2013年英语四级考试每日一练(6月27日)
1. 回答58-63题:
The survey by the Kaiser Family Foundation is mentioned to illustrate the idea that __
A) kids don't always follow parents' rules
B) only few parents believe the good news
C) much media use results in bad health
D) parents' rules make a huge difference
2. Questions 63-9are based on the following passage.Public speaking fills most people with dread. Humiliation (羞辱) is the greatest fear; self-exposure and failing to appeal to the audience come a close second. Women hate it most, since girls are pressurized from an early age to be concerned with appearances of all kinds.
Most people have plenty of insecurities, and this seems like a situation that will bring them out. If you were under pressure to be perfect, you are terrified of falling in the most public of ways.
While extroverts (性格外向者 ) will feel less fear before the ordeal, it does not mean they will necessarily do it better.
Some very shy people manage to shine. When I met the British comedian Julian Clary, he was shy and cautious, yet his TV performances are perfect.
In fact, personality is not the best predictor of who does it well Regardless of what you are like in real life, the key seems to be to act yourself.
Actual acting, as in performing the scripted lines of a character other than yourself, does not do the job. While politicians may limit damage by having carefully rehearsed, written scripts to speak from, there is always a hidden awareness among the
audience that the words might not be true.
Likewise, the incredibly perfect speeches of many American academics are far from natural. You may end up buying their book on the way out, but soon afterwards, it is much like fast food, and you get a nameless sense that you've been cheated.
Although, as Earl Spencer proved at his sister Princess Diana's funeral, it is possible both to prepare every word and to act naturally. A script rarely works and it is used to help most speakers. But, being yourself doesn't work either. If you spoke as if you were in your own kitchen, it would be too authentic, too unaware of the need to communicate with an audience.
I remember going to see British psychiatrist R. D. Laing speak in public. He behaved like a seriously odd person, talking off the top of his head. Although he was talking about madness and he wrote on mental illness, he seemed to be exhibiting rather than explaining it.
The best psychological place from which to speak is an unselfconscious self-consciousness, providing the illusion of being natural. Studies suggest that this state of "flow", as psychologists call it, is very satisfying.
注意:此部分试题请在答题卡2上作答。
Women hate public speaking most mainly because of
A. their upbringing very early on
B. their inability to appeal to the audience
C. their sense of greater public pressure
D. their sense of greater humiliation
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3. 回答9-2题
Caring for Elderly Parents Catches ManyUnprepared
Last July, Julie Baldocchi's mother had a massive stroke(中风)and was paralyzed. Baldocchisuddenly had to become a family caregiver, something that she wasn't preparedfor.
"I was flying by the seat of my pants," says Baldocchi,an employment specialist in San Francisco. Both of her parents are 83, and sheknew her father couldn't handle her mother's care.
The hospital recommended putting her mother in a nursing home.Baldocchi wasn't willing to do that. But moving her back into her parents' homecreated other problems.
Baldocchi, 48, is married and lives about a mile away from herparents. She has a full-time job and has back problems that make it difficultfor her to lift her mother. "I couldn't do it all," she says."But I didn't even know how to find help. "
With help from the Family Caregiver Alliance, she eventually hireda live-in caregiver. "But even if you plan intellectually and legally,you're never ready for the emotional impact," Baldocchi says. In the firsttwo months after her mother's stroke, she lost about 30 pounds as stressmounted.
More than 42 million Americans provide family care giving for anadult who needs help with daily activities, according to a 2009 survey by theAARP. An additional 61.6 million provided at least some care during the year.
And many are unprepared.
Starting with the paperwork
While many parents lack an advance care directive, it's the mostbasic and important step they can take. The directive includes several parts,including: a durable power of attorney(授权书),which gives someonelegal authority to make financial decisions on another's behalf; a health careproxy(代理委托书),which is similar tothe power of attorney, except it allows someone to make decisions regardingmedical treatment; and a living will that outlines instructions for end-of-lifecare. (For example, parents can say if they want to be kept alive by artificialmeasures.)
"It's invaluable for the kids, because it's hard to makethose decisions for a parent," says Jennifer Cona, an elder-law attorneyat Genser & Cona in Melville, N.Y..
An advance care directive is the first line of defense if asituation arises, says Kathleen Kelly, executive director of the FamilyCaregiver Alliance, which supports and educates caregivers. Without an advancedirective, the family will have to petition the court to be appointed theparent's legal guardian, says AgingCare. com.
It's important for families to talk about long-term care so theadult children know their parents' preferences,wishes and goals, says LynnFeinberg, a caregiving expert at AARP. But it's not an easy conversation.
