1、考研英语（阅读）模拟试卷 193 及答案与解析Part ADirections: Read the following four texts. Answer the questions below each text by choosing A, B, C or D. (40 points)0 Superior customer service can be an essential source of strength as companies emerge from the recession, but managers need to understand the extent to w
2、hich the consumer landscape has shifted. Weakened brands, customers easy access to information about vendors, and the erosion of barriers to switching among competitors have combined to create a much more challengingenvironment for service, whether its outsourced or delivered in-house. Evidence show
3、s that customers will no longer tolerate the rushed and inconvenient service that has become all too common. Instead, they are looking for a satisfying experience. Companies that provide it will win their loyalty.Our recent research demonstrates that when customers contact companies for service, the
4、y care most about two things: Is the frontline employee knowledgeable? And is the problem resolved on the first call? Yet those factors often arent even on customer-service managers dashboards. Most service centers continue to measure time on hold and minutes per call, as they have for decades. Such
5、 metrics encourage agents to hurry through callsresulting in just the kind of experience customers dislike. More than half of the customers we surveyed across industries say theyve had a bad service experience, and nearly the same fraction think many of the companies they interact with dont understa
6、nd or care about them. On average, 40% of customers who suffer through bad experiences stop doing business with the offending company.To get a better understanding of what customers experience, managers should draw on a variety of information sources, including customer satisfaction surveys, behavio
7、ral data collected through self-service channels, and recorded customer-agent conversations. In addition, companies must revise processes to give agents the leeway and authority to meet individual customers needs and provide positive, satisfying experiences.In evaluating service, managers should mea
8、sure across all channels the percentage of customer problems resolved within the first contact, determine what is at the root of problems that arent settled in one call, and make any necessary changes. They should also aim to have consistently high-quality interactions between customers and frontlin
9、e employees. That may sound costly, but knowledge-management systems, speech recognition for automated calls, and other technologies can help to substantially offset the expense.Some executives believe that irritated customers will forgive vendors and come back for more. Our research indicates that,
10、 on the contrary, alienated customers often disappear without the slightest warning. And as companies rebuild themselves after the recession, this silent attrition represents a host of lost opportunities for future sales and positive word of mouth.1 Providing superior customer service now is more ch
11、allenging mainly because（A）companies have just recovered from the economic recession.（B） consumers can easily change vendors thanks to the Internet.（C） customers prefer services delivered in-house to outsourced ones.（D）consumers have come to demand satisfying customer services.2 It is indicated in P
12、aragraph 2 that（A）customers today are demanding and hasty.（B） most customer-service managers are lazy.（C） customer service need change with the times.（D）customers surveyed dont care about the service.3 We can infer from Paragraph 3 that companies（A）did not understand what customers experienced.（B） d
13、id not record customer-agent conversations.（C） did not allow agents to provide individualized service.（D）did not have enough money to collect information.4 High-quality interactions between customers and frontline employees（A）can settle the problems at the first shot.（B） call for a radical change wi
14、thin the company.（C） should be one of managers consistent pursuits.（D）are too expensive for a company to implement.5 According to the author, offended customers are most likely to（A）tolerate the vendors bad service.（B） continue business with the vendors.（C） warn and accuse the vendors.（D）leave and s
15、witch to another vendor.5 Man is born free but is everywhere in debt. In the rich world, getting hold of your first credit card is a rite of passage far more important for your daily life than casting your first vote. Buying your first home normally requires taking on a debt several times the size o
16、f your annual income. And even if you shun the temptation of borrowing to indulge yourself, you are still saddled with yourportion of the national debt.Throughout the 1980s and 1990s a rise in debt levels accompanied the “great moderation“, when growth was steady and unemployment and inflation remai
17、ned low. No longer did Western banks have to raise rates to halt consumer booms. By the early 2000s a vast international scheme of vendor financing had been created. Those who cautioned against rising debt levels were dismissed as doom-mongers; after all, asset prices were rising even faster, so bal
18、ance-sheets looked healthy. And with the economy advancing, debtors could afford to meet their interest payments. In short, it paid to borrow and it paid to lend. like alcohol, a debt boom tends to induce euphoria. Traders and investors saw the asset-price rises as proof of their brilliance; central
19、 banks and governments thought that rising markets and higher tax revenues attested to the soundness of their policies.The answer to all problems seemed to be more debt Depressed? Use your credit card for a shopping spree “because youre worth it“. Want to get rich quick? Work for a private-equity or
