2016年12月大学英语六级真题（第2套）及答案解析

M: Guess what? The worst food I've ever had was in France. W: Really? That's odd. I thought the French were all good cooks. M: Yes. That's right. I suppose it's really like anywhere else, though. You know, some places are good. Some bad. But it's really all our own fault. W: What do you mean? M: Well, it was the first time I'd been to France. This was years ago when I was at school, I went there with my parents' friends, from my father's school. They'd hired a coach to take them to Switzerland. W: A school trip? M: Right. Most of them had never been abroad before. We'd crossed the English Channel at night, and we set off through France, and breakfast time arrived, and the coach driver had arranged for us to stop at this little cafe. There we all were, tired and hungry, and then we made the great discovery. W: What was that? M: Bacon and eggs. W: Fantastic! The real English breakfast. M: Yes. Anyway, we didn't know any better—so we had it, and ugh...! W: What was it like? Disgusting? M: Oh, it was incredible! They just got a bowl and put some fat in it. And then they put some bacon in the fat, broke an egg over the top and put the whole lot in the oven for about ten minutes. W: In the oven! You're joking. You can't cook bacon and eggs in the oven! M: Well, they must have done it that way. It was hot, but it wasn't cooked. There was just this egg floating about in gallons of fat and raw bacon. W: Did you actually eat it? M: No! Nobody did. They all wanted to turn round and go home. You know, back to teabags and fish and chips. You can't blame them really. Anyway, the next night we were all given another foreign speciality.

M: You say your shop has been doing well. Could you give me some idea of what "doing well" means in facts and figures? W: Well, "doing well" means averaging £1,200 or more a week for about 7 years, making almost a quarter of a million pounds. And "doing well" means your earnings are rising. Last year, we did slightly over 50,000 and this year, we hope to do more than 60,000. So, that's good if we continue to rise. M: Now, that's gross earnings, I assume. What about your expenses? W: Yes, that's gross. The expenses, of course, go up steadily. And since we've moved to this new shop, the expenses have increased greatly, because it's a much bigger shop. So I couldn't say exactly what our expenses are. They are something in the region of six or seven thousand pounds a year, which is not high. Commercially speaking, it's fairly low, and we try to keep our expenses as low as we can. M: And your prices are much lower than the same goods in shops round about. How do the local shopkeepers feel about having a shop doing so well in their midst? W: Perhaps a lot of them don't realize how well we are doing, because we don't make a point of publicizing. That was a lesson we learned very early on. We were very friendly with all local shopkeepers and we happened to mention to a local shopkeeper how much we had made that week. He was very unhappy and never as friendly again. So we make a point of never publicizing the amount of money we make. But we are on very good terms with all the shops. None of them have ever complained that we are putting them out of business or anything like that. I think it's a nice friendly relationship. Maybe if they did know what we made, perhaps they wouldn't be so friendly. a quarter of a million pounds.

Birds are famous for carrying things around. Some, like homing pigeons, can be trained to deliver messages and packages. Other birds unknowingly carry seeds that cling to them for the ride. Canadian scientists have found a worrisome, new example of the power that birds have to spread stuff around. Way up north in the Canadian Arctic, seabirds are picking up dangerous chemicals in the ocean and delivering them to ponds near where the birds live. Some 10,000 pairs of the birds, called fulmars, a kind of Arctic seabird, make their nests on Devon Island, north of the Arctic Circle. The fulmars travel some 400 kilometers over the sea to find food. When they return home, their droppings end up all around their nesting sites, including in nearby ponds. Previously, scientists noticed pollutants arriving in the Arctic with the wind. Salmon also carry dangerous chemicals as the fish migrate between rivers and the sea. The bodies of fish and other meat- eaters can build up high levels of the chemicals. To test the polluting power of fulmars, researchers collected samples of deposit from 11 ponds on Devon Island. In ponds closest to the colony, the results showed there were far more pollutants than in ponds less affected by the birds. The pollutants in the ponds appear to come from fish that fulmars eat when they're out on the ocean. People who live, hunt, or fish near bird colonies need to be careful, the researchers say. The birds don't mean to cause harm, but the chemicals they carry can cause major problems. spread stuff around.

In recent years, the death rate among American centenarians—people who have lived to age 100 or older—has decreased, dropping 14 percent for women and 20 percent for men from 2008 to 2014. The leading causes of death in this age group are also changing. In 2000, the top five causes of death for centenarians were heart disease, stroke, flu, cancer and Alzheimer's disease. But by 2014, the death rate from Alzheimer's disease for this age group had more than doubled—increasing from 3.8 percent to 8.5 percent—making the progressive brain disease the second leading cause of death for centenarians. One reason for the rise in deaths from Alzheimer's disease in this group may be that developing this condition remains possible even after people beat the odds of dying from other diseases such as cancer. People physically fit enough to survive over 100 years ultimately give in to diseases such as Alzheimer's which affect the mind and cognitive function. In other words, it appears that their minds give out before their bodies do. On the other hand, the death rate from flu dropped from 7.4 percent in 2000 to 4.1 percent in 2014. That pushed flu from the third leading cause of death to the fifth. Overall, the total number of centenarians is going up. In 2014, there were 72,197 centenarians, compared to 50,281 in 2000. But because this population is getting larger, the number of deaths in this group is also increasing—18,434 centenarians died in 2000, whereas 25,914 died in 2014. 100 or older—has decreased, dropping 14 percent for women and 20 percent for men from 2008 to 2014.

