题目内容
Some interesting recent research by a team from MRC Applied Psychology Unit at Cambridge analysed the sound structure of a large number of first names, and found some interesting differences between men and women. It seems the sexes do not sound the same. The claims are of course limited by the size of their sample--1,667 entries taken from a dictionary of English first names--but the claims they make can easily be checked against our intuitions, and they seem very plausible:
-- Female first names tend to be longer than males, in terms of the number of syllables they contain. Males are much more likely to have a monosyllabic first name (Bob, Jim Fred, Frank, John), and much less likely to have a name of three or more syllables (Christopher, Nicholas). By contrast, there are few monosyllabic female names in the list (Ann, Joan, May) , and many of them are trisyllabic or more (Katherine, Elizabeth, Amanda).
-- 95% of male names have a first syllable which is strongly stressed, whereas only 75% of female names show this pattern. It is not difficult to think of female names which begin with an unstressed syllable (Patricia, Elizabeth, Rebecca, Michelle), but male names are few and far between (Jerome, Dementrius). In fact, none of the popular British male names in top-2-1ists from the past 75 years has had an unstressed initial syllable--and only three American names.
-- The stressed syllables of female names tend to make much more use of the high front vowel / I/, such as Lisa, Tina, Celia, Maxine, and the archetypal Fifi and Mimi. Male names in /I/ are far less common (Steve, Keith, Peter).
-- Female pet names tend to be longer than male. A dissyllabic pet name could be either male or female, but a monosyllabic one is much more likely to be male. Jackie could be either sex, but Jack is male. Several other pairs share this expectancy, such as Bill /Billie and Bob/Bollie.
-- Female names are much more likely to end in a vowel, as with Linda, Judy, Deborah, Barbara. If not a vowel, the last sound will very likely be a continuant, especially a nasal (Jean, Kathleen, Sharon, Ann). By contrast, plosives are much more likely to be found in male endings (Bob, David, Dick, Jack).
It is of course difficult, perhaps impossible, to explain these trends. Could the sound-symbolic associations of /I/, such as smallness and brightness, explain the bias of that vowel？ Can we relate the trend towards use of an initial stressed syllable to greater masculine aggressiveness？ One thing is sure: it is much more difficult to generalize safely about female names. Popular male names are used much more predictably. There are several male names which have appeared on every list of the top 20 names in recent times (e. g. John, David), but no one female name appears on all lists. People are much readier to be inventive and different with female names.
The writer adopts a (n) ______ tone to report the findings of the research in the sound structure of first names.
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According to the research, which of the following statements is true？
Insects which eat grain and other stored food can be partially controlled by cooling the grain. But the damage insects cause can be further limited by making them even more susceptible to cold, says a Canadian researcher.
Insect pests die if they freeze, but many have the ability to become "supercool", remaining alive even when the temperature drops to - 10℃. However, Paul Fields of the Agriculture Canada Research Station in Winnipeg has discovered that the ability of these insects to supercool can be seriously affected by "ice-nucleating-active bacteria". When the bacteria are present, the insects freeze and die at a higher temperature than normal.
Ice-nucleating-active bacteria are found naturally on most plant leaves. They are also grown commercially for use in cloud seeding and in making artificial snow.
Fields added these bacteria to wheat which was stored at a temperature of - 10℃ and contained the rusty grain beetle. He found that when the bacteria accounted for only 10 parts per million of the grain, the beetles' supercooling point rose from - 11.3℃ to - 7.1℃, so more died. At concentrations of 100 ppm or 1000 ppm, the bacteria increased the supercooling point to as high as -6.3℃, which resulted in more than 75 percent of the beetles dying.
Fields also applied the bacteria to two other species of grain beetle, Sitophilus granarius and Oryzaephilus surinamensis, keeping them at - 10℃. He found that more of these beetles also died. First, though, he gradually acclimatized some of the insects to cold, to simulate the increase in tolerance to cold which they normally develop as winter approaches. Fields found that the insects that had been acclimatized were less affected by cold than the beetles that had not been acclimatized, but that more of them still died at - 10℃.
Fields says that the technique of using ice-nucleating-active bacteria leaves no noxious chemical residues and poses little risk to the people who apply the treatment. It is also effective against insects which have become resistant to pesticides.
Which of the following statements about ice-nucleating-active bacteria is true？
The seating at a press conference is not by accident. The regulars have marked seats in the first three or four rows, and beyond that the seating is on a first-come, first-served basis. In a way that no one talks about, this allows a press secretary to let you know about his or the President's displeasure. If a reporter who has been in the front row walks in one day and finds he is sitting five rows back, he knows what has happened.
This fixed seating allows the President to know who is sitting where. Johnson studied the charts, and Nixson always knew where the reporters who mattered, in his view, were seated. He knew where he could go if he needed to change the subject. The lack of follow-up to an answer has always been one of the flaws of the press conference format. The press corps has never done a good job on it. I tried to go into a press conference with five questions I would like to ask, and a backup list of five more. But I had to be ready to follow up someone else's question.
There are other weaknesses in press conferences, of course, among them the fact that ninety-nine percent of the questions are political. Such issues as genetic-engineering, overpopulation, the global economy do not often get raised. We have not figured out yet what our responsibility should be reporting these issues before they get to be such immense problems.
Ideally, a presidential news conference should be held every ten days to two weeks, live, in an unstructured seating. Television works best when it puts you there, in a situation where the camera has the least influence on the person. With our improvement in technology, we are coming to that point soon. The new minicams spit our broadcast-ready videotape on the spot.
According to the passage, at a presidential press conference of about 200 people, will be reporters.
SECTION C NEWS BROADCAST
Directions: In this section, you will hear several news items. Listen to them carefully and then answer the questions that follow.
听力原文： Doctors yesterday warned amorous British couples not to try for a millennium baby as hospitals could be overloaded, and they might even end up with a handicapped child. The warning was issued as surveys showed as many as one in 10 British couples are trying for a baby to be born on the magic stroke of midnight.
What's the doctors' attitude toward British couples planning to have millennium babies？
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