A new study says one part of the human brain may become smaller as the result of a condition known as jet lag. Jet lag results from flying long distances in an airplane. People with jet lag may feel extremely tired for several days. They may also have problems thinking clearly and remembering.

Recently a researcher at the University of Bristol in Britain reported the findings of his jet lag study, which involved twenty young women who worked for international airlines. They had served passengers on airplanes for five years. These flight attendants flew across many countries and at least seven time zones. In the study, the flight attendants had different amounts of time to recover from jet lag. Half the women spent five days or fewer in their home areas between long flights The other half spent more than fourteen days in their home areas.

The researcher took some saliva from the women's mouths to measure levels of a hormone(荷尔蒙) that increases during stress (紧张). He tested them to see if they could remember where black spots appeared on a computer screen. And he took pictures of their brains to measure the size of the brain's temporal lobes (脑叶).

It was found that the women who had less time between flights had smaller right temporal lobes. This area of the brain deals with recognizing and remembering what is seen. The same group performed worse and had slower reaction times on the visual memory test. And their saliva samples showed higher levels of stress hormones.

The researcher believes the brain needs at least ten days to recover after a long trip. He says airline workers told him their ability to remember got worse after working on planes for about four years. Other studies have shown that increased feelings of stress can cause a loss of cells in the part of the brain that controls memory.

Scientists say more tests are needed to study the effects of jet lag on the brain. They want to find out if too much jet lag could permanently (永久性的) affect memory.

According to the text, jet lag _________.

A. can cause difficulties in speaking

B. can make people feel tired for a few weeks

C. can be only found in flight attendants

D. can be caused by flying over several time zones

It can be inferred from the text that _________.

A. the conclusion is refused by many scientists

B. scientists fear that this research is not done properly

C. every scientific conclusion needs the support from many tests

D. the women who were examined in the research were not healthy

From the result of the research we can see that _________.

A. the women who have longer rest at home show better memory

B. the women who fly in short time have smaller right temporal lobes

C. the women who have longer flights fail the memory test

D. the women who rest more than 14 days produce less hormones

What is the subject discussed in the text?

A. The cause of jet lag.      B. A story of a group of flight attendants.

C. The importance of having enough rest after flights.

D. A research about the effects of jet lag on the brain.

1) Your teens don’t want you to be their friends. What they need is for you to be a reliable responsible role model worthy of their respect, and not some overgrown child who wears too tight jeans or T-shirts with slogans advocating the good points of 100 proof liquor.

2) Don’t debate the teen ever. If she wants to debate, suggest she sign up for the Debate Club. If you buy into their teen logic (which is basically illogic, the product of an immature brain and every extreme of emotion known to mankind) your mouth will go dry. Teens need to know that no means no. Remember when your teen was two years old and he said “no” a lot? Well now it’s your turn, particularly when your teen wants to engage in behaviors that are dangerous.

3) Don’t buy your teen a car. If you do, he will total it in record time. Guaranteed. The teen should earn the car, or at least a portion of it (and by that I don’t mean one of the tires). You know how you take much better care of an item of clothing you spent a fortune on compared to one you bought in a bargain basement? It’s the same thing, only a car can do serious damage.

4) Encourage sports participation even if your teen has two left feet. In some sports, two left feet won’t knock him out of the box, so to speak. Sports participation develops perseverance and cheerfully functioning as a team member. You also will know where your child is every day after school (on the field, that is, or at a rival school). Just make sure you root for the right team, okay? Been there, done that.

5) Let the school know you in a good way so that school personnel do not dive under the desk when you approach. If you are asked to speak at the school, your teen will feel mighty proud. If you make something for the bake sale, try to make it taste edible and if you can’t see it through, do yourself and your child a favor and buy something at the local bakery or supermarket.

6) To know your teens’ friends is to know your teens. Teens have a secret life, and a parent’s goal is to find out secrecy that is sometimes thicker than the CIA and the KGB combined. If you really want to know what your kid is up to, get to know their friends. How? By being warm and kind, and by asking questions that don’t sound like an interrogation（审讯）, but serve that purpose without their knowing it.

