[外语类试卷]雅思（阅读）模拟试卷54及答案与解析.doc

1、雅思（阅读）模拟试卷 54及答案与解析 一、 Reading Module (60 minutes) 0 Right-and left-handedness in humans Why do humans, virtually alone among all animal species, display a distinct left of right-handedness? Not even our closest relatives among the apes possess such decided lateral asymmetry, as psychologists call i

2、t. Yet about 90 per cent of every human population that has ever lived appears to have been right-handed. Professor Bryan Turner at Deakin University has studied the research literature on left-handedness and found that handedness goes with sid-edness. So nine out of the people are right-handed and

3、eight are right-footed. He noted that this distinctive asymmetry in the human population is itself systematic. Humans think in categories: black and white, up and down, left and right. Its a system of signs that enables us to categorise phenomena that are essentially ambiguous. Research has shown th

4、at there is a genetic or inherited element to handedness. But while left-handedness tends to run in families, neither left nor right handers will automatically produce off-spring with the same handedness; in fact about 6 per cent of children with two right-handed parents will be left-handed. However

5、, among two left-handed parents, perhaps 40 per cent of the children will also be left-handed. With one right and one left-handed parent, 15 to 20 per cent of the offspring will be left-handed. Even among identical twins who have exactly the same genes, one in six pairs will differ in their handedne

6、ss. What then makes people left-handed if it is not simply genetic? Other factors must be at work and researchers have turned to the brain for clues. In the 1860s the French surgeon and anthropologist, Dr Paul Broca, made the remarkable finding that patients who had lost their powers of speech as a

7、result of a stroke(a blood clot in the brain)had paralysis of the right half of their body. He noted that since the left hemisphere of the brain controls the right half of the body, and vice versa, the brain damage must have been in the brains left hemisphere. Psychologists now believe that among ri

8、ght-handed people, probably 95 per cent have their language centre in the left hemisphere, while 5 per cent have right-sided language. Left-handers, however, do not show the reverse pattern but instead a majority also have their language in the left hemisphere. Some 30 per cent have right hemisphere

9、 language. Dr Brinkman, a brain researcher at the Australian National University in Canberra, has suggested that evolution of speech went with right-handed preference. According to Brinkman, as the brain evolved, one side became specialised for fine control of movement(necessary for producing speech

10、)and along with this evolution came right-hand preference. According to Brinkman, most left-handers have left hemisphere dominance but also some capacity in the right hemisphere. She has observed that if a left-handed person is braindamaged in the left hemisphere, the recovery of speech is quite oft

11、en better and this is explained by the fact that left-handers have a more bilateral speech function. In her studies of macaque monkeys, Brinkman has noticed that primates(monkeys)seem to learn a hand preference from their mother in the first year of life but this could be one hand or the other. In h

12、umans, however, the specialisation in function of the two hemispheres results in anatomical differences: areas that are involved with the production of speech are usually larger on the left side than on the right. Since monkeys have not acquired the art of speech, one would not expect to see such a

13、variation but Brinkman claims to have discovered a trend in monkeys towards the asymmetry that is evident in the human brain. Two American researchers, Geschwind and Galaburda, studied the brains of human embryos and discovered that the left-right asymmetry exists before birth. But as the brain deve

14、lops, a number of things can affect it. Every brain is initially female in its organisation and it only becomes a male brain when the male foetus begins to secrete hormones. Geschwind and Galaburda knew that different parts of the brain mature at different rates; the right hemisphere develops first,

15、 then the left. Moreover, a girls brain develops somewhat faster than that of a boy. So, if something happens to the brains development during pregnancy, it is more likely to be affected in a male and the hemisphere more likely to be involved is the left. The brain may become less lateralised and th

16、is in turn could result in left-handedness and the development of certain superior skills that have their origins in the left hemisphere such as logic, rationality and abstraction. It should be no surprise then that among mathematicians and architects, left-handers tend to be more common and there a

17、re more left-handed males than females. The results of this research may be some consolation to left-handers who have for centuries lived in a world designed to suit right-handed people. However, what is alarming, according to Mr Charles Moore, a writer and journalist, is the way the word right rein

18、forces its own virtue. Subliminally he says, language tells people to think that anything on the right can be trusted while anything on the left is dangerous or even sinister. We speak of left-handed compliments and according to Moore, it is no coincidence that left-handed children, forced to use th