Elderly parents are sometimes suspicious of their children'sfinancial motives, says Susan John, a financial planner at Financial Focus inWolfeboro, N.H.. One client asked John to hold a family meeting because they neededan intermediary to talk about financial issues, she says.
And when there are many siblings(兄弟姐妹),the familydecisions can become a three-ring circus with much acrimony(尖刻),says Ann-Margaret Carrozza, an elder-lawattorney in Glen Cove, N.Y..
Families who need information and help sorting out disagreementscan call on elder-law attorneys, financial planners, geriatric(老年人的)care managers and care giversupport,rouos. In February, AARP said it will offer its members a newcaregiving support service through financial services firm Genworth. Navigatingthe long-term care system
Many families are unprepared for quick decisions, especially whenthey find out that Medicare doesn't pay for long-term care, Feinberg says.
The median cost of a year in a private room at a nursing home in2011 was $77,745, according to Genworth.
And only those who have spent most of their assets can qualify forMedicaid to pay for the nursing home.
Assisted living is another option. Residents can have their ownapartment to maintain some independence.
But the facilities generally provide personal care services, suchas meals, housekeeping and assistance with activities.
Still, it's not cheap: The national median cost in 2011 was$39,135, according to Genworth. Assisted living isn't covered by Medicaid.
If they have a choice, at least 90% of elderly parents prefer tostay at home as long as they can, according to
AARP research.
But it is possible that the parents can no longer safely live athome, and it can be hard for children to move them into an adult care facility.
There may be another option. Sometimes the home can be modified soa parent can stay there. For example,
Baldocchi put in a chair lift for her mother. She also arrangedfor a home caregiver.
The job of family caregivers
Family Caregivers take over many responsibilities. One might manage a parent'sfinances, while another sibling will take the parent to doctors' appointmentsand shopping. Those who live with a parent take on a significant and sustainedburden of care.
Jan Walker moved into her mother's home in Leesburg, Fla. Afterher mother, who is 83, had fallen, she wasn't able to get around as well.
Walker, 55, has three brothers. But she is the only daughter, is divorced andhas no children. "I always knew that this was the role that I would have.and I guess my mind was prepared for it," says Walker, who now is afull-time caregiver and works from home as a tutorial instructor for a digitalscrapbooking(剪贴簿)website.
"When you get into the trenches, it's literally baptism(洗礼)by fire," she says. "New things come up. It's not just aboutadvance planning for finances or medical care. It's everything," she says.
Caregivers need to also watch their own health. "There issuch a thing as caregiver burnout," Cona says.
Among female caregivers 50 and older, 20% reported symptoms ofdepression, according to a 2010 study on working caregivers by MetLife.
"It's a hard job," Walker says. "But mostworthwhile things are hard. She was always there for me when I needed a helpinghand. It's only natural that I be here for her now. "
If it is hard forchildren to move their parent who can't live independently into an adult carefacility, they can_________________so the parent can stay there.
4. How to Visualize Your Success
Have you ever heard of visualization (可视化)? Of course you have. Everybody's heard of visualization and everybody partakes in it whether they realize it or not. How it works though is an altogether different matter. I want to take a closer look today at the mechanics of why visualizing works without necessarily delving into concepts and theories that cannot be proven.
The brain has great difficulty in distinguishing between what's true and what's imagined. There is an off-cited (经常被引用的) example of an experiment conducted by Austrahan Psychologist, Alan Richardson. He took some basketball players and split them into 3 equal groups. One group was told to practice their free throw technique twenty minutes per day. The next group was told to spend twenty minutes per day visualizing, but not attempting free throws, and the final group wasn't allowed to either practice or visualize. At the end of the test period the group that had done nothing remained as they were, but both the other groups showed similar degrees of improvement, The people who only visualized playing basketball were able to perform almost as well as the ones who had actually practiced.
"How can that be so?"
Firstly, the people practicing would miss some shots. Each time they missed they had in effect, practiced how to miss.
The people that were visualizing would be hitting every basket so they were building up the feelings and memory of how to be successful.
Forging a Path through a Meadow
Imagine walking home from a new job. You suddenly realize that there is a meadow of long grass that will cut 20 minutes off your walk. If you live in New York you're going to need a great imagination for this one.
The first few times you can barely see which way you had walked the previous day. However, after 10 or 20 times you can clearly see a pathway starting to form, and after 100 times all the grass is worn away and there's a farmer with a shotgun
and large dog waiting for you at the end. Let's presume our gun-toting friend is a big softie and he allows you to use that route as long as you want. What are the odds that next time you try a slightly different direction? Slim to none would be my guess.
