高考英语阅读理解及任务型阅读7

2010年高考英语阅读理解和任务型阅读课堂综合练习七

一阅读理解

阅读下列短文，从每题所给的四个选项(A、B、C和D)中，选出最佳选项。

A

Believe it or not, optical illusion(错觉) can cut highway crashes.

Japan is a case in point. It has reduced automobile crashes on some roads by nearly 75 percent using a simple optical illusion. But stripes, called chevrons(人字形), painted on the roads make drivers think that they are driving faster than they really are, and thus drivers slow down.

Now the American Automobile Association Foundation(基金会) for Traffic Safety in Washington D.C. is planning to repeat Japan’s success. Starting next year, the foundation will paint chevrons and other patterns of stripes on selected roads around the country to test how well the patterns reduce highway crashes.

Excessive (too great) speed plays a major role in as much as one fifth of all fatal traffic accidents, according to the foundation. To help reduce those accidents, the foundation will conduct its tests in areas where speed-related hazards (danger) are the greatest curves, exit slopes, traffic circles, and bridges.

Some studies suggest that straight, horizontal bars painted across roads can initially cut the average speed of drivers in half. However, traffic often returns to full speed within months as drivers become used to seeing the painted bars.

Chevrons, scientists say, not only give drivers the impression that they are driving faster than they really are but also make a lane appear to be narrower. The result is a longer lasting reduction in highway speed and the number of traffic accidents.

1. The passage mainly discusses ________.

A. a new way of highway speed control

B. a new pattern for painting highways

C. a new way of training drivers

D. a new type of optical illusion

2. On roads painted with chevrons, drivers tend to feel that ________.

A. they should avoid speed-related hazards

B. they are driving in the wrong lane

C. they should slow down their speed

D. they are coming near to the speed limit

3. The advantage of chevrons over straight, horizontal bars is that the former

________.

A. can keep drivers awake

B. can cut road accidents in half

C. will look more attractive

D. will have a longer effect on drivers

4. The American Automobile Association Foundation for Traffic Safety plans to

________.

A. try out the Japanese method in certain areas

B. change the road signs across the country

C. replace straight, horizontal bars with chevrons

D. repeat the Japanese road patterns

5. What does the author say about straight, horizontal bars painted across roads?

A. They are suitable only on broad roads.

B. They are falling out of use in the United States.

C. They are ignored in a long period of time.

D. They cannot be used successfully to traffic circles.

B

The common cold is the world's most widespread illness, which is plagues(疫病) that flesh receives.

The most widespread mistake of all is that colds are caused by cold. They are not. They are caused by viruses(病毒) passing on from person to person. You catch a cold by coming into contact, directly or indirectly, with someone who already has one. If cold causes colds, it would be reasonable to expect the Eskimos to suffer from them forever. But they do not. And in isolated Arctic regions explorers have reported being free from colds until coming into contact again with infected people from the outsi

During the First World War soldiers who spent long periods in the trenches(战壕),

In the Second World War prisoners at the notorious Auschwitz concentration camp(奥斯维辛集中营), naked and starving, were astonished to find that they seldom

At the Common Cold Research Unit in England, volunteers took part in Experiments in which they gave themselves to the discomforts of being cold and wet for long stretches of time. After taking hot baths, they put on bathing suits, allowed themselves to be with cold water, and then stood about dripping wet in drafty room. Some wore wet socks all day while others exercised in the rain until close to exhaustion. Not one of the volunteers came down with a cold unless a cold virus was

If, then, cold and wet have nothing to do with catching colds, why are they more frequent in the winter? Despite the most pains—taking research, no one has yet found the answer. One explanation offered by scientists is that people tend to stay together indoors more in cold weather than at other times, and this makes it easier