首页
外语
计算机
考研
公务员
职业资格
财经
工程
司法
医学
专升本
自考
实用职业技能
登录
外语
Play Is a Serious Business A)Playing is a serious business. Children engrossed in a make-believe world, fox cubs play-fighting o
Play Is a Serious Business A)Playing is a serious business. Children engrossed in a make-believe world, fox cubs play-fighting o
admin
2020-06-08
46
问题
Play Is a Serious Business
A)Playing is a serious business. Children engrossed in a make-believe world, fox cubs play-fighting or kittens teaming a ball of string aren’t just having fun. Play may look like a carefree and exuberant way to pass the time before the hard work of adulthood comes along, but there’ s much more to it than that.
B)For a start, play can even cost animals their lives. Eighty percent of deaths among juvenile fur seals occur because playing pups fail to sport predators approaching. It is also extremely expensive in terms of energy. Playful young animals use around two or three per cent of energy cavorting, and in children that figure can be closer to fifteen per cent. "Even two or three per cent is huge," says John Byers of Idaho University. "You just don’t find animals wasting energy like that," he adds. There must be a reason.
C)But if play is not simply a developmental hiccup, as biologists once thought, why did it evolve? The latest idea suggests that play has evolved to build big brains. In other words, playing makes you intelligent. Playfulness, it seems, is common only among mammals, although a few of the larger-brained birds also indulge. Animals at play often use unique signs—tail-wagging in dogs, for example—to indicate that activity superficially resembling adult behaviour is not really in earnest.
D)A popular explanation of play has been that it helps juveniles develop the skills they will need to hunt, mate and socialise as adults. Another has been that it allows young animals to get in shape for adult life by improving their respiratory endurance. Both these ideas have been questioned in recent years.
E)Take the exercise theory. If play evolved to build muscle or as a kind of endurance training, then you would expect to see permanent benefits. But Byers points out that the benefits of increased exercise disappear rapidly after training stops, so many improvement in endurance resulting from juvenile play would be lost by adulthood.
F)"If the function of play was to get into shape," says Byers, "the optimum time for playing would depend on when it was most advantageous for the young of a particular species to do so. But it doesn’t work like that." Across species, play tends to peak about halfway through the suckling stage and then decline.
G)Then there’ s the skills-training hypothesis. At first glance, playing animals do appear to be practising the complex manoeuvres they will need in adulthood. But a closer inspection reveals this interpretation as too simplistic. In one study, behavioural ecologist Tim Caro, from the University of California, looked at the predatory play of kittens and their predatory behaviour when they reached adulthood. He found that the way the cats played had no significant effect on their hunting prowess in later life.
H)Earlier this year, Sergio Pellis of Lethbridge University, Canada, reported that there is a strong positive link between brain size and playfulness among mammals in general. Comparing measurements for fifteen orders of mammals, he and his team found large brains(for a given body size)are linked to greater playfulness. The converse was also found to be true.
I)Robert Barton of Durham University believes that, because large brains are more sensitive to developmental stimuli than smaller brains, they require more play to help mould them for adulthood. "I concluded it’ s to do with learning and with the importance of environmental data to the brain during development," he says.
J)According to Byers, the timing of the playful stage in young animals provides an important clue to what’ s going on. If you plot the amount of time juvenile devotes to play each day over the course of its development, you discover a pattern typically associated with a "sensitive period"—a brief development window during which the brain can actually be modified in ways that are not possible earlier or later in life.
K)Think of the relative ease with which young children—but not infants or adults—absorb language. Other researchers have found that play in cats, rats and mice is at its most intense just as this "window of opportunity" reaches its peak.
L)"People have not paid enough attention to the amount of the brain activated by plays," says Marc Bekoff from Colorado University. Bekoff studied coyote pups at play and found that the kind of behaviour involved was markedly more variable and unpredictable than that of adults. Such behaviour activates many different parts of the brain, he reasons. Bekoff likens it to a behavioural kaleidoscope, with animals at play jumping rapidly between activities. "They use behaviour from a lot of different contexts—predation, aggression, reproduction," he says. "Their developing brain is getting all sorts of stimulation."
M)Not only is more of the brain involved in play that was suspected, but it also seems to activate higher cognitive processes. "There’ s enormous cognitive involvement in play," says Bekoff. He points out that play often involves complex assessments of playmates, ideas of reciprocity and the use of specialised signals and rules. He believes that play creates a brain that has greater behavioural flexibility and improved potential for learning later in life.
N)The idea is backed up by the work of Stephen Siviy of Gettysburg College. Siviy studied how bouts of play affected the brain’ s levels of particular chemical associated with the stimulation and growth of nerve cells. He was surprised by the extent of the activation. "Play just lights everything up," he says. By allowing link-ups between brain areas that might not normally communicate with each other, play may enhance creativity.
O)What might further experimentation suggest about the way children are raised in many societies today? We already know that rat pups denied the chance to play grow smaller brain components and fail to develop the ability to apply social rules when they interact with their peers. With schooling beginning earlier and becoming increasingly exam-orientated, play is likely to get even less of a look-in. Who knows what the result of that will be?
Play consumes about fifteen percent of children’ s energy.
选项
答案
B
解析
本题意为玩耍会消耗孩子大约15%的能量。题干中的数字fifteen percent energy为定位词.对应到B段Playful young animals use around two or three per cent of energy cavorting,and in children that figure can be closer to fifteen per cent.“顽皮的小动物要花上百分之二三的精力来嬉戏打闹。而对于儿童而言,这个数字可以高达百分之十五。”题干中consume是对原文use的近义词替换。
转载请注明原文地址:https://kaotiyun.com/show/TLP7777K
0
大学英语六级
相关试题推荐
Ourape-menforefathershadnoobviousnaturalweaponsinthestruggleforsurvivalintheopen.Theyhadneitherthepowerfult
Ourape-menforefathershadnoobviousnaturalweaponsinthestruggleforsurvivalintheopen.Theyhadneitherthepowerfult
WhyIBecameaTeacher:toPassonMyLoveofLiteratureA)Likelotsofpeople,IneverthoughtI’dbeateacherwhenIwasat
A、AcitynamedMilton.B、AtownnamedMilton.C、TorontoAirport.D、MiltonAirport.B细节题。根据Ineedtogettoatowncalledum,Milt
NewDiscoveriesofPublicTransportA)AnewstudyconductedfortheWorldBankbyMurdochUniversity’sInstituteforSciencean
A、Americansvowtochangeit.B、Itisnotasbadasitusedtobe.C、Americansknowhowbaditistotheirhealth.D、Americansd
A、Thepossibilityofruiningherfamily.B、Becomingawareofherdeclininghealth.C、Thefatiguefromlivingafast-pacedlife.
A、22percentofmoviedirectorswerepeopleofcolor.B、HalfoftheTVprogramswereethnicallybalanced.C、Onlyone-fifthofTV
A、Projectorganizer.B、Publicrelationsofficer.C、Marketingmanager.D、Marketresearchconsultant.D对话开头男士就问女士做市场研究顾问多长时间了,由此可知
最近,中国政府决定将其工业升级。中国现在涉足建造高速列车、远洋船舶、机器人,甚至飞机。不久前,中国获得了在印度尼西亚(Indonesia)建造一条高铁的合同;中国还与马来西亚(Malaysia)签署了为其提供高速列车的合同。这证明人民信赖中国造产品。中
随机试题
下列哪种材料不能用作桥体的龈端
A.中心型脊柱椎体结核B.边缘型脊柱椎体结核C.脊柱肿瘤D.椎间盘突出症中青年多见,无骨质破坏,椎体边缘增生,椎间隙变窄见于
工资核算系统中的数据恢复功能可用某一备份盘对任意账套的工资数据进行恢复。()
绿安集团创建于20世纪90年代,专门从事化工原料贸易,化工原料主要来源于国内生产企业。在绿安集团成立后的几年内,国内民用化工产品的市场不断扩大,对化工原料的需求日益增加,绿安集团的业务开展得红红火火,利润持续增长。2000年开始,在董事长李先生的推动下,绿
外商投资企业在设立、变更等过程中订立的某些合同,依法律、行政法规的规定应当经外商投资企业审批机关批准后才生效。根据涉外投资法律制度的规定,此类合同未经批准时的效力状态是()。
为解决“不重”的问题,统计分组时习惯上规定()。
债权人的撤销权,应当自知道或者应当知道撤销事由之日起()内行使。
比较直接插入排序、起泡排序、简单选择排序、快速排序、堆排序、2一路归并排序和基数排序的算法性能,并填写下表:
"Down-to-earth"meanssomeoneorsomethingthatishonest,realisticandeasytodealwith.Itisapleasuretofind【31】______w
AbundanceIsaLifestyleI.Whatisabundance?1)alifestyle,awayof【T1】【T1】______—notsomethingyoubuy—notsomethingyouu
最新回复
(
0
)