19、eir right hand, often develop a stammer as they are robbed of their freedom of speech. However, as more research is undertaken on the causes of left-hand-edness, attitudes towards left-handed people are gradually changing for the better. Indeed when the champion tennis player Ivan Lendl was asked wh

20、at the single thing was that he would choose in order to improve his game, he said he would like to become a left-hander. Geoff Maslen Questions 1 - 7 Use the information in the text to match the people(listed A - E)with the opinions(listed 1 - 7)below. Write the appropriate letter(A - E)in boxes 1

21、- 7 on your answer sheet. Some people match more than one opinion. (A)Dr Broca (B)Dr Brinkman (C)Geschwind and Galaburda (D)Charles Moore (E)Professor Turner Example Answer Monkeys do not show a species specific preference for left-or right-handedness. (B) 1 Human beings started to show a preference

22、 for right-handedness when they first developed language. 2 Society is prejudiced against left-handed people. 3 Boys are more likely to be left-handed. 4 After a stroke, left-handed people recover their speech more quickly than right-handed people. 5 People who suffer strokes on the left side of the

23、 brain usually lose their power of speech. 6 The two sides of the brain develop different functions before birth. 7 Asymmetry is a common feature of the human body. 7 Using the information in the passage, complete the table below. Write your answers in boxes 8 - 10 on your answer sheet. 11 A study o

24、f monkeys has shown that_ （ A） monkeys are not usually right-handed. （ B） monkeys display a capacity for speech. （ C） monkey brains are smaller than human brains. （ D） monkey brains are asymmetric. 12 According to the writer, left-handed people_ （ A） will often develop a stammer. （ B） have undergone

25、 hardship for years. （ C） are untrustworthy. （ D） are good tennis players. 12 MIGRATORY BEEKEEPINGTaking WingTo eke out a full-time living from their honeybees, about half the nations 2,000 commercial beekeepers pull up stakes each spring, migrating north to find more flowers for their bees. Besides

26、 turning floral nectar into honey, these hardworking insects also pollinate crops for farmers -for a fee. As autumn approaches, the beekeepers pack up their hives and go south, scrambling for pollination contracts in hot spots like Californias fertile Central Valley.Of the 2,000 commercial beekeeper

27、s in the United States about half migrate. This pays off in two ways. Moving north in the summer and south in the winter lets bees work a longer blooming season, making more honey and money for their keepers. Second, beekeepers can carry their hives to farmers who need bees to pollinate their crops.

28、 Every spring a migratory beekeeper in California may move up to 160 million bees to flowering fields in Minnesota and every winter his family may haul the hives back to California, where farmers will rent the bees to pollinate almond and cherry trees. Migratory beekeeping is nothing new. The ancien

29、t Egyptians moved clay hives, probably on rafts, down the Nile to follow the bloom and nectar flow as it moved toward Cairo. In the 1880s North American beekeepers experimented with the same idea, moving bees on barges along the Mississippi and on waterways in Florida, but their lighter, wooden hive

30、s kept falling into the water. Other keepers tried the railroad and horse-drawn wagons, but that didnt prove practical. Not until the 1920s when cars and trucks became affordable and roads improved, did migratory beekeeping begin to catch on. For the Californian beekeeper, the pollination season beg

31、ins in February. At this time, the beehives are in particular demand by farmers who have almond groves; they need two hives an acre. For the three-week long bloom, beekeepers can hire out their hives for $ 32 each. Its a bonanza for the bees too. Most people consider almond honey too bitter to eat s

32、o the bees get to keep it for themselves. By early March it is time to move the bees. It can take up to seven nights to pack the 4,000 or so hives that a beekeeper may own. These are not moved in the middle of the day because too many of the bees would end up homeless. But at night, the hives are st

33、acked onto wooden pallets, back-to-back in sets of four, and lifted onto a truck. It is not necessary to wear gloves or a beekeepers veil because the hives are not being opened and the bees should remain relatively quiet. Just in case some are still lively, bees can be pacified with a few puffs of s

34、moke blown into each hives narrow entrance. In their new location, the beekeeper will pay the farmer to allow his bees to feed in such places as orange groves. The honey produced here is fragrant and sweet and can be sold by the beekeepers. To encourage the bees to produce as much honey as possible

