables and fare information are available from:
Public Transport Information Centre
69 Ann Street (corner of George St)
Brisbane City
Phone l3 12 30(Transport Information Service) The transport guide above is most likely provided by ．
| A．Public Transport Information Centre | B．the Brisbane City Council |
| C．Queensland University of Technology． | D．BCC Customer Service Centres |
We can learn from the passage that ．
| A．buses are scheduled as usual on weekends and public holidays |
| B．regular students at QUT need to buy adult tickets |
| C．Pre-paid tickets can be bought from the Public Transport Information Centre |
| D．Ten-trip Savers can be used at off-peak time |
An exchange student staying at QUT for five days has to travel between zones every day．What type of ticket would he probably buy?
| A．Single． | B．Weekly． | C．Off-peak Daily． | D．Ten-trip Saver． |
A company advertised in the newspaper for a sales position. Details of the requirements, salary and benefits were given. It was also clearly stated that applicants needed to take an aptitude test (能力倾向测试) and an interview. However, looking at the whole advertisement, one could not find any contact information of the company.
Most interested applicants thought that it was the company’s HR department’s carelessness or a printing error. They therefore waited patiently for the newspaper to publish an amendment(订正). But instead of waiting for the newspaper to publish the company details, another three applicants took the initiative(主动性) to find out the company’s contact information themselves.
Tim did a search on the Internet. By typing the company’s name, he easily obtained all the information including its contact number. Lisa called up the local telephone number search service and found out the company’s office number. She called up the office and got the required contact information. Donna put in a greater effort in her search. She remembered seeing a poster by the same company in the city so she drove all the way down and made a few rounds to search for it. She finally found it together with the company’s contact information.
Three days after that advertisement was published in the newspaper, most interested applicants were still waiting eagerly for an amendment. On the other hand, the application letters and resumes of Tim, Lisa and Donna had already reached the hands of the company’s HR manager. They were then called up for an interview. During the interview, all went well and immediately they were hired. The three of them were a little surprised at how fast things went on. They were expecting for an aptitude test as stated in the advertisement. The HR director answered them, smiling, “Our test is hidden in the advertisement itself. To be a good salesperson in this age, he or she has to be broad-minded and very importantly, does not follow rigid (死板的) steps or rules. You are all clever. In a short time, you’ve managed to find ways of contacting us. It shows clearly that you have passed the test with flying colors!”
The fools sit around waiting for their chances whereas the wise actively take actions with great initiative.According to the passage the company wanted to test the applicants’ ______.
| A．sales skills | B．carefulness | C．attitude | D．initiative |
Whose search skill is the easiest of all?
| A．Tim’s. | B．Lisa’s. | C．Donna’s. | D．None. |
What can we infer from the passage?
| A．The HR manager of the company made a mistake. |
| B．The company meant to omit (遗漏) its contact information. |
| C．The HR manager of the company was unfit for his / her job. |
| D．A printing error occurred in the advertisement in the newspaper. |
Which of the statements is NOT correct according to the passage?
| A．Many applicants thought the company made a mistake. |
| B．The advertisement was very special to many applicants. |
| C．Whoever found the company’s contact information didn’t need to have an interview. |
| D．The company needed broad-minded and clever salespersons. |
The writer wants to tell us through this passage that ______.
| A．no contact information seen in an advertisement might not be the company’s mistake |
| B．applicants should be careful not to be fooled by the company’s advertisement |
| C．opportunity always belongs to whoever is active and broad-minded |
| D．there are many successful chances to be found in this age |
What makes one person more intelligent than another? What makes one person a genius, like the brilliant Albert Einstein, and another person a fool? Are people born intelligent or stupid, or is intelligence the result of where and how you live? These are very old questions and the answers to them are still not clear.
We know, however, that just being born with a good mind is not enough. In some ways, the mind is like a leg or an arm muscle. It needs exercise. Mental exercise is particularly important for young children. Many child psychologists (心理学家) think that parents should play with their children more often and give them problems to think about. The children are then more likely to grow up bright and intelligent. If, on the other hand, children are left alone a great deal with nothing to do, they are more likely to become dull and unintelligent.
