The study of psychology is facing a crisis. The Research Excellence Framework(the Ref) has led to a research culture which is holding back attempts to stabilize psychology in particular, and science in general. The Ref encourages universities to push for groundbreaking, novel, and exciting research in the form of 4* papers, but it does not reward the efforts of those who replicate(复制) studies.
The point of replicating a study is to test whether a statistically significant result will appear again if the experiment is repeated. Of course, a similar result may not appear – casting into question the validity(有效性) of the results from the first experiment.
Last year, the Open Science Collaboration attempted to replicate 100 studies from highly ranked psychological journals. While 97% of the original studies had a statistically significant result, just 36% of the replications had the same outcome. Equally worrying: when an effect did appear, it was often much smaller than previously thought.
Recent data calls into question some widely influential findings in psychological science. These problems are not confined to psychology however – many findings published in scientific literature may actually be false.
Science is supposed to be self-correcting and reproducibility is a cornerstone of the scientific method. Yet, we simply aren’t invested in replicating findings. We all want to be good researchers and understand more about how the world works. So why are we so reluctant to check our conclusions are valid?
Because no incentive is provided by the system we carry out our research in. In the UK, the Ref ranks the published works of researchers according to their originality (how innovative is the research?), significance (does it have practical or commercial importance?), and rigour (is the research technically right?). Outputs are then awarded one to four stars. 4* papers are considered world-leading. The cumulative total of 3* and 4* papers determines research funding allocation and has a knock-on effect on institutional position in league tables(排名表) and therefore attractiveness to students. Obviously, the more publications the better.
Worryingly, many academics admit to engaging in at least one questionable research practice in order to achieve publication. Examples of this include: coming up with a theory after data is collected, stopping collecting data when an effect appears in case it disappears later, or only reporting the significant effects from collected data. Others simply fabricate data – Dutch psychologist Diederik Stapel shockingly falsified data from more than 50 studies.
The Ref completely harms our efforts to produce a reliable body of knowledge. Why? The focus on originality – publications exploring new areas of research using new paradigms, and avoiding testing well-established theories – is the exact opposite of what science needs to be doing to solve the troubling replication crisis. According to Ref standards, replicating an already published piece of work is simply uninteresting.
With the next Ref just four years away, many researchers are effectively faced with a choice: be a good scientist, or be a successful academic who gets funding and a promotion.
1.What crisis is the study of psychology facing?
A. The Ref has led to a revolution in not-only psychology but also science.
B. The universities are encouraged to generate more groundbreaking research.
C. The Ref tends to set up a different standard of replications of studies.
D. The Ref’s indifference to replications of studies has led to worrying effects.
2.The Ref’s focus on originality has brought about _______.
A. a reliable body of knowledge
B. publications exploring new areas
C. tests of well- established theories
D. uninteresting replications of studies
3.We can infer from the passage that the Ref _______.
A. is a system for assessing the quality of research in UK universities
B. provides UK researchers with funding and job opportunities
C. recognizes researchers’ work and adds to their attractiveness to students
D. is planning to change its standard before the next Ref submission
4.What does the writer mean by saying “be a good scientist”?
A. Contribute to the solution to the replication crisis.
B. Reform the standards that have been set up by the Ref.
C. Give up possible funding and promotion given by universities.
D. Avoid using false research practices to test old theories.
Traditional surgical procedures require surgeons to make large incisions(伤口) in a patient’s body in order to gain access to the internal organs. It was once common for heart surgeons, who perform highly specialized and complex procedures, to make long incisions in a patient’s chest and then split the breastbone to reach the heart. Patients who undergo surgery are often at the risk of infection, as bacteria can infect the cut in the skin. In addition, there is often a lengthy recovery period.
A surgical technique known as “keyhole surgery” has become more common in recent years. In general, the surgeon will make a couple of small incisions around the area where the operation is going to be performed. Tubes are pushed into the holes, and a tiny camera, which is called an endoscope, is put into the body. The camera is attached to a large monitor screen that is positioned so that the doctor can see it while he performs the operation. In addition to the camera, doctors also push their tiny surgical instruments through the tubes. The awkward part of keyhole surgery is that it is counterintuitive; that is to say, if a surgeon wants to move the tool to the left, he or she must push it to the right.
