1、雅思阅读-练习十四及答案解析(总分：318.00，做题时间：120 分钟)How to increase sales Published online： Nov 9th 2006 From The Economist print edition How shops can exploit peoples herd mentality to increase sales 1. A TRIP to the supermarket may not seem like an exercise in psychological warfarebut it is. Shopkeepers know tha
2、t filling a store with the aroma of freshly baked bread makes people feel hungry and persuades them to buy more food than they had intended. Stocking the most expensive products at eye level makes them sell faster than cheaper but less visible competitors. Now researchers are investigating how “swar
3、m intelligence” (that is， how ants， bees or any social animal， including humans， behave in a crowd) can be used to influence what people buy. 2. At a recent conference on the simulation of adaptive behaviour in Rome， Zeeshan-ul-hassan Usmani， a computer scientist from the Florida Institute of Techno
4、logy， described a new way to increase impulse buying using this phenomenon. Supermarkets already encourage shoppers to buy things they did not realise they wanted： for instance， by placing everyday items such as milk and eggs at the back of the store， forcing shoppers to walk past other tempting goo
5、ds to reach them. Mr Usmani and Ronaldo Menezes， also of the Florida Institute of Technology， set out to enhance this tendency to buy more by playing on the herd instinct. The idea is that， if a certain product is seen to be popular， shoppers are likely to choose it too. The challenge is to keep cus
6、tomers informed about what others are buying. 3. Enter smart-cart technology. In Mr Usmanis supermarket every product has a radio frequency identification tag， a sort of barcode that uses radio waves to transmit information， and every trolley has a scanner that reads this information and relays it t
7、o a central computer. As a customer walks past a shelf of goods， a screen on the shelf tells him how many people currently in the shop have chosen that particular product. If the number is high， he is more likely to select it too. 4. Mr Usmanis “swarm-moves” model appeals to supermarkets because it
8、increases sales without the need to give people discounts. And it gives shoppers the satisfaction of knowing that they bought the “right” productthat is， the one everyone else bought. The model has not yet been tested widely in the real world， mainly because radio frequency identification technology
9、 is new and has only been installed experimentally in some supermarkets. But Mr Usmani says that both Wal-Mart in America and Tesco in Britain are interested in his work， and testing will get under way in the spring. 5. Another recent study on the power of social influence indicates that sales could
10、， indeed， be boosted in this way. Matthew Salganik of Columbia University in New York and his colleagues have described creating an artificial music market in which some 14，000 people downloaded previously unknown songs. The researchers found that when people could see the songs ranked by how many t
11、imes they had been downloaded， they followed the crowd. When the songs were not ordered by rank， but the number of times they had been downloaded was displayed， the effect of social influence was still there but was less pronounced. People thus follow the herd when it is easy for them to do so. 6. I
12、n Japan a chain of convenience shops called RanKing RanQueen has been ordering its products according to sales data from department stores and research companies. The shops sell only the most popular items in each product category， and the rankings are updated weekly. Icosystem， a company in Cambrid
13、ge， Massachusetts， also aims to exploit knowledge of social networking to improve sales. 7. And the psychology that works in physical stores is just as potent on the internet. Online retailers such as Amazon are adept at telling shoppers which products are popular with like-minded consumers. Even in
14、 the privacy of your home， you can still be part of the swarm. （分数：120.00）(1).Questions 1-6 Complete the sentences below with words taken from the reading passage. Use NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS for each answer. 1. Shopowners realize that the smell of 1 can increase sales of food products. （分数：10.00）填
15、空项 1:_(2). In shops， products shelved at a more visible level sell better even if they are more 1.（分数：10.00）填空项 1:_(3). According to Mr. Usmani， with the use of “swarm intelligence” phenomenon， a new method can be applied to encourage 1.（分数：10.00）填空项 1:_(4).On the way to everyday items at the back o
16、f the store， shoppers might be tempted to buy 1.（分数：10.00）填空项 1:_(5). If the number of buyers shown on the 1 is high， other customers tend to follow them.（分数：10.00）填空项 1:_(6).Using the “swarm-moves” model， shopowners do not have to give customers 1 to increase sales.（分数：10.00）填空项 1:_(7). Questions 7