Okay. So let's get started. And to start things off I think what we need to do is consider a definition. I'm going to define what love is but then most of the experiments I'm going to talk about are really focused more on attraction than love. And I'm going to pick a definition from a former colleague, Robert Sternberg, who is now the dean at Tufts University but was here on our faculty at Yale for nearly thirty years. And he has a theory of love that argues that it's made up of three components: intimacy, passion, and commitment, or what is sometimes called decision-commitment. And these are relatively straightforward. He argued that you don't have love if you don't have all three of these elements. Intimacy is the feeling of closeness, of connectedness with someone, of bonding. Operationally, you could think of intimacy as you share secrets, you share information with this person that you don't share with anybody else. Okay. That's really what intimacy is, the bond that comes from sharing information that isn't shared with other people. The second element is passion. Passion is the drive that leads to romance. You can think of it as physical attraction. And Sternberg argues that this is a required component of a love relationship. The third element of love in Sternberg's theory is what he calls decision/commitment, the decision that one is in a love relationship, the willingness to label it as such, and a commitment to maintain that relationship at least for some period of time. Sternberg would argue it's not love if you don't call it love and if you don't have some desire to maintain the relationship. So if you have all three of these, intimacy, passion and commitment, in Sternberg's theory, you have love. Now what's interesting about the theory is what do you have if you only have one out of three or two out of three? What do you have and how is it different if you have a different two out of three? What's interesting about this kind of theorizing is it gives rise to many different combinations that can be quite interesting when you break them down and start to look them carefully. So what I've done is I've taken Sternberg's three elements of love, intimacy, passion and commitment, and I've listed out the different kinds of relationships you would have if you had zero, one, two or three out of the three elements. really focused more on attraction than love.

Hi! I am Elizabeth Hoffler, Master of Social Work. I am a social worker, a lobbyist, and a special assistant to the executive director at the National Association of Social Workers. Today we are going to be talking about becoming a social worker. Social work is the helping profession. Its primary mission is to enhance human well-being and help meet the basic needs of all people, with a particular focus on those who are vulnerable, oppressed, and living in poverty. We often deal with complex human needs. Social work is different from other professions, because we focus on the person and environment. We deal with the external factors that impact a person's situation and outlook. And we create opportunity for assessment and intervention, to help clients and communities cope effectively with their reality and change that reality when necessary. In thousands of ways social workers help other people, people from every age, every background, across the country. Wherever needed, social workers come to help. The most well-known aspect of the profession is that of a social safety net. We help guide people to critical resources and counsel them on life-changing decisions. There are more than 600,000 professional social workers in the country, and we all either have a bachelor's degree, a master's degree, or a PhD in Social Work. There are more clinically trained social workers than clinically trained psychiatrists, psychologists, and psychiatric nurses combined. Throughout this series you will learn more about the profession, the necessary steps to get a social work degree, the rich history of social work, and the many ways that social workers help others. Later in this series, you will hear from Stacy Collins and Mel Wilson, fellow social workers at the National Association of Social Workers. Stacy is going to walk you through the step-by-step process of becoming a social worker, and Mel will tell you about the range of options you have once you get your social work degree, as well as the high standards of responsibility that social workers must adhere to. The National Association of Social Workers represents nearly 145,000 social workers across the country. Our mission is to promote, protect, and advance the social work profession. We hope you enjoy this series about how you can make a difference by becoming a social worker. Next, we are going to talk about choosing social work. helping profession. talking about becoming a social worker.

Today, I'd like to talk about what happens when celebrity role models get behind healthy habits but at the same time, promote junk food. Currently, there's mounting criticism of Michelle Obama's "Let's Move!" campaign, which fights childhood obesity by encouraging youngsters to become more physically active, and has signed on singer Beyonce, and basketball player Shaquille O'Neal, both of whom also endorse sodas, which are a major contributor to the obesity epidemic. Now there's a lot more evidence of how powerful a celebrity—especially a professional athlete—can be in influencing children's behavior. In a report published by the Rudd Center for Food Policy & Obesity at Yale University, researchers studied 100 professional athletes and their endorsement contracts. The team focused on athletes since they are theoretically the best role models for active, healthy lifestyles for children. After sorting the deals by category, they determined that among the 512 brands associated with the athletes, most involved sporting goods, followed closely by food and beverage brands. Sports drinks, which are often high in sugar and calories, made up most of the food and drink deals, with soft drinks and fast food filling out the remainder. Of the 46 beverages endorsed by professional athletes, 93% relied exclusively on sugar for all of their calories. It's no surprise that high-profile athletes can influence children's eating behaviors, but the scientists were able to quantify how prevalent these endorsements are in the children's environment. Advertisements featuring professional athletes and their endorsed products tend to get impressive exposure, on TV, radio, in print and online. And in 2010, the researchers reported that children ages 12 to 17 saw more athlete- endorsed food and beverage brand commercials than adults. One reason any campaign wants a popular celebrity spokesperson is because kids are attracted to them no matter what they are doing. We can't expect kids to turn off that admiration when the same person is selling sugar. At best, kids might be confused. At worst, they'll think the messages about soda are the same as the messages about water, but those two beverages aren't the same. If children are turning to athletes as role models, it's in their best interest if their idols are consistent. Consistent messaging of positive behaviors will show healthier lifestyles for kids to follow. fights childhood obesity by encouraging youngsters to become more physically active. C To encourage kids to play more sports.