Other advancements in technology are also being used today in the OR (operation room). A new machine called the “da Vinci Surgical System” has been tested in hospitals in the U.S.. Unlike keyhole surgery, the da Vinci’s robot’s moving parts are designed to imitate the natural hand and wrist movement of a surgeon, thus providing better control and sensitivity. The system is controlled by a surgeon from a console(控制台). Sitting at a console a few feet from the patient, the surgeon can perform an operation by holding and moving highly sensitive pads that enable him or her to control the instruments. The area of the body on which the surgeon is working is enlarged on a screen, which is attached to the console. This gives surgeons a realistic three-dimensional view of the area — similar to what they would see during a traditional surgical procedure.
Although the da Vinci Surgical System is undergoing some trials for some procedures, it has been welcomed as revolutionary by many surgeons. Patients with serious illnesses must still undergo major surgery, but the smaller incisions and less invasive procedures typically mean that a shorter recovery time is needed. In some cases, the patient’s stay in the hospital has been cut in half when the da Vinci Surgical System was used. On the downside, some operations have taken up to fifty minutes longer because surgeons are inexperienced at using the new technology. As surgeons become more familiar with the machines, the time needed for surgical procedures is likely to decrease.
1.What can be learned about the traditional surgery according to the passage?
A. The cost of the traditional surgery is very high.
B. It often leaves a large wound in a person’s body.
C. Long incisions are made in a patient’s chest.
D. The incision is often infected after the operation.
2.Which of the following is one DISADVANTAGE of keyhole surgery?
A. It requires the use of long, thin tools and a tiny camera.
B. The doctor can not view the inside of the patient’s body clearly.
C. The direction in which a doctor moves the surgical tools is reversed.
D. An endoscope has to be inserted into the patient’s body in advance.
3.The da Vinci Surgical System differs from keyhole surgery in that _______.
A. requires that a surgeon make more small incisions on a patient
B. reduces the amount of time it takes to perform a surgical procedure
C. allows the surgeon to use the surgical instruments more sensitively
D. eliminates the need for surgeons to make large incisions on patients
4.The passage mainly tells the reader ________.
A. the challenges brought about by new technology
B. the benefits and drawbacks of the da Vinci Surgical System
C. the reflections on the development in medical science
D. the application of new technologies in modern surgery
By now you’ve probably heard about the “you’re not special” speech, when English teacher David McCullough told graduating seniors at Wellesley High School: “Do not get the idea you’re anything special, because you’re not.” Mothers and fathers present at the ceremony — and a whole lot of other parents across the Internet — took issue with McCullough’s ego-puncturing words. But lost in the uproar was something we really should be taking to heart: our young people actually have no idea whether they’re particularly talented or accomplished or not. In our eagerness to elevate their self-esteem, we forgot to teach them how to realistically assess their own abilities, a crucial requirement for getting better at anything from math to music to sports. In fact, it’s not just privileged high-school students: we all tend to view ourselves as above average.
Such inflated self-judgments have been found in study after study, and it’s often exactly when we’re least competent at a given task that we rate our performance most generously. In a 2006 study published in the journal Medical Education, for example, medical students who scored the lowest on an essay test were the most charitable in their self-evaluations, while high-scoring students judged themselves much more stringently. Poor students, the authors note, “lack insight” into their own inadequacy. Why should this be? Another study, led by Cornell University psychologist David Dunning, offers an enlightening explanation. People who are incompetent, he writes with coauthor Justin Kruger, suffer from a “dual burden”: they’re not good at what they do, and their very ineptness prevents them from recognizing how bad they are.
In Dunning and Kruger’s study, subjects scoring at the bottom of the heap on tests of logic, grammar and humor “extremely overestimated” their talents. Although their test scores put them in the 12th percentile, they guessed they were in the 62nd. What these individuals lacked (in addition to clear logic, proper grammar and a sense of humor) was “metacognitive skill”: the capacity to monitor how well they’re performing. In the absence of that capacity, the subjects arrived at an overly hopeful view of their own abilities. There’s a paradox here, the authors note: “The skills that engender competence in a particular domain are often the very same skills necessary to evaluate competence in that domain.” In other words, to get better at judging how well we’re doing at an activity, we have to get better at the activity itself.
There are a couple of ways out of this double bind. First, we can learn to make honest comparisons with others. Train yourself to recognize excellence, even when you yourself don’t possess it, and compare what you can do against what truly excellent individuals are able to accomplish. Second, seek out feedback that is frequent, accurate and specific. Find a critic who will tell you not only how poorly you’re doing, but just what it is that you’re doing wrong. As Dunning and Kruger note, success indicates to us that everything went right, but failure is more ambiguous: any number of things could have gone wrong. Use this external feedback to figure out exactly where and when you screwed up.
If we adopt these strategies — and most importantly, teach them to our children — they won’t need parents, or a commencement（毕业典礼） speaker, to tell them that they’re special. They’ll already know that they are, or have a plan to get that way.