20、 hedge-fund firm, using borrowed money to enhance returns. Looking for faster growth for your company? Borrow money and make an acquisition. And if the economy is in recession, let the government go into deficit to bolster spending.Debt increased at every level, from consumers to companies to banks
21、to whole countries. The effect varied from country to country, but a survey by the McKinsey Global Institute found that average total debt (private and public sector combined) in ten mature economies rose from 200% of GDP in 1995 to 300% in 2008. There were even more startling rises in Iceland and I
22、reland, where debt-to-GDP ratios reached 1,200% and 700% respectively. The burdens proved too much for those two countries, plunging them into financial crisis. Such turmoil is a sign that debt is not the instant solution it was made out to be.From early 2007 onwards there were signs that economies
23、were reaching the limit of their ability to absorb more borrowing. The growth-boosting potential of debt seemed to peter out. According to Leigh Skene of Lombard Street Research, each additional dollar of debt was associated with less and less growth.6 It can be inferred from Paragraph 1 that a cred
24、it card may（A）symbolize adulthood.（B） replace voting right.（C） encourage loaning.（D）reduce inflation.7 We know from Paragraph 2 that debt boom in the last decades has（A）halted consumer booms.（B） won universal welcome.（C） promoted economic growth.（D）confronted strong suspicions.8 “Like alcohol, a deb
25、t boom tends to induce euphoria“ (Line 7, Para. 2) indicates a debt boom（A）is beneficial to both borrowers and lenders.（B） seems to inspire self-satisfaction.（C） is hard to control like strong wine.（D）has much potential to create profits.9 The examples of Iceland and Ireland are intended to show tha
26、t（A）the effect of debt differs in each country.（B） the two countries have the highest debt rise.（C） debt isnt always an instant solution as believed.（D）debt rise is the origin of the financial crisis.10 According to this text, the author is likely to agree that（A）debt is unavoidable as well as neces
27、sary.（B） a booming economy always follows a debt rise.（C） more debt has been related to less growth.（D）debt is reaching its limit to boost economy.10 Labor is not just a meaningful experienceits also a marketable one. When instant cake mixes were introduced, in the 1950s, housewives were initially r
28、esistant: The mixes were too easy, suggesting that their labor was undervalued. When manufacturers changed the recipe to require the addition of an egg, adoption rose dramatically. Ironically, increasing the labor involvedmakingthe task more arduousled to greater liking.Research conducted with my co
29、lleagues Daniel Mochon, of Yale University, and Dan Ariely, of Duke University, shows that labor enhances affection for its results. When people construct products themselves, from bookshelves to Build-a-Beais, they come to overvalue their (often poorly made) creations. We call this phenomenon the I
30、KEA effect, in honor of the wildly successful Swedish manufacturer whose products typically arrive with some assembly required.In one of our studies we asked people to fold origami (the Japanese art of folding paper into shapes representing objects) and then to bid on their own creations along with
31、other peoples. They were consistently willing to pay more for their own origami. In fact, they were so fond of their amateurish creations that they valued them as highly as origami made by experts.We also investigated the limits of the IKEA effect, showing that labor leads to higher valuation only w
32、hen the labor is fruitful: When participants failed to complete an effortful task, the IKEA effect dissipated. Our research suggests that consumers may be willing to pay a premium for do-it-yourself projects, but theres an important caution: Companies hoping to persuade their customers to assume lab
33、or costsfor example, by nudging them toward self-service through internet channelsshould be careful to create tasks difficult enough to lead to higher valuation but not so difficult that customers cant complete them.Finally, the IKEA effect has broader implications for organizational dynamics: It co
34、ntributes to the sunk cost effect, whereby managers continue to devote resources to (sometimes failing) projects in which they have invested their labor, and to the not-invented-here syndrome, whereby they discount good ideas developed elsewhere in favor of their (sometimes inferior) internally deve
35、loped ideas. Managers should keep in mind that ideas they have come to love because they invested their own labor in them may not be as highly valued by their coworkersor their customers.11 Instant cake mixes is mentioned to（A）highlight the lifestyle in the 1950s.（B） demonstrate how peoples labor wa
36、s undervalued.（C） stress the markets effect on human labor.（D）illustrate that labor leads to love for its results.12 Which of the following is true of the IKEA effect?（A）It refers to the phenomenon that people usually undervalue their creations.（B） It is put forward by the honorable and successful m
37、anufacturer IKEA（C） It explains why the participants think highly of their own origami.（D）It accounts for the popularity of do-it-yourself among youngsters.13 We know from Paragraph 4 that the IKEA effect would disappear（A）as long as the labor is fruitful and effortful.（B） as the difficulty of the t
38、asks heightens.（C） if the customers are unwilling to pay a premium.（D）when the task is beyond his/her ability.14 It is indicated in the last paragraph that（A）the IKEA effect has been broadly employed in organizational building.（B） the sunk cost effect and the not-invented-here syndrome are the same.
