2023年英语专业四级考试真题及答案解析

(1)Pairing the words"baby"and“sleep"can evoke strong emotions. Those who have had limited contact with little ones might interpret this word-combination as implying deep and prolonged slumber. For others, this union of words may elicit memories of prolonged periods of chaotic sleep(or what can feel like no sleep at all). (2)Coping with the way babies sleep can be difficult. It's not that babies don't sleep. In fact, they sleep more than at any other stage of life. It's more an issue of when they sleep. Newborns start by sleeping and waking around the clock. This is not always easy for parents. There is even research suggesting that in adults waking repeatedly at night can feel as bad as getting hardly any sleep in terms of attentional skills, fatigue levels and symptoms of depression. (3)As to why infants wake at night, this is best explained by thinking about the two things that govern our sleep: the homeostatic and circadian processes. The crux of the homeostatic process is the straightforward idea that the longer we have been awake the greater our sleep drive (and the more sleepy we feel).It may take an adult an entire day to build up enough sleep drive to fall asleep at bedtime, but an infant may only need an hour or two of wakefulness before being able to drift off to sleep. (4)The second process is circadian, which works like a clock. Adults typically feel more awake during the morning hours and sleepy at night, regardless of when we last slept. In very young babies this process is not yet developed. This means that sleep is more likely to occur at different points across the 24-hour day. (5)Practically speaking, the immaturity of these two processes means that newborn babies are actually expected to wake at night: they are doing exactly what they are supposed to do!They start life with small stomachs which need to be filled regularly so your child can gain strength and stay hydrated, so it's a good thing that they are waking regularly to feed. As hard as disturbed sleep can be for caregivers, a waking baby is a good thing. (6)But how long might this continue?The parenting mantra"this too shall pass"is true when it comes to dealing with certain aspects of a baby's sleep. Night wakings typically become less frequent as an infant grows up, and sleep changes in other ways throughout a person's life. For example, sleep length reduces and there are changes in sleep architecture(or composition of Rapid Eye Movement, REM, and Non-Rapid Eye Movement, NREM, sleep).A premature baby's sleep cycle might take just 45 minutes, whereas an adult's can be double that at 90 minutes. Other changes also occur; for example, whereas babies'sleep cycles start with REM-like sleep, adults start with NREM sleep. (7)For some parents, knowing that sleep changes throughout life is enough to help them cope with an infant's night awakenings. In fact, sleep education alone can help some parents to deal with infant sleep. Other parents want more detailed information, such as about babies'sleep schedules, bedtime routines, sleep problems, sleep safety, sleep environment, naps, sleep training, and special circumstances. We provide all this information, and more, on our website, where physicians, psychologists, and researchers from the Pediatric Sleep Council have also answered hundreds of questions about sleep via video and text. (8)Remember: sleep matters. Experts agree that sleep is essential for health, growth and general development. It is important not just for babies, but for parents too. If we can improve sleep within a family, and create a happy association between the words"baby"and"sleep", then the Pediatric Sleep Council has achieved its goal.

(1)Roie Galitz's adventurous spirit has quite literally driven him to the ends of the Earth. He has made several excursions to the Arctic islands of Svalbard and the ice sheets of Antarctica. He has also been to the snowy plain of Norway and the wild waters of Kamchatka, Russia—all in the hopes of capturing some of the Earth's most elusive creatures. (2)The photographer comes from Tel Aviv, Israel. He first fell in love with wildlife photography in the sweltering savannas of Tanzania, Africa. Galitz says he prefers to work in the cold—even when that can mean temperatures as low as 40 degrees below zero. He layers up multiple pairs of long trousers, fleece shirts and the thickest wool socks he can find. On top of all of that, he wears an 8-pound Arctic suit.“When you're cold, you can always put on an extra layer,"he says."But when you're hot, there is a legal limit to how much you can remove." (3)Extreme environments are also where he finds his favorite photography subjects: animals that are rarely viewed in the wild. (4)“If I showed things that have been viewed time and time again, it wouldn't be special. It wouldn't be unique,"Galitz says."It would just be like photographing a sparrow. Who cares about a sparrow?Everybody sees them all the time. As a photographer, I always try to find what has been done, what hasn't been done, why it hasn't been done—then try to do it." (5)One photo that captures Galitz's quest features a polar bear with a live seal in its grasp. This moment of the hunt had rarely, if ever, been photographed before. Local bear experts doubted that Galitz would be able to get the shot. But after a long night of silently kneeling on the ice, fighting to stay warm but remaining still so as not to disturb the seals swimming below—he got the shot. (6)Venturing into the wild comes with some risk, from frostbite to close encounters with bears and walruses. Galitz takes it all in stride. A minor case of frostbite in the Arctic is like getting a sunburn at the beach, he says. And the cold forces him to be resourceful. On multiple occasions, he has used his nose to operate the touch screen on his camera. Sometimes, though, he will quickly remove his gloves to snap the shot. (7)Wildlife photography requires a certain spirit, Galitz says. For many of the far-off places he chooses to shoot, he has to obtain production permits and coordinate the often-complicated logistics of getting there. But the planning pays off, he says, when he gets the perfect shot. In a photo titled“Polar Bear Family Hug”, he captured two cubs and a mother bear in a moment of vulnerability as they awoke from a nap. (8)“That's actually the best compliment a wildlife photographer can ask for,”Galitz says. “Because when an animal is sleeping in front of you, it means she trusts you.” · (9)In another photo of brown bears playing together in Lake Kuril in Russia, Galitz laid low to the ground and took shot after shot. He was trying to capture the symmetry of the bears'open mouths."With wildlife, you control the scene by controlling yourself,"he says, referring to his position in relation to his furry subjects. You can't tell a bear to strike a pose or turn toward the light. So for a wildlife photographer, Galitz explains, it's all about the technique. (10)In addition to stunning action shots, Galitz also looks to capture moments that will elicit specific feelings from the viewer.“When I'm photographing the animals, I'm trying to show their character, their soul,"he says. Many of his photos depict animals in moments of closeness— courting, parenting, cuddling—to demonstrate their individual personalities and familial relationships."I'm trying to make people relate to animals in an intimate way, as I am relating to animals in an intimate way,"he says. (11)Galitz also regularly uses his photography to promote conservation efforts. Looking at his photos from year to year, he says he can see the world changing and the habitats of the animals he photographs disappearing.“My images are testimony,"he says.“This is what I saw last year, this is what I saw here, you can see the difference. We can't ignore that."