Parents should also be careful with what they say to young children. According to some psychologists, if parents are always telling a child that he or she is a fool or an idiot, then the child is more likely to keep doing silly and foolish things. So it is probably better for parents to say very positive things to their children, such as “That was a very clever thing you did.” or “You are such a smart child.”The words “intelligent” and “brilliant” in the first paragraph probably mean _______ while “dull” in the second paragraph means ________.
| A．bright and splendid; slow in thinking and understanding |
| B．pretty and handsome; ordinary-looking |
| C．great and important; common |
| D．hopeful and helpful; careless |
According to the context we can guess that a genius is ________ while an idiot is ________.
| A．a normal person; a funny person |
| B．a strong person; a weak person |
| C．a highly intelligent person; a foolish or weak-minded person |
| D．a famous person; an ordinary person |
A person ________ is more likely to become a genius.
| A．whose parents are clever |
| B．often thinking about difficult problems |
| C．often helped by his parents and teachers |
| D．born with a good brain and putting it into active use |
It is better for parents ________.
| A．to praise and encourage their children more often |
| B．to be hard on their children |
| C．to leave their children alone with nothing to do |
| D．to give their children as much help as possible |
Which of the following is NOT true according to the article?
| A．Parents play an important part in their children’s growth. |
| B．The less you use your mind the duller you may become. |
| C．Intelligence is obviously the result of where and how you live. |
| D．What makes a person bright or stupid is still under discussion. |
O. Henry was a pen name used by an American writer of short stories. His real name was William Sydney Porter. He was born in North Carolina in 1862. As a young boy he lived an exciting life. He did not go to school for very long, but he managed to teach himself everything he needed to know. When he was about 20 years old, O. Henry went to Texas, where he tried different jobs. He first worked on a newspaper, and then had a job in a bank, when some money went missing from the bank. O. Henry was believed to have stolen it. Because of that, he was sent to prison. During the three years in prison, he learned to write short stories. After he got out of prison, he went to New York and continued writing. He wrote mostly about New York and the life of the poor there. People liked his stories, because simple as the tales were, they would finish with a sudden change at the end, to the reader’s surprise. In which order did O. Henry do the following things?
a. Lived in New York. b. Worked in a bank. c. Travelled to Texas.
d. Was put in prison. e. Had a newspaper Job. f. Learned to write stories.
| A．e. c. f. b. d. a | B．c. e. b. d. f. a | C．e. b. d. c. a. f. | D．c. b. e. d. a f. |
People enjoyed reading O. Henry’s stories because
| A．they had surprise endings | B．they were easy to understand |
| C．they showed his love for the poor | D．they were about New York City |
O. Henry went to prison because .
| A．people thought he had stolen money from the newspaper |
| B．he broke the law by not using his own name |
| C．he wanted to write stories about prisoners |
| D．people thought he had taken money that was not his |
What do we know about O. Henry before he began writing?
| A．He was well-educated. | B．He was not serious about his work. |
| C．He was devoted to the poor. | D．He was very good at learning. |
Where did O. Henry get most material for his short stories?
| A．His life inside the prison. | B．The newspaper articles he wrote. |
| C．The city and people of New York. | D．His exciting early life as a boy. |
In the United States, when one becomes rich, he wants people to know it. And even if he does not become very rich, he wants people to think that he is. That is what ‘keeping up with the Joneses’ is about, It is the story of someone who tried to look as rich as his neighbours.
The expression was first used in 1913 by a young American called Arthur Momand. He told this story about himself. He began earning $ 125 a week at the age of 23. That was a lot of money in those days. He got married and moved with his wife to a very wealthy neighbourhood outside New York City. When he saw that rich people rode horses, Momand went horseback riding every day. When he saw that rich people had servants, Momand and his wife also hired a servant and gave big parties for their new neighbours.
It was like a race, but one could never finish this race because one was always trying to keep up. The race ended for Momand and his wife when they could no longer pay for their new way of life. They moved back to an apartment in New York City.
Momand looked around him and noticed that many people do things just to keep up with rich life--style of their neighbours. He saw the funny side of it and started to write a series of short stories, He called it ‘Keeping up with the Joneses’ because ‘Jones’ is a very common name in the United States.’ Keeping up with the Joneses’ came to mean keeping up with rich lifestyle of the people around you. Momand’s series appeared in different newspapers across the country for over 28 years.
People never seem to get tired of keeping up with the Joneses. And there are ‘Jonses’ in every city of the world. But one must get tired of trying to keep up with the Joneses because no matter what one does, Mr. Jones always seems to be ahead.Some people want to keep up with the Joneses because they ______.
| A．want to be as rich as their neighbours |
| B．want others to know or to think that they are rich |
| C．don’t want others to know they are rich |
| D．want to be happy |
It can be inferred from the story that rich people like to ________.
| A．live outside New York City | B．live in New York City |
| C．live in apartments | D．have many neighbours |
The underlined word neighbourhood in the second paragraph means ________.
| A．a person who lives near another | B．people living in an area |
| C．an area near the place referred to | D．an area in another town or city |
Arthur Momand used the name ‘Jones’ in his series of short stories because’ Jones’ is ________.
| A．an important name | B．a popular name in the United States |
| C．his neighbour’s name | D．not a good name |
According to the writer, it is to keep up with the Joneses.
| A．correct | B．interesting | C．impossible | D．good |
粤公网安备 44130202000953号