17、-12 Do the following statements agree with the information given in the reading passage? For questions 7-12 write YES if the statement agrees with the information NO if the statement contraicts the information NOT GIVEN if there is no information on this in the passage 7. Radio frequency identificat
18、ion technology has been installed experimentally in big supermarkets like Wal-Mart. （分数：10.00）填空项 1:_(8).People tend to download more unknown songs than songs they are familiar with.（分数：10.00）填空项 1:_(9). Songs ranked high by the number of times being downloaded are favored by customers.（分数：10.00）填空项
19、 1:_(10).People follow the others to the same extent whether it is convenient or not.（分数：10.00）填空项 1:_(11).Items sold in some Japanese stores are simply chosen according to the sales data of other shops.（分数：10.00）填空项 1:_(12).Swarm intelligence can also be observed in everyday life.（分数：10.00）填空项 1:_R
20、ogue theory of smell gets a boost Published online： 6 December 2006 Rogue theory of smell gets a boost 1. A controversial theory of how we smell， which claims that our fine sense of odour depends on quantum mechanics， has been given the thumbs up by a team of physicists. 2. Calculations by researche
21、rs at University College London (UCL) show that the idea that we smell odour molecules by sensing their molecular vibrations makes sense in terms of the physics involved. 3. Thats still some way from proving that the theory， proposed in the mid-1990s by biophysicist Luca Turin， is correct. But it sh
22、ould make other scientists take the idea more seriously. 4. “This is a big step forward，“ says Turin， who has now set up his own perfume company Flexitral in Virginia. He says that since he published his theory， “it has been ignored rather than criticized.“ 5. Most scientists have assumed that our s
23、ense of smell depends on receptors in the nose detecting the shape of incoming molecules， which triggers a signal to the brain. This molecular lock and key process is thought to lie behind a wide range of the bodys detection systems： it is how some parts of the immune system recognise invaders， for
24、example， and how the tongue recognizes some tastes. 6. But Turin argued that smell doesnt seem to fit this picture very well. Molecules that look almost identical can smell very different such as alcohols， which smell like spirits， and thiols， which smell like rotten eggs. And molecules with very di
25、fferent structures can smell similar. Most strikingly， some molecules can smell different to animals， if not necessarily to humans simply because they contain different isotopes (atoms that are chemically identical but have a different mass)。 7. Turins explanation for these smelly facts invokes the
26、idea that the smell signal in olfactory receptor proteins is triggered not by an odour molecules shape， but by its vibrations， which can enourage an electron to jump between two parts of the receptor in a quantum-mechanical process called tunnelling. This electron movement could initiate the smell s
27、ignal being sent to the brain. 8. This would explain why isotopes can smell different： their vibration frequencies are changed if the atoms are heavier. Turins mechanism， says Marshall Stoneham of the UCL team， is more like swipe-card identification than a key fitting a lock. 9. Vibration-assisted e
28、lectron tunnelling can undoubtedly occur it is used in an experimental technique for measuring molecular vibrations. “The question is whether this is possible in the nose，“ says Stonehams colleague， Andrew Horsfield. 10. Stoneham says that when he first heard about Turins idea， while Turin was himse
29、lf based at UCL， “I didnt believe it“. But， he adds， “because it was an interesting idea， I thought I should prove it couldnt work. I did some simple calculations， and only then began to feel Luca could be right.“ Now Stoneham and his co-workers have done the job more thoroughly， in a paper soon to
30、be published in Physical Review Letters. 11. The UCL team calculated the rates of electron hopping in a nose receptor that has an odorant molecule bound to it. This rate depends on various properties of the biomolecular system that are not known， but the researchers could estimate these parameters b
31、ased on typical values for molecules of this sort. 12. The key issue is whether the hopping rate with the odorant in place is significantly greater than that without it. The calculations show that it is which means that odour identification in this way seems theoretically possible. 14. Meanwhile， Tu
32、rin is pressing ahead with his hypothesis. “At Flexitral we have been designing odorants exclusively on the basis of their computed vibrations，“ he says. “Our success rate at odorant discovery is two orders of magnitude better than the competition.“ At the very least， he is putting his money where h