(1)It was a big, squarish frame house that had once been white, decorated with cupolas and spires and scrolled balconies in the heavily lightsome style of the seventies, set on what had once been our most select street. But garages and cotton gins had encroached and obliterated even the names of that neighborhood; only Miss Emily's house was left, lifting its stubborn and coquettish decay above the cotton wagons and the gasoline pumps—an eyesore among eyesores. (2)Alive, Miss Emily had been a tradition, a duty, and a care; a sort of hereditary obligation upon the town, dating from that day in 1894 when Colonel Sartoris, the mayor—he who fathered the edict that no Negro woman should appear on the streets without an apron—remitted her taxes, the dispensation dating from the death of her father on into perpetuity. Not that Miss Emily would have accepted charity. Colonel Sartoris invented an involved tale to the effect that Miss Emily's father had loaned money to the town, which the town, as a matter of business, preferred this way of repaying. Only a man of Colonel Sartoris'generation and thought could have invented it, and only a woman could have believed it. (3)When the next generation, with its more modern ideas, became mayors and aldermen, this arrangement created some little dissatisfaction. On the first of the year they mailed her a tax notice. February came, and there was no reply. They wrote her a formal letter, asking her to call at the sheriff's office at her convenience. A week later the mayor wrote her himself, offering to call or to send his car for her, and received in reply a note on paper of an archaic shape, in a thin, flowing calligraphy in faded ink, to the effect that she no longer went out at all. The tax notice was also enclosed, without comment. (4)They called a special meeting of the Board of Aldermen. A delegation waited upon her, knocked at the door through which no visitor had passed since she ceased giving china-painting lessons eight or ten years earlier. They were admitted by the old Negro into a dim hall from which a stairway mounted into still more shadow. It smelled of dust and disuse—a close, dank smell. The Negro led them into the parlor. It was furnished in heavy, leather-covered furniture. When the Negro opened the blinds of one window, they could see that the leather was cracked; and when they sat down, a faint dust rose sluggishly about their thighs, spinning with slow motes in the single sunray. On a tarnished gilt easel before the fireplace stood a crayon portrait of Miss Emily's father. (5)They rose when she entered—a small, fat woman in black, with a thin gold chain descending to her waist and vanishing into her belt, leaning on an ebony cane with a tarnished gold head. Her skeleton was small and spare; perhaps that was why what would have been merely plumpness in another was obesity in her: She looked bloated, like a body long submerged in motionless water, and of that pallid hue. Her eyes, lost in the fatty ridges of her face, looked like two small pieces of coal pressed into a lump of dough as they moved from one face to another while the visitors stated their errand. (6)She did not ask them to sit. She just stood in the door and listened quietly until the spokesman came to a stumbling halt. Then they could hear the invisible watch ticking at the end of the gold chain. (7)Her voice was dry and cold.“I have no taxes in Jefferson. Colonel Sartoris explained it to me. Perhaps one of you can gain access to the city records and satisfy yourselves." (8)“But we have. We are the city authorities, Miss Emily. Didn't you get a notice from the sheriff, signed by him?” (9)“I received a paper, yes,"Miss Emily said.“Perhaps he considers himself the sheriff.….I have no taxes in Jefferson." (10)“But there is nothing on the books to show that, you see. We must go by the.…” (11)“See Colonel Sartoris. I have no taxes in Jefferson.” (12)“But, Miss Emily.” (13)“See Colonel Sartoris.(Colonel Sartoris had been dead almost ten years.)I have no taxes in Jefferson. Tobe!"The Negro appeared.“Show these gentlemen out."