1. When your kids are doing something that might negatively affect their future, you should _____.

A. have your kids express their opinions fully and then discuss with them

B. think about how you can be their close friends

C. report that to their school immediately

D. say no and tell them that they must stop

2. According to the passage, as a parent, you should encourage your kids __________.

A. to wear too tight jeans              B. to sign up for the Debate Club

C. to be greatly involved in sports       D. to make as many friends as they can

3. The underlined word “total” in the third paragraph probably means ________.

     A. damage     B. add      C. buy      D. earn

4. The passage mainly wants you to know that __________.

     A. kids have their secrecy and freedom

B. Raising Teenagers calls for certain parenting skills

     C. your teen needs some house rules         

D. the family is changing

One of the most difficult questions to answer is how much a job is worth. We naturally expect that a doctor’s salary will be higher than a bus conductor’s wage. But the question becomes much more difficult to answer when we compare, say, a miner with an engineer, or an unskilled man working on an oil-rig(钻油机) in the North Sea with a teacher in a secondary school. What the doctor, the engineer and teacher have is many years of training in order to obtain the necessary qualifications for their professions. We feel instinctively that these skills and these years, when they were studying instead of earning money, should be rewarded. At the same time we recognize that the work of the miner and the oil-rig laborer is both hard and dangerous, and that they must be highly paid for the risks they take.

Another factor we must take into consideration is how socially useful a man’s work is, regardless of the talents he may bring to it. Most people would agree that looking after the sick or teaching children is more important than, say, selling secondhand cars or improving the taste of toothpaste by adding a red stripe to it. Yet it is almost certain that the used car salesman earns more than the nurse, and that research chemist earns more than the school teacher.

Indeed, this whole question of just rewards can be turned on its head. You can argue that a man who does a job which brings him personal satisfaction is already receiving part of his reward in the form of a so-called “psychic(精神的) wage”, and that it is the man with the boring, repetitive job who needs more money to make up for the soul-destroying monotony(单调) of his work. It is significant that that those jobs which are traditionally regarded as “vocations” --- nursing, teaching and the Church, for example --- continue to be poorly paid, while others, such as those in the world of sport or entertainment, carry financial rewards out of all proportion to their social worth.

Although the amount of money that people earn is in reality largely determined by market forces, this should not prevent us from seeking some way to decide what is the right pay for the job. A starting point for such an investigation would be to try to decide the ratio which ought to exist between the highest and the lowest paid. The picture is made more complicate by two factors: firstly by the “social wage”, i.e, the welfare benefits which every citizen receives; and secondly, by the taxation system, which is often used as an instrument of social justice by taxing high incomes at a very high rate indeed. Allowing for these two things, most countries now regard a ratio of 7:1 as socially acceptable. If it is less, the highly-qualified people carrying heavy responsibilities become disillusioned, and might even end up by emigration(移民) (the so-called “brain-drain” is an evidence that this can happen). If it is more, the gap between rich and poor will be so great that it will lead social tensions and ultimately to violence.

1. The professional man, such as the doctor, should be well paid because ______.

A. he has spent several years learning how to do his job

B. his work involves much great intelligence than, say, a bus conductor’s

C. he has to work much harder than most other people

D. he knows more than other people about his subject

2. The “brain-drain” is an evidence that ______.

A. well-educated people are prepared to emigrate whenever they can get a better paid job

B. people with jobs or responsibility expect to be highly paid

C. high taxation is a useful and effective instrument of social justice

D. the poor are generally more patriotic(爱国的) than the rich

3. As far as rewarding people for their work is concerned, the writer, believes that ______.

A. we should pay for socially-useful work, regardless of the person’s talent

B. we should pay people according to their talents

C. market forces will determine how much a person is paid

D. qualified people should be the highest paid

4. The argument of the “psychic wage” is used to explain why ______.

A. people who do socially important work are not always well paid

B. people who do monotonous jobs are highly paid

C. you should not try to compare the pay of different professions

D. some professional people are paid more than others

In meditation(冥想) ，people sit quietly and focus their attention on their breath. As they breathe in and out, they attend to their feelings. As thoughts go through their minds. they let them go. Breathe. Let go. Breathe. Let go.

According to a recent study at the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, Massachusetts, three months of training in this kind of meditation causes a market change in how the brain allocates(分配) attention. It appears that the ability to let go thoughts that come into mind frees the brain to attend to more rapidly changing things and events in the outside world. Expert mediators are better than other people at catching such fast-changing stimuli(刺激), like facial expressions.

