Question

    As any plane passenger will confirm, a crying baby is almost impossible to ignore, no matter how hard you try. Now scientists believe they may have worked out why. A baby’s cry pulls at the heartstrings(扣人心弦) in a way while other cries don’t, researchers found.

Researchers found that a baby’s cry can trigger unique emotional responses in the brain, making it impossible for us to ignore them—whether we are parents or not. Other types of cries, including calls of animals in great pain, fail to get the same response, suggesting the brain is programmed to respond specifically to a baby’s cry.

A team of Oxford University scientists scanned the brains of 28 men and women as they listened to a variety of calls and cries. After 100 milliseconds — roughly the time it takes to blink(眨眼) — two parts of the brain that respond to emotion lit up. Their response to a baby’s cry was particularly strong. The response was seen in both men and women—even if they had no children.

Researcher Dr Christine Parsons said, “You might read that men should just notice a baby and step over it and not see it, but it’s not true. There is a special processing in men and women, which makes sense from an evolutionary(演化的) view that both men and women would be responding to these cries.” The study was in people who were not parents, yet they are all responding at 100ms to these particular cries, so this might be a fundamental response present in all of us regardless of parental status.

Fellow researcher Katie Young said it may take a bit longer for someone to recognize their own child’s cries because they need to do more “fine-grained analysis”. The team had previously found that our reactions speed up when we hear a baby crying. Adults performed better on computer games when they heard the sound of a baby crying than after they heard recordings of adults crying.

1.A baby’s cry is difficult to ignore because it ________.

A.keeps on crying B.cries harder than adults

C.causes people great pain D.makes people feel strong emotions

2.The underlined word “trigger” in Paragraph 2 probably means “________”.

A.cause B.remove C.avoid D.cure

3.What may Christine Parsons agree to?

A.A crying baby makes no sense to people without children.

B.Parents can hardly recognize their own babies’ cries.

C.Men pay less attention to a crying baby than women.

D.Almost everyone makes certain response to a baby’s cry.

4.What’s the main idea of the text?

A.How to recognize different babies’ cries.

B.Why you can’t get a baby’s cry out of your head.

C.Why a baby is easy and likely to cry.

D.How to prevent a baby crying.

Answer

1.D

2.A

3.D

4.B

【解析】

本文是一篇说明文。文章讲述的是为什么我们无法把婴儿的哭声从脑海中抹去。

1.细节理解题。根据第一段最后一句A baby’s cry pulls at the heartstrings(扣人心弦) in a way while other cries don’t, researchers found.可知，婴儿的哭声在某种程度上扣人心弦，会引起人们的强烈的情感共鸣，故选D。

2.猜测词义题。根据第一段最后一句可知，研究人员发现，孩子的哭声扣人心弦，也就是能引起大脑独特的情感反应，所以画线单词trigger意为“引发，引起”，与A项cause意思接近。故选A。

3.细节理解题。根据第四段中There is a special processing in men and women, which makes sense from an evolutionary(演化的) view that both men and women would be responding to these cries.可知，男性和女性都会对孩子的哭声作出反应，故选D。

4.主旨大意题。根据第一段As any plane passenger will confirm, a crying baby is almost impossible to ignore, no matter how hard you try. Now scientists believe they may have worked out why. A baby’s cry pulls at the heartstrings(扣人心弦)in a way while other cries don’t, researchers found.和下文分析的原因，本文讲述的是“为什么无法把婴儿的哭声从脑海中抹去?”故选B。

【易错分析】

1. A baby’s cry is difficult to ignore because it ________.

A. keeps on crying

B. cries harder than adults

C. causes people great pain

D. makes people feel strong emotions

A、B、C项在文章中都未提到，但根据生活实际，容易误选这几项，一定要根据文章内容来选答案。