1.Which can be the best title of this passage?
A. Special or Not? Teach Kids To Figure It Out
B. Let's Admit That We Are Not That Special
C. Tips On Making Ourselves More Special
D. Tell The Truth: Kids Overestimate their Talents
2.The author thinks the real problem is that ______.
A. we don't know whether our young people are talented or not
B. young people don't know how to assess their abilities realistically
C. no requirement is set up for young people to get better
D. we always tend to consider ourselves to be privileged
3.Which is NOT mentioned about poor students according to the passage?
A. They usually give themselves high scores in self-evaluations.
B. They tend to be unable to know exactly how bad they are.
C. They are intelligently inadequate in tests and exams.
D. They lack the capacity to monitor how well they are performing.
4.We can infer from the passage that those high-scoring students ______.
A. know how to cultivate clear logic and proper grammar
B. don't know how well they perform due to their stringent self-judgement
C. don't view themselves as competent because they know their limits
D. tend to be very competent in their high-scoring fields.
5.The strategies of becoming special suggest that ______.
A. we need internal honesty with ourselves and external honesty from others
B. the best way to get better is to carefully study past success and failure
C. through comparison with others, one will know where and when he fails
D. neither parents nor a commencement speaker can tell whether one is special
Ladies and gentlemen,
I feel that this award was not made to me as a man, but to my work - a life's work in the agony（痛苦） and sweat of the human spirit. But I would like to use this moment as a climax from which I might be listened to by the young men and women already dedicated to the same agony and sweat, among whom is already that one who will someday stand here where I am standing.
Our tragedy today is a general and universal physical fear so long sustained by now that we can even bear it. Because of this, the young man or woman writing today has forgotten the problems of the human heart in conflict with itself which alone can make good writing because only that is worth writing about, worth the agony and the sweat.
He, the writer, must learn them again. He must teach himself that the worst of all things is to be afraid; and, teaching himself that, forget it forever, leaving no room in his workshop for anything but the old truths of the heart, the old universal truths lacking which any story is short-lived and doomed - love and honor and pity and pride and sympathy and sacrifice. Until he does so, he labors under a curse（诅咒）. He writes not of love but of desire, of defeats in which nobody loses anything of value, of victories without hope and, worst of all, without pity or sympathy. His griefs grieve on no universal bones, leaving no scars. He writes not of the heart but of the glands（腺体）.
Until he relearns these things, he will write as though he stood among and watched the end of man. I decline to accept the end of man. It is easy enough to say that man is immortal simply because he will endure. I refuse to accept this. I believe that man will not merely endure: he will prevail. He is immortal, not because he alone among creatures has an inexhaustible voice, but because he has a soul, a spirit capable of sympathy and sacrifice and endurance. The poet's, the writer's, duty is to write about these things. It is his privilege to help man endure by lifting his heart, by reminding him of the courage and honor and hope and pride and sympathy and pity and sacrifice which have been the glory of his past. The poet's voice need not merely be the record of man, it can be one of the pillars to help him endure and prevail.
1.The word “that” in the 2nd paragraph probably means ______.
A. the agony and sweat of the human spirit
B. the general and universal physical fear
C. the sustenance and endurance for a long time
D. the human heart in conflict with itself
2.According to the speaker, the old truths of the heart are so important that ______.
A. they are love, honor, pity, pride, sympathy and sacrifice
B. they prolong a writer’s life and protect him from curses
C. they are the soul of a real and powerful piece of writing
D. they can effectively stop the trend towards the end of man
3.How can poets / writers help man endure and prevail?
A. By inspiring man with his past glories through words.
B. By helping man endure the end through endless voices.
C. By recording sympathy, sacrifice and endurance in his soul.
D. By building spiritual pillars through immortal hearts.
4.The speaker may probably agree that ______.
A. the award was not fair because his life was too painful
B. young writers now are too fearful to bear the agony and sweat
C. the biggest obstacle to good writing is the writer’s fear
D. writing about man’s soul signals his final prevalence
To be really happy and really safe, one ought to have at least two or three hobbies, and they must all be real. It is no use starting late in life to say “I will take an interest in this or that.” Such an attempt only aggravates the strain of mental effort. A man may acquire great knowledge of topics unconnected with his daily work, and yet hardly get any benefit or relief. It is no use doing what you like; you have got to like what you do.
