Question

Summer's here and it won't be long before school-aged kids across America start complaining that they're tired of riding their bikes, playing at the park, swimming in the pool...and all the other awesome activities their parents hoped would keep them pleasant for the next 10 weeks. Well, if it's any comfort, such rapid boredom could suggest that the kids have amazing powers of memory. A new study shows that the better your short-term memory is, the faster you fed sated (过饱的）and decide you've had enough.

"Though satiation can be physical, like when you feel full after eating too much, we were interested in the psychological (心理学的）side of satiation. Like when you’re just tired of something," Noelle Nelson, assistant professor of marketing and consumer behavior. She and her colleague Joseph Redden at the University of Minnesota tried to think outside the lunch box." Something that was interesting to me is that some people get tired of same things at very different speeds. So if you think about pop songs on the radio, some people must still be enjoying them and requesting them even after hearing them a lot. But a lot of other people are really sick of those same songs."

The difference, the researchers thought, might have to do with memories of past experiences. For example, studies show that people push away from the dinner table sooner when they're asked to describe in detail what they ate earlier for lunch.

So the researchers tested the memory capacity (能力）of college students, The students then viewed a repeating series of three classic paintings...like The Starry Night, American Gothic, and The Scream...or listened and re-listened to a series of three pop songs...or three pieces of classical music. Throughout the test, the students were asked to rate（定等级）their experience from zero to tan. And the better a participant scored in the memory test, the faster they got bored." We found that people with larger capacities remembered more about the music or art, which led to them getting tired of the music or art more quickly. So remembering more details actually made the students feel like they'd experienced the music or art more often."

The findings suggest that marketers could control our desire for their products by figuring out ways to keep us from fully remembering our experiences. We could also trick ourselves into eating less junk food by putting ourselves in the memory of a previous (之前的）snack. As for kids easily bored, just tell them to forget about it—it might help them have more fun.

1.According to the new study, kids get tired of some activities quickly because of     .

A. too many activities    B. good short-term memory

C. fast satiation    D. physical tiredness

2.The researchers did a test on college students and found that     .

A. lower capacities could help them remember more about the music or art

B. these students got tired of things at the same speed

C. they remembered the three classic paintings better than the songs

D. students with larger memory capacity would get bored faster

3.The underlined word "it" in the last paragraph refers to     .

A. the past memory    B. the past capacity

C. the past boredom    D. the past complaints

4.What does the passage mainly talk about?

A. School-aged kids tend to have good short-term memory in summer.

B. Bad short-term memory is more likely to make us lose interest in something easily.

C. The quality of your short-term memory affects the speed you feel bored.

D. It is important to develop the memory capacity of college students.

Answer

1. B

2. D

3. A

4. C

【解析】

这是一篇科普类阅读。这篇文章主要讲了短期记忆的质量会影响你感到无聊的速度。

1.细节理解题。答案定位在第一段Well, if it's any comfort, such rapid boredom could suggest that the kids have amazing powers of memory.（好吧，如果这是一种安慰的话，那么这种快速的无聊可能意味着孩子们有惊人的记忆力。）由此可知，根据这项新的研究，由于良好的短期记忆，孩子们很快就会厌倦一些活动，故选B。

2.细节理解题。答案定位在倒数第二段And the better a participant scored in the memory test, the faster they got bored.（参与者在记忆测试中得分越高，他们越容易感到无聊。）由此可知研究人员对大学生进行了一项测试，发现记忆力较强的学生更容易感到无聊，故选D。

3.推理判断题。上文We could also trick ourselves into eating less junk food by putting ourselves in the memory of a previous (之前的）snack.说我们也可以欺骗自己少吃垃圾食品，让自己记住之前吃过的零食。由此可知As for kids easily bored, just tell them to forget about it意思是对于那些容易感到无聊的孩子，只要告诉他们忘掉过去的记忆就行了。"it"的意思是过去的记忆，故选A。

4.主旨大意题。第一段A new study shows that the better your short-term memory is, the faster you fed sated (过饱的）and decide you've had enough.是全文的主题句，结合全文内容，可知这篇文章主要讲了短期记忆的质量会影响你感到无聊的速度，故选C。