Part II Reading Comprehension
(35 minutes)
Directions: There are 4 passages in this part. Each passage is followed by some questions or unfinished statements. For each of them there are four choices marked A), B), C) and D). You should decide on the best choice and mark the corresponding letter on the Answer Sheet with a single line through the center.
Passage One
Questions 21 to 25 are based on the following passage.
The biggest safety threat facing airlines today may not be a terrorist with a gun, but the man with the portable computer in business class. In the last 15 years, pilots have reported well over 100 incidents that could have been caused by electromagnetic interference. The source of this interference remains unconfirmed, but increasingly, experts are pointing the blame at portable electronic device such as portable computers, radio and cassette players and mobile telephones.
RTCA, an organization which advises the aviation (航空) industry, has recommended that all airlines ban (禁止) such devices from being used during “critical” stages of flight, particularly take-off and landing. Some experts have gone further, calling for a total ban during all flights. Currently, rules on using these devices are left up to individual airlines. And although some airlines prohibit passengers from using such equipment during take-off and landing, most are reluctant to enforce a total ban, given that many passengers want to work during flights.
The difficulty is predicting how electromagnetic fields might affect an aircraft’s computers. Experts know that portable device emit radiation which affects those wavelengths which aircraft use for navigation and communication. But, because they have not been able to reproduce these effects in a laboratory, they have no way of knowing whether the interference might be dangerous or not.
The fact that aircraft may be vulnerable (易受损的) to interference raises the risk that terrorists may use radio systems in order to damage navigation equipment. As worrying, though, is the passenger who can’t hear the instructions to turn off his radio because the music’s too loud.

21. The passage is mainly about ________.

22. What is said about the over 100 aircraft incidents in the past 15 years?

23. Few airlines want to impose a total ban on their passengers using electronic devices because ________.

24. Why is it difficult to predict the possible effects of electromagnetic fields on an airplane’s computers?

25. It can be inferred from the passage that the author ________.

Passage Two
Questions 26 to 30 are based on the following passage.
The rise of multinational corporations (跨国公司), global marketing, new communications technologies, and shrinking cultural differences have led to an unparalleled increase in global public relations or PR.
Surprisingly, since modern PR was largely an American invention, the U.S.  relations is being threatened by PR efforts in other countries. Ten years ago, for example, the world’s top five public relations agencies were American-owned. In 1991, only one was. The British in particular are becoming more sophisticated and creative. A recent survey found that more than half of all British companies include PR as part of their corporate (公司的) planning activities, compared to about one-third of U.S. companies. It may
not be long before London replaces New York as the capital of PR.
Why is America lagging behind in the global PR race? First, Americans as a whole tend to be fairly provincial and take more of an interest in local affairs. Knowledge of world geography, for example, has never been strong in this country. Secondly, Americans lag behind their European and Asian counterparts (相对应的人) in knowing a second language. Less than 5 percent of Burson—Marshall’s U.S. employees know two languages. Ogilvy and Mather has about the same percentage. Conversely, some European firms have half or more of their employees fluent in a second language. Finally, people involved in PR abroad tend to keep a closer eye on international affairs. In the financial PR area, for instance, most Americans read the Wall Street Journal. Overseas, their counterparts read the Journal as well as the Financial Times of London and The Economist, publications not often read in this country.
Perhaps the PR industry might take a lesson from Ted Turner of CNN (Cable News Network). Turner recently announced that the word “foreign” would no longer be used on CNN news broadcasts. According to Turner, global communications have made the nations of the world so interdependent that there is no longer any such things as foreign.

26. According to the passage, U.S.  relations is being threatened because of ________.

 27. London could soon replace New York as the center of PR because ________.

28. The word “provincial” (Line 2, Para. 3)  means “________”.

29. We learn from the third paragraph that employees in the American PR industry ________.

30. What  PR industry take from Ted Turner of CNN?

Passage Three
Questions 31 to 35 are based on the following passage.
Brazil has become one of the developing world’s great successes at reducing population growth-but more by accident than design. While countries such as India have made joint efforts to reduce birth rates, Brazil has had better result without really trying, says George Martine at Harvard.
Brazil’s population growth rate has dropped from 2.99% a year between 1951 and 1960 to 1.93% a year between 1981 and 1990, and Brazilian women now have only 2.7 children on average. Martine says this figure may have fallen still further since 1990, an achievement that makes it the envy of many other Third World countries.
Martine puts it down to, among other things, soap operas (通俗电视连续剧) and installment (分期付款) plans introduced in the 1970s. Both played an important, although indirect, role in lowering the birth rate. Brazil is one of the world’s biggest producers of soap operas. Globo, Brazil’s most popular television network, shows three hours of soaps six nights a week, while three others show at least one hour a night. Most soaps are based on wealthy characters living the high life in big cities.
“Although they have never really tried to work in a message towards the problems of reproduction, they describe middle and upper class values-not many children, different attitudes towards sex, women working,” says Martine. “They sent this image to all parts of Brazil and made people conscious of other patterns of behavior and other values, which were put into a very attractive package.”
Meanwhile, the installment plans tried to encourage the poor to become consumers. “This led to an enormous change in consumption patterns and consumption was incompatible (不相容的) with unlimited reproduction,” says Martine.

31. According to the passage, Brazil has cut back its population growth ________.
 

32. According to the passage, many Third World countries ________.

33. The phrase “puts it down to” (Line 1, Para. 3) is closest in meaning to “________”.

34. Soap operas have helped in lowering Brazil’s birth rate because ________.
 

35. What is Martine’s conclusion about Brazil’s population growth?

Passage Four
Questions 36 to 40 are based on the following passage.
There seems never to have been a civilization without toys, but when and how they developed is unknown. They probably came about just to give children something to do.
In the ancient world, as is today, most boys played with some kinds of toys and most girls with another. In societies where social roles are rigidly determined, boys pattern their play after the activities of their fathers and girls after the tasks of their mothers. This is true because boys and girls are being prepared, even in play, to step into the roles and responsibilities of the adult world.
What is remarkable about the history of toys is not so much how they changed over the centuries but how much they have remained are same. The changes have been mostly in terms of craftsmanship, mechanics, and technology. It is the universality of toys with regard to their development in all parts of the world and their persistence to the present that is amazing. In Egypt, the Americas, China, Japan and among the Arctic (北极的) peoples, generally the same kinds of toys appeared. Variations depended on local customs and ways of life because toys imitate their surroundings. Nearly every civilization had dolls, little weapons, toy soldiers, tiny animals and vehicles.
Because toys can be generally regarded as a kind of art form, they have not been subject to technological leaps that characterize inventions for adult use. The progress from the wheel to the oxcart to the automobile is a direct line of ascent (进步). The progress from a rattle (拨浪鼓) used by a baby in 3000 BC to one used by an infant today, however, is not characterized by inventiveness. Each rattle is the product of the artistic tastes of the times and
subject to the limitations of available materials.

36. The reason why the toys most boys play with are different from those that girls play with is that ________.

37. One aspect of “the universality of toys” lies in the fact that ________.

38. Which of the following is the author’s view on the historical development of toys?

39. Regarded as a kind of art form, toys ________.
 

40. The author uses the example of rattle to show that ________.