35、during this period, the beekeepers open the hives and stack extra boxes called supers on top. These temporary hive extensions contain frames of empty comb for the bees to fill with honey. In the brood chamber below, the bees will stash honey to eat later. To prevent the queen from crawling up to the

36、 top and laying eggs, a screen can be inserted between the brood chamber and the supers. Three weeks later the honey can be gathered. Foul smelling chemicals are often used to irritate the bees and drive them down into the hives bottom boxes, leaving the honey-filled supers more or less bee free. Th

37、ese can then be pulled off the hive. They are heavy with honey and may weigh up to 90 pounds each. The supers are taken to a warehouse. In the extracting room, the frames are lifted out and lowered into an uncapper where rotating blades shave away the wax that covers each cell. The uncapped frames a

38、re put in a carousel that sits on the bottom of a large stainless steel drum. The carousel is filled to capacity with 72 frames. A switch is flipped and the frames begin to whirl at 300 revolutions per minute; centrifugal force throws the honey out of the combs. Finally the honey is poured into barr

39、els for shipment. After this, approximately a quarter of the hives weakened by disease, mites, or an ageing or dead queen, will have to be replaced. To create new colonies, a healthy double hive, teeming with bees, can be separated into two boxes. One half will hold the queen and a young, already ma

40、ted queen can be put in the other half, to make two hives from one. By the time the flowers bloom, the new queens will be laying eggs, filling each hive with young worker bees. The beekeepers family will then migrate with them to their summer location. Adapted from Americas Beekeepers: Hives for Hir

41、e by Alan Mairson , National Geographic.Questions 13-19 BEEKEEPER MOVEMENTSExample AnswerIn February, Californian farmers hire bees to help pollinate almond trees.In March, beekeepers【 R13】 _ .for migration at night when the hives are【 R14】_and the bees are generally tranquil. A little【 R15】 _ .can

42、ensure that this is the case.They transport their hives to orange groves where farmers【 R16】_ .beekeepers for placing them on their land. Here the bees make honey.After three weeks, the supers can be taken to a warehouse where【 R17】 _ are used to remove the wax and extract the honey from the 【 R18】

43、_After the honey collection, the old hives are rejected. Good double hives are 【 R19】 _ .and re-queened and the beekeeper transports them to their summer base.List of Words/Phrasessmoke chemicals paybarrels protection chargeset off light splitpollinate machines superscombs screen preparefull empty q

44、ueens 13 【 R13】 14 【 R14】 15 【 R15】 16 【 R16】 17 【 R17】 18 【 R18】 19 【 R19】 19 Label the diagram below. Choose ONE OR TWO WORDS from the Reading Passage for each answer . Write your answers in boxes 20 - 23 on your answer sheet. 23 Do the following statements agree with the information given in Read

45、ing Passage 2 ? In boxes 24 - 27 write YES if the statement agrees with the information given NO if the statement contradicts the information given NOT GIVEN if there is no information about this 24 The Egyptians keep bees on the banks of the Nile. （ A） YES （ B） NO （ C） NOT GIVEN 25 First attempts a

46、t migratory beekeeping in America were unsuccessful. （ A） YES （ B） NO （ C） NOT GIVEN 26 Bees keep honey for themselves in the bottom of the hive. （ A） YES （ B） NO （ C） NOT GIVEN 27 The honey is spun to make it liquid. （ A） YES （ B） NO （ C） NOT GIVEN 27 You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions

47、28 - 41 which are based on Reading Passage 3 below. TOURISM A Tourism, holidaymaking and travel are these days more significant social phenomena than most commentators have considered. On the face of it there could not be a more trivial subject for a book. And indeed since social scientists have had

48、 considerable difficulty explaining weightier topics, such as work or politics, it might be thought that they would have great difficulties in accounting for more trivial phenomena such as holidaymaking. However, there are interesting parallels with the study of deviance. This involves the investiga

49、tion of bizarre and idiosyncratic social practices which happen to be defined as deviant in some societies but not necessarily in others. The assumption is that the investigation of deviance can reveal interesting and significant aspects of normal societies. It could be said that a similar analysis can be applied to tourism. B Tourism is a leisure activity which presupposes its opposite, namely regulated and organised work. It is one manifestation of how work and leisure