Section Ⅱ Reading Comprehension

　　Part A

　　Directions:

　　Read the following four texts. Answer the questions below each text by choosing A, B, C or D. Mark your answers on the ANSWER SHEET. (40 points)

　　Text 1

　　Rats and other animals need to be highly at tuned to social signals from others so that can identify friends to cooperate with and enemies to avoid. To find out if this extends to non-living beings, Loleh Quinn at the University of California, San Diego, and her colleagues tested whether rats can detect social signals form robotic rats.

　　They housed eight adult rats with two types of robotic rat- one social and one asocial一for 5 our days. The robots rats were quite minimalist, resembling a chunkier version of a computer mouse with wheels-to move around and colorful markings.

　　During the experiment, the social robot rat followed the living rats around, played with the same toys, and opened caged doors to let trapped rats escape. Meanwhile, the asocial robot simply moved forwards and backwards and side to side

　　Next, the researchers trapped the robots in cages and gave the rats the opportunity to release them by pressing a lever.

　　Across 18 trials each, the living rats were 52 percent more likely on average to set the social robot free than the asocial one. This suggests that the rats perceived the social robot as a genuine social being. They may have bonded more with the social robot because it displayed behaviours like communal exploring and playing. This could lead to the rats better remembering having freed it earlier, and wanting the robot to return the favour when they get trapped, says Quinn.

　　The readiness of the rats to befriend the social robot was surprising given its minimal design. The robot was the same size as a regular rat but resembled a simple plastic box on wheels.“We' d assumed we' d have to give it a moving head and tail, facial features, and put a scene on it to make it smell like a real rat, but that wasn’t necessary, ”says Janet Wiles at the University of Queensland in Australia, who helped with the research.

　　The finding shows how sensitive rats are to social cues, even when they come from basic robots. Similarly, children tend to treat robots as if they are fellow beings, even when they display only simple social signals.“ We humans seem to be fascinated by robots, and it turns out other animals are too,”says Wiles.

　　21. Quin and her colleagues conducted a test to see if rats can________

　　[A] pickup social signals from non-living rats

　　[B] distinguish a friendly rat from a hostile one

　　[C] attain sociable traits through special training

　　[D] send out warning messages to their fellow

　　22. What did the social robot do during the experiment?

　　[A] It followed the social robot.

　　[B]It played with some toys.

　　[C] It set the trapped rats free.

　　[D]It moved around alone.

　　23. According to Quinn, the rats released the social robot because they________

　　[A] tried to practice a means of escape

　　[B] expected it to do the same in return

　　[C] wanted to display their intelligence

　　[D]considered that an interesting game

　　24. James Wiles notes that rats________

　　[A]can remember other rat's facial features

　　[B] differentiate smells better than sizes

　　[C] respond more to cations than to looks

　　[D]can be scared by a plastic box on wheels

　　25. It can be learned from the text that rats________

　　[A]appear to be adaptable to new surroundings

　　[B] are more socially active than other animals

　　C] behave differently from children in socializing

　　[D]are more sensitive to social cues than expected

　　Text 2

　　It is true that CEO pay has gone up-top ones may make 300 times the pay of typical workers on average, and since the mid-1970s CEO pay for large publicly traded American corporations has, by varying estimates, gone up by about 500% The typical CEO of a top American corporation now makes about S18.9 million a year.

　　The best model for understanding the growth of CEO pay is that of limited CEO talent in a world where business opportunities for the top firms are growing rapidly. The efforts of America's highest-earning 1% have been one of the more dynamic elements of the global economy. It's not popular to say, but one reason their pay has gone up so much is that CEOs really have upped their game relative to many other workers in the U.S. economy.

　　Today's CEO, at least for major American firms, must have many mere skills than simply being able to“run the company" CEOs must have a good sense of financial markets and maybe even how the company should trade in them. They also need better public relations skills than their predecessors, as the costs of even a minor slipup can be significant. Then there' s the fact that large American companies are much more globalized than ever before,with supply chains spread across a larger number of countries. To lead in that system requires knowledge that is farly mind-boggling plus, virtually all major American companies are beyond this major CEOs still have to do all the day-to-day work they have always done.

　　The common idea that high CEO pay is mainly about ripping people off doesn't explain history very well. By most measures, corporate governmance has become a lot tighter and more rigorous since the 1970s. Yet it is principally during this period of stronger govemnance that CEO pay has been high and rising. That suggests it is in the broader corporate interest to recruit top candidates for increasingly tough jobs.”

　　Furthermore, the highest CEO salaries are paid to outside candidates, not to the cozy insider picks, another sign that high CEO pay is not some kind of depredation at the expense of the rest of the company. And the stock market reacts positively when companies tie CEO pay to, say, stock prices, a sign that those practices build up corporate value not just for the CEO.

　　26. Which of the following has contributed to CEO pay rise?

　　[A] The growth in the number of corporations

　　[B] The general pay rise with a better economy

　　[C] Increased business opportunities for top firms

　　[D] Close cooperation among leading economies

　　27. Compared with their predecessors, today's CEOs are required to______

　　[A] foster a stronger sense of teamwork

　　[B] finance more research and development

　　[C] establish closer ties with tech companies

　　[D] operate more globalized companies

　　28. CEO pay has been rising since the 1970s despite______

　　[A] continual internal opposition

　　[B] strict corporate governance

　　[C] conservative business strategies

　　[D] Repeated government warnings

　　29. High CEO pay can be justified by the fact that it helps______

　　[A] confirm the status of CEOs

　　[B] motivate inside candidates

　　[C] boost the efficiency of CEOs

　　[D] increase corporate value

　　30. The most suitable title for this text would be______

　　[A] CEOs Are Not Overpaid

　　[B] CEO Pay: Past and Present

　　[C] CEOs' challenges of Today

　　[D] CEO Traits: Not Easy to Define

扫描/长按二维码关注获取考研答案

获取2020考研真题答案

获取2020考研资讯

获取2套仿真内部资料

获取考研历年真题答案

考研万题库下载丨微信搜索"万题库考研"

　　相关推荐：

　　2020年考研真题pdf下载 ※ 2020年考研答案pdf下载

　　2020考研答案 ※ 2020考研真题 ※ 考研万题库估分 ※ 关注微信对答案

　　2020考研政治答案 ※ 2020考研英语答案 ※ 2020考研数学答案

　　2020年考研成绩查询时间 ※ 考研复试分数线 ※ 考研调剂