After all, you know this way works and you have a lovely easy path.
On the other hand, if Farmer Giles starts taking pot shotsat you and sportingly lets the dog try and shoot you too, before releasing it to sink its gnashers into your rear end, then you'll probably find a new way home once you're released from
hospital.
The next time you're walking home you opt against reacquainting yourself with Fido and spot another meadow further along the road. The same process then begins to take place only this time the original path you made has started to grow back.
How We Create a Path in Our Mind That is what happens when we form thoughts in our mind. The first time we have a new thought it is a weakling(虚弱者 ) of a thought that has sand kicked in its face by stronger thoughts and beliefs. Each time you re-think it though it grows in strength as the physical pathway becomes more and more well-defined. Not only that, but if it is a belief that contradicts one you already hold, the older belief starts to atrophy and die.
This also explains why we have the same thoughts over and over again and why people have difficulty snapping negative loops (循环) of thinking. The pathway has been established and it's just easier to continue following it than trying to think
about something new and form a new connection in the brain.
Making Visualization Work for You
Visualization is an incredibly successful and simple way of speeding up the process by fooling the unconscious into believing that you have already done something before you have. That's what the basketball visualizers were doing, fooling their own unconscious into thinking they know how to hit basket after basket. Of course this in and of itself will not turn you into an NBA star, you do actually have to practice as well, but it will help you succeed more quickly.
All you need to do to be successful at this is to visualize yourself doing something, as you would like to do it. Profound stuff, huh? Seriously though, that is all there is to it. How long you do it each day will affect the speed of change and it's really
not advisable visualizing your success for 20 minutes per day and then spending 10 hours worrying about failing and replaying negative stuff in your head. It kind of defeats the object.
You can also incorporate the "fake it till you make it" method in with your visualization to help speed up the process.
This is simply a matter of pretending you are already proficient at something before you really are. Again, it's simply a way of tricking your unconscious and getting it to do what you want it to do.
Some people have difficulty with this process and tell me it's being unrealistic. Well yeh, maybe they're right, but who cares? If you want to be shackled by the chains of realism then go ahead, knock yourself out, but let me tell you this. There are few highly successful people out there that haven't used this method or visualization at one time or another. In fact, successful people don't care too much for reality; it just gets in the way and slows them down. What about you?
阅读以上短文,回答2-1题
According to the passage, visualization works ______
[A] through delving into concepts and theories
[B] without searching deeply into concepts and theories
[C] in a way that could be proven
[D] when playing basketball
5. Section A
Directions: In this section, there is a passage with ten blanks. You are required to select one word for each blank from a list of choices given in a word bank following the passage. Read the passage through carefully before making your choices. Each choice in the bank is identified by a letter. Please mark the corresponding letter for each item on Answer Sheet 2 with a single line through the centre. You may not use any of the words in the bank more than once.
Questions 47 to 56 are based on the following passage.
What determines the kind of person you are? What factors make you more or less bold, intelligent, or able to read a map? All of these are influenced by the interaction of your genes and the environment in which you were 47 . The study of how genes and environment interact to influence 48 activity is known as behavioral genetics. Behavioral genetics has made important 49 to the biological revolution, providing information about the extent to which biology influences mind, brain and behavior.
Any research that suggests that 50 to perform certain behaviors are based in biology is controversial. Who wants to be told that there are limitations to what you can 51 based on something that is beyond your control, such as your genes? It is easy to accept that genes control physical characteristics such as sex, race and eye color. But can genes also determine whether people will get divorced, how 52 they are, or what career they are likely to choose? A concern of psychological scientists is the 53 to which all of these characteristics are influenced by nature and nurture(养育), by genetic makeup and the environment. Increasingly, science 54 that genes lay the groundwork for many human traits. From this perspective, people are born 55 like undeveloped photographs: The image is already captured, but the way it 56 appears can vary based on the development process. However, the basic picture is there from the beginning.
注意:此部分试题请在答题卡2上作答。
[A] abilities [I] extent
[B] achieve [J] indicates
[C] appeal [K] proceeds
[D] complaints [L] psychological
[E] contributions [M] raised
[F] displayed [N] smart
[G] essentially [O] standard
[H] eventually
请在(47)处填上答案。
6. 根据以下材料回答1-2:
According to the passage, visualization works _______.
7. 根据以下资料回答2-12题
Who is the director of the movie "Inconvenient Truth" ?
8. What factors should physicians consider in the medical research?
9. 根据以下资料回答{TSE}题
What is the passage mainly about?
__________ __________ __________ __________ __________ __________ __________ __________ __________ __________.
10. 第49题: