Part A: Reading Comprehension
Directions: Read the following text. Answer the questions below each text by choosing A, B, C or D. Mark your answers on the ANSWER SHEET. (40 points)
Text 1
Come on—Everybody’s doing it. That whispered message, half invitation and half forcing, is what most of us think of when we hear the words peer pressure. It usually leads to no good—drinking, drugs and casual sex. But in her new book Join the Club, Tina Rosenberg contends that peer pressure can also be a positive force through what she calls the social cure, in which organizations and officials use the power of group dynamics to help individuals improve their lives and possibly the world.
Rosenberg, the recipient of a Pulitzer Prize, offers a host of examples of the social cure in action: In South Carolina, a state-sponsored antismoking program called Rage Against the Haze sets out to make cigarettes uncool. In South Africa, an HIV-prevention initiative known as loveLife recruits young people to promote safe sex among their peers.
The idea seems promising, and Rosenberg is a perceptive observer. Her critique of the lameness of many public-health campaigns is spot-on: they fail to mobilize peer pressure for healthy habits, and they demonstrate a seriously flawed understanding of psychology. “Dare to be different, please don’t smoke!” pleads one billboard campaign aimed at reducing smoking among teenagers—teenagers, who desire nothing more than fitting in. Rosenberg argues convincingly that public-health advocates ought to take a page from advertisers, so skilled at applying peer pressure.
But on the general effectiveness of the social cure, Rosenberg is less persuasive. Join the Club is filled with too much irrelevant detail and not enough exploration of the social and biological factors that make peer pressure so powerful. The most glaring flaw of the social cure as it’s presented here is that it doesn’t work very well for very long. Rage Against the Haze failed once state funding was cut. Evidence that the loveLife program produces lasting changes is limited and mixed.
There’s no doubt that our peer groups exert enormous influence on our behavior. An emerging body of research shows that positive health habits—as well as negative ones—spread through networks of friends via social communication. This is a subtle form of peer pressure: we unconsciously imitate the behavior we see every day.
Far less certain, however, is how successfully experts and bureaucrats can select our peer groups and steer their activities in virtuous directions. It’s like the teacher who breaks up the troublemakers in the back row by pairing them with better-behaved classmates. The tactic never really works. And that’s the problem with a social cure engineered from the outside: in the real world, as in school, we insist on choosing our own friends.
21. According to the first paragraph, peer pressure often emerges as
22. Rosenberg holds that public-health advocates should
23. In the author’s view, Rosenberg’s book fails to
24. Paragraph 5 shows that our imitation of behaviors
25. The author suggests in the last paragraph that the effect of peer pressure is
全文翻译
来吧——大家都在这样做。这种半是邀请、半是强迫的低语，就是我们大多数人在听到"同伴压力"这个词时所想到的。它通常不会带来什么好事——酗酒、吸毒和随意性行为。但在她的新书《加入俱乐部》中，蒂娜·罗森伯格认为，同伴压力也可以通过她所谓的"社会疗法"成为一种积极力量——在这种疗法中，组织和官员利用群体动力的力量来帮助个人改善生活，甚至可能改善世界。
普利策奖得主罗森伯格提供了大量社会疗法付诸实施的例子：在南卡罗来纳州，一个由州政府资助的名为Rage Against the Haze的反吸烟项目致力于让香烟变得不酷。在南非，一项名为loveLife的艾滋病预防倡议招募年轻人来在同龄人中推广安全性行为。
这个想法似乎很有前景，罗森伯格也是一位敏锐的观察者。她对许多公共健康运动乏力的批评非常精准：它们未能动员同伴压力来推动健康习惯，并且展示出对心理学严重有缺陷的理解。一个旨在减少青少年吸烟的广告牌运动恳求道："敢于与众不同，请不要吸烟！"——而青少年最渴望的恰恰是融入群体。罗森伯格令人信服地指出，公共健康倡导者应该向广告人学习，他们在运用同伴压力方面是如此娴熟。
但在社会疗法的总体有效性上，罗森伯格不那么有说服力。《加入俱乐部》充斥着太多无关的细节，却没有充分探讨使同伴压力如此强大的社会和生物学因素。这里所呈现的社会疗法最明显的缺陷是，它无法长久有效地发挥作用。Rage Against the Haze在州政府资金被削减后就失败了。表明loveLife项目产生持久变化的证据是有限且矛盾的。
毫无疑问，我们的同伴群体对我们的行为施加着巨大的影响。越来越多的研究表明，积极的健康习惯——以及消极的习惯——通过社交沟通在朋友网络中传播。这是一种微妙的同伴压力：我们不自觉地模仿我们每天看到的行为。
然而，远没有那么确定的是，专家和官僚们在多大程度上能够成功地为选择我们的同伴群体，并引导他们的活动朝着善良的方向发展。这就像老师把后排的捣乱分子分开，让他们和行为较好的同学坐在一起。这种策略从来没有真正奏效过。这就是从外部设计的社会疗法的问题所在：在现实世界中，就像在学校一样，我们坚持选择自己的朋友。
Answers & Explanations (答案与深度解析)
试题精解
21. [D] a cause of undesirable behaviors.
【解析】细节题。第一段提到：它（同辈压力）通常导致没有好处的事情——饮酒、吸毒和随便的性行为。这些都属于“不良行为的起因（cause of undesirable behaviors）”。
22. [B] learn from advertisers’ experience.
【解析】细节题。第三段最后一句：Rosenberg 令人信服地指出，公共卫生倡导者应当“向广告商借鉴（take a page from advertisers）”，因为广告商非常擅长运用同辈压力。B选项“从广告商经验中学习”是对 take a page from 的同义替换。
23. [A] adequately probe social and biological factors.
【解析】细节题。第四段指出：Rosenberg 的书中充斥了太多无关的细节，而“对使同辈压力如此强大的社会和生物因素的探讨却不够”。A选项中的 adequately probe（充分探究）反义对应 not enough exploration。
24. [C] occurs without our realizing it.
【解析】细节题。第五段末尾指出：这是一种微妙的同辈压力形式：我们每天都在“无意识地（unconsciously）”模仿我们看到的行为。C选项“在没有意识到的情况下发生”正是 unconsciously 的同义解释。
25. [D] questionable.
【解析】态度题。最后一段首句就提出质疑：专家和官僚能否成功挑选同辈群体并引导其活动方向，“远不那么确定（Far less certain）”。因此，作者认为这种由外部策划的同辈压力效果是可疑的（questionable）。
考研核心句型与长难句
【长难句剖析】
1. 地道俚语与短语应用：
"Rosenberg argues convincingly that public-health advocates ought to take a page from advertisers, so skilled at applying peer pressure."
【解析】take a page from sb’s book 是一句非常地道的英语习语，意为“效仿某人/向某人借鉴经验”。句末的 so skilled... 是形容词短语作后置定语，修饰 advertisers。
"Rosenberg argues convincingly that public-health advocates ought to take a page from advertisers, so skilled at applying peer pressure."
【解析】take a page from sb’s book 是一句非常地道的英语习语，意为“效仿某人/向某人借鉴经验”。句末的 so skilled... 是形容词短语作后置定语，修饰 advertisers。
2. 倒装句增强语气：
"Far less certain, however, is how successfully experts and bureaucrats can select our peer groups and steer their activities in virtuous directions."
【解析】这是一个完全倒装句，表语 Far less certain 被提前以强调不确定性，主语是由 how 引导的主语从句 how successfully...。正常语序应为：How successfully experts... can select... is far less certain.
"Far less certain, however, is how successfully experts and bureaucrats can select our peer groups and steer their activities in virtuous directions."
【解析】这是一个完全倒装句，表语 Far less certain 被提前以强调不确定性，主语是由 how 引导的主语从句 how successfully...。正常语序应为：How successfully experts... can select... is far less certain.
3. 同位语与双重否定：
"“Dare to be different, please don’t smoke!” pleads one billboard campaign aimed at reducing smoking among teenagers—teenagers, who desire nothing more than fitting in."
【解析】破折号后的 teenagers 是对前文的重复和解释。who 引导定语从句，其中 desire nothing more than（没有比...更渴望的了，即极度渴望）利用双重否定表达了最强烈的肯定：青少年极度渴望融入群体（fitting in）。
"“Dare to be different, please don’t smoke!” pleads one billboard campaign aimed at reducing smoking among teenagers—teenagers, who desire nothing more than fitting in."
【解析】破折号后的 teenagers 是对前文的重复和解释。who 引导定语从句，其中 desire nothing more than（没有比...更渴望的了，即极度渴望）利用双重否定表达了最强烈的肯定：青少年极度渴望融入群体（fitting in）。