16年四级真题二：听力原文

1. News

New 1

Recording

You probably think college students are experts at sleeping. But parties, preparations for tests, personal problems and general stress can wreck a student's sleep habits, which can be bad for the body and the mind. Texas Tech University is even offering a class called "Improving Your Sleep Habits". People suffering from sleep loss are adding increased risk from obesity, psychological problems and car crashes. Students who don't get enough sleep have poorer attendance and lower grades. On top of all that, a new study published in the journal Learning & Memory finds you are probably better off sleeping than making last-minute preparations for a test. Two hundred college kids were taught to play some unfamiliar video games. Subjects who learned the games in the morning lost some skills when they played again 12 hours later, but they did much better after getting a good night sleep. So, if you really want to do your job well, don't forget to get some sleep. 

Questions 1 and 2 are based on the news report you have just heard. 

Question 1. What is the news report mainly about? 

Question 2. What is the finding of the new study published in the journal Learning & Memory? 

New 2 

Recording

Long queues, delayed flights and overcrowding at airports have become almost as much a topic for conversation in Britain as the traditional complaining about the weather. Meanwhile, there are complaints that poor service at London's major airports is discouraging foreigners from doing business in Britain. Much of the criticism is directed at the British Airports Authority, which runs seven major airports, including the three main ones serving London. The Competition Commission is now to investigate whether the British Airports Authority needs to sell off some of its assets. The idea is that competition between rival operators would lead to better service at airports. The British Airports Authority, recently bought by a Spanish company, says the root cause of the problem is not the ownership structure but a lack of runway and terminal capacity, which it is addressing through a program of heavy investment. 

Questions 3 and 4 are based on the news report you have just heard.

Question 3. What is the Competition Commission going to investigate? 

Question 4. What is the root cause of the poor service at British airports according to the British Airports Authority? 

New 3 

Recording

Under the law in Massachusetts, tobacco companies have to measure the nicotine content of every type of cigarette and report the results. The Department of Public Health in Boston gathers and carefully examines the figures and then draws its conclusion. A hundred and sixteen brands were looked at for the study. Ninety two were found to have higher nicotine yields than they did six years previously. The biggest increases tended to be in brands that were popular with young smokers. That worries the department because of the addictive nature of nicotine. Stand Glance, a professor of medicine in San Francisco, explains why: "The amount of nicotine that is delivered in every cigarette is ten percent higher than it was six year ago, which means that is easier to get hooked and harder to quit. The big tobacco companies have always insisted that they are frank with their customers about the dangers of smoking and provide them with enough detail to make an informed decision. However, none of them were prepared to comment on this study or discuss the detailed nicotine content of their products." 

Questions 5 to 7 are based on the news report you have just heard. 

Question 5. What do tobacco companies have to do under the law in Massachusetts? 

Question 6. What do we learn from the study by the Department of Public Health in Boston? Question 7. What do we learn from the news report about the big tobacco companies?

2. Conversations

Conversation 1 

Recording

M: And you know one thing that I wanted to ask you. It is great that you have had this experience of teaching in Indonesia and following up on what you just mentioned, what would you recommend for students who do not live in an English-speaking country? And, you know, they want to learn. I don't know about perfecting but they want at least to be able to communicate decently. How can they go about this? 

W: Yeah, it is really hard. That’s the real struggle because right now I do live in Holland but I really don't socialize much with Dutch people. And my boyfriend's English is so good that we just basically speak English all the time. So I have to make a real effort to practice. There's as much listening exposure as I want. All I have to do is turn on the TV. 

M: And reading also, right? 

W: Yeah, reading. There's plenty I can get to read and listen to. But for speaking, there really is no substitute for trying to speak and use the language in a relaxed atmosphere. So I think that is really the challenge for people who live in a country where their target language isn't spoken. And for that, gosh, what would I do? If I didn't have people here, probably try to find a club? In Sweden, they have a really cool system called study circles where not…It's like a course, but really you just have a course leader, who is there, sort of, as a coaching guide and to help out. And you don't get grade, and you go just because you want to learn. 

Questions 8 to 11 are based on the conversation you have just heard. 

Question 8. Where does the woman live right now? 

Question 9. What does the woman say is the real challenge? 

Question 10. What does the woman suggest doing to learn to speak a foreign language? 

Question 11. What does the woman say about the study circles in Sweden? 

Conversation 2 

Recording

W: OK, Nathan. So we are talking about driving and are there any rules or regulations that you'd like to change? 

M: I'm not sure I want to change rules. But I'd like the police to be stricter on the rules. Like if people jump the traffic lights, I don't know why there isn't a camera at the traffic lights to stop people doing that. Or like speeding. It is very easy to put speed cameras in certain places. 

W: Maybe car manufacturers should have some responsibility in limiting the power of their engines. What’s the point in producing an engine that is big and powerful enough to go like 200 km/h when the speed limit is only 100? 

M: Right. But do you know there are no speed limits in Germany? 

W: People there do drive responsibly, though. Often, people break laws simply because the laws are there. If the law isn't there, people will drive within their ability range. When you've got speed limit, this creates situation that actually presents dangers on the road. 

