大学英语快速阅读College English.1附习题8RATS HAVE HEAD FOR LANGUAGE..doc

RATS HAVE HEAD FOR LANGUAGEResearchers in Spain reported that animals, especially mammals ( nfLD), evolved some of the skills underlying the use and development of language long before language itself ever evolved.It is the first time that an animal other than a human or monkey has been shown to have this skill.For their study neuroscientist Juan Toro and his colleagues at Barcelonas Scientific Park tested 64 adult male rats. They used Dutch and Japanese because these languages were used in earlier, similar tests, and because they are very different from one another in use of words, rhythm and structure.The rats were trained to respond to either Dutch or Japanese using food as a reward. Then they were separated into four groups one that heard each language spoken by a native, one that heard synthesized ()speech, one that heard sentences read in either language by different speakers and a fourth that heard the languages played backwards. Rats rewarded for responding to Japanese did not respond to Dutch and rats trained to recognize Dutch did not respond to spoken Japanese. The rats could not tell apart Japanese or Dutch played backwards.Results showed that rats could discriminate natural sentences when uttered by a single speaker and not when uttered by different ones, nor could they distinguish the languages when spoken by different people. Human newborns have the same problem, although tamarins C ) can easily tell languages apart even when spoken by different people.It was striking to find that rats can track certain information that seems to be so important in language development in humans.The study shows which abilities that humans use for language are shared with other animals, and which are uniquely human. Lt also suggests what sorts of evolutionary precursors ( fuJl ) language might have.Choose the best answers to the following questions.1. 64 adult male rats have been tested toshow that.A. rats can be trained to speak Japanese and DutchB. ratshave some of the skills potential to the use and development of lanquaqeC. ratsare able to recognize a language when it is spoken by different peopleD. ratscan understand the words, rhythm and structure of a language2. Dutch and Japanese are chosen to be thetest languages because.A. they were used in earlier, similar testsB. somerats can recognize Dutch and some JapaneseC. Dutchand Japanese belong to different families of language and they were used earlier in similar testsD. Dutchand Japanese have different words, rhythms and structure3. Rats were rewarded when they.A. could respond to either of the two languagesB. could respond to both Dutch and JapaneseC. could tell apart Japanese or Dutch played backwardsD. coulddiscriminate natural sentences spoken by different speakers4. The test results have shown us all of thefollowing EXCEPT.A. rats can distinguish the languages spoken by a single speakerB. ratsshare some of the abilities for language with human beingsC. ratscan track certain information which seems to be important in language development in humansD. ratscan discriminate natural sentences spoken by different speakersS. The sentence Rats rewarded for responding to Japanese did not respond to Dutch and rats trained to recognize Dutch did not respond to spoken Japanese is closest in meaning to .A. When rats were trained to respond to one of the two languages, they didnt respond to the otherB. When rats responded to Japanese, they were rewarded. When rats responded to Dutch, they were not rewardedC. Given good rewards and special training, a rat could respond to both Dutch and JapaneseD. Forrats, responding to one language is less difficult than to two languagesJudge whether or not the following statements agree with the information given in the passage, and mark Y for YES, N for NO, or NG if information is not given in the passage.1. The scientists used Dutch and Japanese as the test languages because of their unusual words, rhythm and structure.Y NNG2. Newly born babies have little trouble in distinguishing language spoken by different people.Y NNG3. When Dutch and Japanese were played backwards, rats could not tell them apart.Y NNG4. The study shows that some abilities for language a