The study provides evidence for changes in the workings of the brain with mental training. People can learn and improve abilities of all sorts with practice. everything from driving to playing the piano. The study has shown that meditation is good for the brain, It appears to reduce pressure and promote a sense of well-being.

In an experiment, 17 volunteers with no meditation experience in the experimental group spent three months meditating 10 to 12 hours a day. A control group also with no meditation experience meditated for 20 minutes a day over the same period. Both groups were then given the tests with two numbers in a group of letters. As both group looked for the numbers, their brain activity was recorded.

Everyone could catch the first number. But the brain recordings showed that the less experienced mediators tended to grasp the first number and hang onto it, so they missed the second number. Those with more experience gave less attention to the first number. as if letting it go, which led to an increased ability to grasp the second number, This shows that attention can change with practice.

Just ask Daniel Levision, who meditated for three months as part of the study.” I am a much better listener,” he said. “I do not get lost in my own personal reaction to what people are saying.”

The underlined word “them” in Paragraph 1 refers to ________.

A. feelings             B. minds               C. people               D. thoughts

Meditations manage their daily tasks better because they ________.

A. are given less pressure                    B. allocate their attention better

C. have more stimuli for life                D. practice them more frequently

In the experiment, volunteers doing meditation for longer hours ________.

A. were more likely to catch both of the members

B. were used to memorizing numbers in groups

C. usually ignored the first number observed

D. paid more attention to numbers than to letters

The study proves that ________.

A. meditation improves one’s health

B. brain activity can be recorded

C. human attention can be trained

D. mediators have a good sense of hearing

When women sit together to watch a movie on TV, they usually talk simultaneously（同时的）about a variety of subjects, including children, men, careers and what’ s happening in their lives. When groups of men and women watch a movie together, the men usually end up telling the women to shut up. Men can either talk or watch the screen -- they can’ t do both -- and they don’ t understand that women can. Besides, women consider that the point of all getting together is to have a good time and develop relationships -- not just to sit there like couch potatoes staring at the screen.
During the ad breaks, a man often asks a woman to explain the plot and tell him where the relationship between the characters is going. He is unable, unlike women, to read the subtle body language signals that reveal how the characters are feeling emotionally. Since women originally spent their days with the other women and children in the group,  they developed the ability to communicate successfully in order to maintain relationships. For a woman, speech continues to have such a clear purpose: to build relationships and make friends. For men, to talk is to relate the facts.
Men see the telephone as a communication tool for sending facts and information to other people, but a woman sees it as a means of bonding. A woman can spend two weeks on vacation with her girlfriend and, when she returns home, telephone the same girlfriend and talk for another two hours.
There is no convincing evidence that social conditioning, the fact that girls’ mothers talked them more, is the reason why girls talk more than boys. Psychiatrist Dr Michael Lewis, author Social Behaviour and Language Acquisition, conducted experiments that found mothers talked to and looked at, baby girls more often than baby boys. Scientific evidence shows parents respond the brain bias of their children. Since a girl’ s brain is better organized to send and receive speech, we therefore talk to them more. Consequently, mothers who try to talk to their sons are usually pointed to receive only short grunts in reply

1. 1.

   While watching TV with others, women usually talk a lot because they______.

   1. A.
      are afraid of awkward silence with their families and friends
   2. B.
      can both talk and watch the screen at the same time
   3. C.
      think they can have a good time and develop relationships
   4. D.
      have to explain the plot and body language to their husbands
2. 2.

   After a vacation with her girlfriend, a woman would talk to her again on the phone for hours in order to ______.

   1. A.
      experience the happy time again
   2. B.
      keep a close tie with her
   3. C.
      recommend her a new scenic spot
   4. D.
      remind her of something forgotten
3. 3.

   What does the author want to tell us most?

   1. A.
      Women’ s brains are better organized for language and communication
   2. B.
      Women love to talk because they are more sociable than men
   3. C.
      Men do not like talking because they rely more on facts
   4. D.
      Social conditioning is not the reason why women love talking
4. 4.

   Which of the following would be the best title for the passage?

   1. A.
      Women Are Socially Trained to Talk
   2. B.
      Talking Maintains Relationships
   3. C.
      Women Love to Talk
   4. D.
      Men Talk Differently from Women