39、（C） managers should guard against the negative influence of the IKEA effect.（D）the not-invented-here syndrome will cause enormous economic losses.15 An appropriate title for the text is most likely to be（A）Labor and Market.（B） The IKEA Effect.（C） A Labor of Love.（D）Problems with the IKEA Effect.15 N
40、euroscientists have long understood that the brain can rewire itself in response to experiencea phenomenon known as neuroplasticity. But until recently, they didnt know what causes gray matter to become plastic, to begin changing. Breakthrough research by a team at MITs Picower Institute for Learnin
41、g and Memory has documented one type of environmental feedback thattriggers plasticity: success. Equally important and somewhat surprising Its opposite, failure, has no impact.Earl Miller, the lead researcher on the study, says understanding the link to environmental feedback is crucial to improving
42、 how people teach and motivate because its a big part of how we learn. But we absorb more from success than from failure, according to the study.Millers researchers gave monkeys a simple learning task: They presented one of two pictures. If it was Picture A, the monkeys were supposed to look to the
43、left; if Picture B, to the right. When the monkeys looked in the correct direction, they were rewarded with a drop of juice. All the while the team recorded brain function.“Neurons (cells specialized to conduct nerve impulses) in the prefrontal cortex and striatum, where the brain tracks success and
44、 failure, sharpened their tuning after success,“ says Miller. Whats more, those changes lingered for several seconds, making brain activity more efficient the next time the monkey did the task. Thereafter, each success was processed more efficiently. That is, the monkey had learned. “But after failu
45、re,“ Miller points out, “there was little change in brain activity.“ In other words,the brain didnt store any information about what went wrong and use it the next time. The monkey just tried, tried again.Miller says this means that on a neurological level, success is actually a lot more informative
46、 than failure. If you get a reward, the brain remembers what it did right. But with failure (unless there is a clear negative consequence, like the shock a child feels when she sticks something in an electrical outlet), the brain isnt sure what to store, so it doesnt change at all.Does this research
47、 confirm the management tenet of focusing on yourand your teamsstrengths and successes? Miller cautions against making too tidy a connection between his findings and an environment like the workplace, but he offers this suggestion: “Maybe the lesson is to know that the brain will learn from success,
48、 and you dont need to dwell on that. You need to pay more attention to failures and challenge why you fail.“16 Which of the following is true of Earl Millers research?（A）It discovers neuroplasticity.（B） It is the first study of this kind.（C） It studies one environmental feedback.（D）It attests to one
49、 cause of neuroplasticity.17 According to Millers study, failure as an environmental feedback（A）has a great impact on our neuro-system.（B） can cause gray matter to become plastic.（C） plays a more important role in learning than success.（D）provides less benefits than success.18 During the experiment each failure made the monkey（A）repeat the task fruitlessly.（B） realize the right way to do the task.（C） give up trying eventually.（D）become more efficient and closer to success.19 The example of an electric shock to a child in Paragraph 5 is given to