33、is nose is. （分数：88.00）(1). Questions 1-4 Do the following statements agree with the information given in the passage? Please write TRUE if the statement agrees with the writer FALSE if the statement does not agree with the writer NOT GIVEN if there is no information about this in the passage 1. The
34、result of the study at UCL agrees with Turins theory. （分数：8.00）填空项 1:_(2).The study at UCL could conclusively prove what Luca Turin has hypothesized.（分数：8.00）填空项 1:_(3).Turin left his post at UCL and started his own business because his theory was ignored.（分数：8.00）填空项 1:_(4).The molecules of alcohol
35、s and those of thiols look alike. （分数：8.00）填空项 1:_(5). Questions 5-9 Complete the sentences below with words from the passage. Use NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS for each answer. 5. The hypothesis that we smell by sensing the molecular vibration was made by 1.（分数：8.00）填空项 1:_(6).Turins company is based in
36、 1.（分数：8.00）填空项 1:_(7).Most scientists believed that our nose works in the same way as our 1.（分数：8.00）填空项 1:_(8).Different isotopes can smell different when 1 weigh differently.（分数：8.00）填空项 1:_(9).According to Audrew Horsfield， it is still to be proved that 1 could really occur in human nose.（分数：8.0
37、0）填空项 1:_(10).Question 10-11 Answer the questions below using NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the passage for each answer. 10. What is the next step of the UCL teams study? （分数：8.00）填空项 1:_(11).What is the theoretical basis in designing odorants in Turins company? （分数：8.00）填空项 1:_雅思阅读-练习十四答案解析(总分：318.
38、00，做题时间：120 分钟)How to increase sales Published online： Nov 9th 2006 From The Economist print edition How shops can exploit peoples herd mentality to increase sales 1. A TRIP to the supermarket may not seem like an exercise in psychological warfarebut it is. Shopkeepers know that filling a store with
39、 the aroma of freshly baked bread makes people feel hungry and persuades them to buy more food than they had intended. Stocking the most expensive products at eye level makes them sell faster than cheaper but less visible competitors. Now researchers are investigating how “swarm intelligence” (that
40、is， how ants， bees or any social animal， including humans， behave in a crowd) can be used to influence what people buy. 2. At a recent conference on the simulation of adaptive behaviour in Rome， Zeeshan-ul-hassan Usmani， a computer scientist from the Florida Institute of Technology， described a new
41、way to increase impulse buying using this phenomenon. Supermarkets already encourage shoppers to buy things they did not realise they wanted： for instance， by placing everyday items such as milk and eggs at the back of the store， forcing shoppers to walk past other tempting goods to reach them. Mr U
42、smani and Ronaldo Menezes， also of the Florida Institute of Technology， set out to enhance this tendency to buy more by playing on the herd instinct. The idea is that， if a certain product is seen to be popular， shoppers are likely to choose it too. The challenge is to keep customers informed about
43、what others are buying. 3. Enter smart-cart technology. In Mr Usmanis supermarket every product has a radio frequency identification tag， a sort of barcode that uses radio waves to transmit information， and every trolley has a scanner that reads this information and relays it to a central computer.
44、As a customer walks past a shelf of goods， a screen on the shelf tells him how many people currently in the shop have chosen that particular product. If the number is high， he is more likely to select it too. 4. Mr Usmanis “swarm-moves” model appeals to supermarkets because it increases sales withou
45、t the need to give people discounts. And it gives shoppers the satisfaction of knowing that they bought the “right” productthat is， the one everyone else bought. The model has not yet been tested widely in the real world， mainly because radio frequency identification technology is new and has only b
46、een installed experimentally in some supermarkets. But Mr Usmani says that both Wal-Mart in America and Tesco in Britain are interested in his work， and testing will get under way in the spring. 5. Another recent study on the power of social influence indicates that sales could， indeed， be boosted i
47、n this way. Matthew Salganik of Columbia University in New York and his colleagues have described creating an artificial music market in which some 14，000 people downloaded previously unknown songs. The researchers found that when people could see the songs ranked by how many times they had been dow
48、nloaded， they followed the crowd. When the songs were not ordered by rank， but the number of times they had been downloaded was displayed， the effect of social influence was still there but was less pronounced. People thus follow the herd when it is easy for them to do so. 6. In Japan a chain of convenience shops called RanKing RanQ