M: Do you think Germans have better education about personal responsibility when driving? 

W: Possibly. They also have very good cars. 

M: Right. 

W: If you’ve got a good car that can go at high speed, then it's really nice to do that. 

M: But still with care. 

W: So I think it is the restriction that creates the dangers sometimes. 

M: OK. 

W: Obviously, when driving through a residential area or where there is a school, you’ve got to have speed policeman. 

M: Speed bumps. 

W: Yes, speed bumps, those speed bumps that force you to slow down. I think they're good idea. 

M: So you don't think fining people is useful? 

W: Not really, because the police don't have time to police every single driver. 

Questions 12 to 15 are based on the conversation you have just heard. 

12. What are the speakers mainly talking about? 

13. What does the woman think car manufacturers could do? 

14. What can we learn about people driving in Germany? 

15. What does the woman think of the police fining drivers?

3. Passages

Passage 1 

Recording

Behind the cash register at a store in downtown San Francisco, Sam Azar swiped his credit card to pay for a pack of cigarettes. The store's card reader failed to scan the card's magnetic strip. Azar tried again and again. No luck. As customers began to queue, Mr. Azar reached beneath the counter for a black plastic bag. He wrapped one layer of the plastic around the card and tried again. Success. The sale was completed. "I don't know how it works. It just does." said Mr. Azar who learned the trick from another clerk. Verifone, the company that makes the store's card reader, would not confirm or deny that the plastic bag trick worked. But it's one of many low-tech fixes for high-tech failures that people without engineering degrees have discovered often out of desperation，and shared. Today's shaky economy is likely to produce many more such tricks. "In post-war Japan, the economy wasn't doing so great so you couldn't get everyday-use items like household cleaners," says Lisa Katayama, author of Urawaza, a book named after the Japanese term for clever lifestyle tips and tricks. "So people looked for ways to do with what they had." Today, Americans are finding their own tips and tricks for fixing malfunctioning devices with supplies as simple as paper and glue. Some, like Mr. Azar's plastic bag, are open to argument as to how they work or whether they really work at all. But many tech home remedies can be explained by a little science. 

Questions 16 to 18 are based on the passage you have just heard. 

Question 16. What happened when Sam Azar swiped his credit card to pay for his purchase? 

Question 17. How did Sam Azar manage to complete the sale? 

Question 18. What is today's shaky economy likely to do? 

Passage 2 

Recording

If you are a graduate student, you may depend on your adviser for many things, including help with improving grades, acquiring financial support, forming an examining committee and getting letters of recommendation. If you are a graduate teaching assistant, your adviser also may be your "boss". Academic departments vary in their procedures for assigning academic advisers to graduate students. In some departments, either the chairman or the director of graduate studies serves for at least the first semester as a new student adviser. Then students select an adviser, based on shared academic interests. In other departments, a new student is assigned a faculty adviser based on some system of distribution of the department's "advising load". Later, students may have the opportunity of selecting the adviser that they prefer. In any case, new graduate students can learn who their advisers or temporary advisers are by visiting or emailing the departmental office and asking for the information. Graduation requirements specify the number of credits you must earn, the minimum grade point average you must achieve and the distribution of credits you must have from among differing departments or fields of study. In addition, it is necessary to apply for graduation when you near that time that you will be completing your graduation requirements. Since graduation requirements vary among divisions of the university, you should consult the Bulletin of Information. You should also direct your questions to your departmental office or academic adviser. 

Questions 19 to 21 are based on the passage you have just heard. 

Question 19. What does the speaker say about the procedures for assigning academic advisers? 

Question 20. How can new graduate students learn who their advisers are? 

Question 21. What does the speaker say about graduation requirements? 

Passage 3 

Recording

Jody Hubbard is a diet and nutrition expert who travels around the state to speak in middle and high schools. She primarily speaks to students in health classes, but sometimes the school will arrange for her to speak to several different groups of girls. Her biggest concern is the emphasis American culture places on thinness and the negative way that affects girls today. Jody has a Ph.D. in nutrition, but, more important, she has personal experience. Her mother taught her to diet when she was only 8 years old. Jody has created several different presentations, which she gives to different types of audiences and she tries to establish an emotional connection with the students so that they will feel comfortable asking questions or talking to her privately. She shows them pictures and images from popular culture of beautiful women and explains how computers are used to make the women look even more thin and "beautiful" than they are in real life. She describes how the definition of beauty has changed over the years and even from culture to culture. She then talks about health issues and the physical damage that can occur as a result of dieting. Finally, she addresses self-respect and the notion that a person's sense of beauty must include more than how much a person weighs. Sometimes Jody feels that she succeeds in persuading some students to stop dieting; other times she feels that she fails. 

Questions 22 to 25 are based on the passage you have just heard. 

Question 22. Who does Jody Hubbard primarily speak to? 

Question 23. What is Jody Hubbard's biggest concern about American culture? 

Question 24. Why does Jody Hubbard show pictures of beautiful women to her audiences? 

Question 25. What is Jody Hubbard's main purpose in giving her speeches?