Question

    In the famous musical My Fair Lady, Eliza Doolittle, the poor daughter of a dustman who speaks with a thick Cockney accent, becomes the unwitting (不知晓的) target for a bet between two phonetics scholars. By the end of the musical, Doolittle is able to pronounce all of her words like a member of the British elite, fooling everyone at an embassy ball about her true origins.

It’s hard to imagine a version of My Fair Lady set in the U.S. because, unlike the British, Americans seem either unwilling or unable to honestly acknowledge their own social class. But a new set of scientific studies conducted by Michael Krauss and his colleagues at Yale University show that Americans find it easy to make distinctions about other people’s social class just by listening to them speak.

In one study, the researchers asked 229 people to listen to 27 different speakers who varied in terms of their age, race, gender and social class. The participants heard each speaker say a total of seven different words. Based on just this short audio, participants were able to correctly identify which speakers were college-educated 55 percent of the time-more than what would be expected by chance. A major limitation of this study, however, was that it used college education as a criterion for social class.

Then in another experiment, 302 participants were asked to either listen to or read transcripts (文本) from 90 seconds of recorded speech in which the speakers talked about themselves without explicitly mentioning anything about their social class. Participants were asked to judge what they thought the social classes of the speakers were by using a 10-rung ascending (上升的) ladder of increasing income, education and occupation. They found that participants who heard the audio recordings were more accurate in judging where the speakers fell in terms of their social status.

To show whether these inferences have real-world consequences, Kraus and his colleagues ran another experiment. They recruited 274 participants, all of whom had past hiring experience, to either listen to the audio or read a transcript of the content. The findings showed that participants were able to accurately judge the social class of the candidates and that this effect was stronger for participants who had heard the audio recordings. In addition, participants judged the higher-class candidates as more competent, a better fit for the job and more likely to be hired.

Taken together, this research suggests that despite our discomfort about the topic, Americans are able to easily detect one another’s social class from small snippets of speech. Moreover, we use this information to discriminate against people who seem to be of a lower social class. This research identifies social class as another potential way that employers may discriminate against candidates, perhaps without even realizing it.

1.The author introduces his topic by______.

A.making a comparison

B.justifying an assumption

C.explaining a phenomenon

D.relating the plot of a musical

2.What do the experiments suggest?

A.Participants tend to make objective judgments.

B.The content rather than the speaking style is reliable.

C.One’s social class can be inferred from how they speak.

D.Education and income are the main criteria for social status.

3.According to the passage, judgments about the way people talk_____.

A.disagree with the facts

B.affect hiring decisions

C.favour competent people

D.hardly provide reference

4.What can be learned from the last paragraph?

A.Americans are slow to judge social classes.

B.People in a low social class lose jobs easily.

C.Social-class discrimination is hard to address.

D.Speech can create social-class discrimination.

Answer

1.D

2.C

3.B

4.D

【解析】

本文是一篇说明文。文章介绍了一项研究，研究发现美国人能够很容易地从讲话的小片段中发现彼此的社会阶层。此外，人们利用这些信息来歧视社会地位较低的人。这项研究还发现，社会阶层可能是雇主歧视求职者的另一种潜在方式，而雇主甚至没有意识到这一点。

1.推理判断题。根据第一段In the famous musical My Fair Lady, Eliza Doolittle, the poor daughter of a dustman who speaks with a thick Cockney accent, becomes the unwitting (不知晓的) target for a bet between two phonetics scholars. By the end of the musical, Doolittle is able to pronounce all of her words like a member of the British elite, fooling everyone at an embassy ball about her true origins.(在著名的音乐剧《窈窕淑女》中，清洁工的可怜女儿伊莉莎·杜利特尔操着浓重的伦敦口音，无意间成为两个语音学者打赌的目标。在音乐剧的最后，杜利特尔能够像英国精英一样发音，在大使馆舞会上骗过所有人她的真实出身)可推知，作者是通过一个音乐剧的情节来介绍他的主题的。故选D。

2.细节理解题。根据第三段中的Based on just this short audio, participants were able to correctly identify which speakers were college-educated 55 percent of the time-more than what would be expected by chance.(仅仅根据这段简短的音频，参与者就能正确识别出55%的发言者是受过大学教育的——这比随机预期的要高)及第四段中的They found that participants who heard the audio recordings were more accurate in judging where the speakers fell in terms of their social status. (他们发现，听过录音的参与者在判断说话者的社会地位方面更准确)可知，这些实验表明，一个人的社会阶层可以从他们的说话方式中推断出来。故选C。

3.推理判断题。根据倒数第二段中的In addition, participants judged the higher-class candidates as more competent, a better fit for the job and more likely to be hired.(此外，参与者认为高水平的候选人更有能力，更适合这份工作，更有可能被聘用)可推知，根据文章，对人们说话方式的判断会影响雇佣决定。故选B。

4.推理判断题。根据最后一段中的This research identifies social class as another potential way that employers may discriminate against candidates, perhaps without even realizing it. (这项研究发现，社会阶层可能是雇主歧视求职者的另一种潜在方式，而雇主甚至没有意识到这一点)可知，说话会造成社会阶层的歧视。故选D。