Broadly speaking, human beings may be divided into three classes: those who are toiled to death, those who are worried to death and those who are bored to death. It is no use offering the manual labourer, tired out with a hard week’s sweat and effort, the chance of playing a game of football or baseball on Saturday afternoon. It is no use inviting the politician or the professional or business man, who has been working or worrying about serious things for six days, to work or worry about trifling things at the weekend. As for the unfortunate people who can command everything they want, who can gratify every caprice and lay their hands on almost every object of desire — for them a new pleasure, a new excitement is only an additional satiation. In vain they rush frantically round from place to place, trying to escape from the avenging boredom by mere clatter and motion. For them discipline in one form or another is the most hopeful path.
It may also be said that rational, industrious, useful human beings are divided into two classes: first, those whose work is work and whose pleasure is pleasure; and secondly, those whose work and pleasure are one. Of these the former are the majority. They have their compensations. The long hours in the office or the factory bring with them as their reward, not only the means of sustenance, but a keen appetite for pleasure even in its simplest and most modest forms. But Fortune’s favoured children belong to the second class. Their life is a natural harmony. For them the working hours are never long enough. Each day is a holiday, and ordinary holidays when they come are grudged as enforced interruptions in an absorbing vocation. Yet to both classes the need of an alternative outlook, of a change of atmosphere, of a diversion of effort, is essential. Indeed, it may well be that those whose work is their pleasure are those who most need the means of banishing it at intervals from their mind.
1.What does “are toiled” in the 2nd paragraph mean?
A. have hobbies B. feel pleased
C. work very hard D. are busy
2.Which is NOT true based on the first two paragraphs?
A. Being late in life to attempt to cultivate hobbies adds to mental stress.
B. Great knowledge irrelevant to the daily work can’t guarantee benefit.
C. Those tired out for a week’s labour are reluctant to play football on weekends.
D. Unfortunate people need discipline to help them build up hope.
3.For those whose work is work and whose pleasure is pleasure, they ______.
A. are very willing to work long hours in the office or the factory
B. earn a large amount of money due to their hard work for a long time
C. are keen to enjoy the pleasure when they are off duty
D. usually enjoy themselves in the simplest and most modest forms
4.Which statement will the author agree with according to the 3rd paragraph?
A. The first class are lazy and the second class are bound to succeed.
B. The second class never need holidays because their life is harmonious.
C. The minority are more favoured by fortune because they never stop working.
D. One really needs alternation for a change in order to work better.
Discoveries in science and technology are thought by “untaught minds” to come in blinding flashes or as the result of dramatic accidents. Sir Alexander Fleming did not, as legend would have it, look at the mold (霉) on a piece of cheese and get the idea for penicillin there and then. He experimented with antibacterial substances for nine years before he made his discovery. Inventions and innovations almost always come out of tough trial and error. Innovation is like soccer; even the best players miss the goal and have their shots blocked much more frequently than they score.
The point is that the players who score most are the ones who take most shots at the goal—and so it goes with innovation in any field of activity. The prime difference between innovation and others is one of approach. Everybody gets ideas, but innovators work consciously on theirs, and they follow them through until they prove practicable or otherwise. What ordinary people see as fanciful abstractions, professional innovators see as solid possibilities.
“Creative thinking may mean simply the realization that there’s no particular goodness in doing things the way they have always been done.” Wrote Rudolph Flesch, a language authority. This accounts for our reaction to seemingly simple innovations like plastic garbage bags and suitcases on wheels that make life more convenient: “How come nobody thought of that before?”
The creative approach begins with the proposal that nothing be as it appears. Innovators will not accept that there is only one way to do anything. Faced with getting from A to B, the average person will automatically set out on the best-known and apparently simplest route. The innovator will search for alternate courses, which may prove easier in the long run and are sure to be more interesting and challenging even if they lead to dead ends. Highly creative individuals really do march to a different drummer.
1.What does the author probably mean by “untaught mind” in the first paragraph?
A. An individual who often comes up with new ideas by accident.
B. A person who has had no education.
C. A citizen of a society that restricts personal creativity.
D. A person ignorant of the hard work involved in experimentation.
2.According to the author, what differs innovators from non-innovators?
A. The way they present their findings. B. The way they deal with problems.
C. The intelligence they possess. D. The variety of ideas they have.
3.The phrase “march to a different drummer” (the last line of the passage) suggests that highly creative individuals are ________.
A. unwilling to follow common ways of doing things
B. diligent in pursuing their goals
C. concerned about the advance of society
D. devoted to the progress of science
4.The most suitable title for this passage might be ________.
A. The Relation Between Creation and Diligence
B. To Be a Creative Expert in the Study of Human Creativity
C. What Are So Special about Creative Individuals
D. Discoveries and Innovation
