Are the endless decisions of modern life leading to decision fatigue，depleting（耗尽）our willpower（意志力）to the point that we end up making increasingly poor，even self-destructive choices?

In an excerpt adapted from his book,John Tierney makes the case that they do.The piece opens with a description of research on parole（假释）decisions made by Israeli judges，which found that the judges were dramatically more likely to free prisoners earlier in the day or right after lunch,compared with other times.

But Stanford psychology professor Carol Dweck has found an interesting perspective.Her research shows that while decision fatigue does occur,it primarily affects those who believe that willpower runs out quickly.

"We find that people get fatigued or depleted after a difficult task only when they believe that willpower is a limited resource,but not when they believe it's not so limited,"says Dweck.Because the majority of people tend to view their stores of willpower as being limited,the effect appears universal in studies that don't distinguish between people holding various beliefs.

"If you look over our studies,we get effects that look like overall fatigue.But when you break it down into the people who believe willpower is limited and those who don't,you have two separate groups," says Dweck. "In fact, in some cases,the people who believe that willpower is not so limited actually perform better after a difficult task."

In the excerpt,Tierney cites research showing that consumption of sugar restores depleted willpower.One study involved giving people either thick,tasty milkshakes or flavorless,low-fat drinks after a series of decision-based tasks had reduced their performance. As long as the food contained sugar, it didn't matter whether the stuff was rewardingly tasty. Although the researchers initially thought that indulging in something pleasurable would reduce participants' decision fatigue, it turned out that it was the sugar,not the pleasure,that actually boosted brain performance.

Other studies have shown that,similarly,sugar consumption reduces people's expressions of prejudice,presumably by helping them maintain self-restraint.

Dweck has tested how this idea fits with her theory on willpower:“We find that sugar improves self-control only for the people who believe in limited willpower,"she says."We think that people who believe in limited willpower are always checking to see how fatigued they are.If they feel fatigued,they show a deficit.If you give them sugar and they get a surge of energy,they don't show a deficit.”

A.when they were hungry

B.when they felt relaxed

C.later in the day

D.right after lunch

A.hold conflicting beliefs

B.have few financial resources

C.develop self-destructive habits

D.think their willpower is limited

A.Choice making takes time

B.Decision fatigue happens

C.Beliefs affect behavior

D.Willpower is infinite

A.A fat-free drink

B.A sugary cookie

C.A pleasurable exercise

D.A comforting atmosphere

A.It weakens their brain performance

B.It causes a deficit of energy

C.It boosts their self-control

D.It intensifies their fatigue

Feedback,I am told,is like a delicious dish for service providers.That's all very well for those that receive it,but where is the reward for those that give it? I'm pretty tired of getting back from a business trip and finding my inbox filled with every supplier that I used asking for my commentary on their services.The airline,my car hire and the hotels I stayed at all use their possession of my email address to send their requests for my opinion.
If I am sufficiently bothered to click into their surveys,I reckon I could waste a good half an hour ticking boxes and adding remarks.Some of these requests for my observations suggest I might win a prize by being added to a draw.Who,I wonder,ever wins? Are there lists of those who benefit? I doubt it.
Why are we getting this constant deluge（接连不断）of requests to help businesses improve themselves? Hotels are the worst.It never happened 30 years ago and I blame the Internet.Ever since that innovation,hotel chains have been using electronic survey tools to track guest satisfaction and monitor quality among their properties.Based on an analysis of chains that have purchased the industry guest satisfaction surveys by JD Power,hotel brands with higher scores apparently make more money than those with lower ones.
Well,that makes sense, and it proves that these surveys are just a cheap way of asking me to improve someone else's enterprise.And while the business traveller might think that their suggestions are being taken into account to improve their future experiences,it's actually only the scores in the boxes that are being used by an anonymous head office to monitor operational management's effectiveness.
The pressure is on the operator to keep satisfaction high, and numbers can be manipulated by the design of the questions and the focus of the form.Trend history shows that respondents （调查对象）consistently rate facility higher than service.Removing some of the questions about service and adding a few about the quality of the bedding can spin the overall scores positively.
Wherever service is involved,it appears that satisfaction scores fall. The School of Hotel Administration at Comell University has produced a number of studies of such surveys that show a 20% drop in approval ratings between physical facilities and service.
All of this seems to indicate that surveys can be designed to fit whatever the originator wishes to hear.

A.He is informed of having no reward for his overwork

B.He is asked to comment on his service providers

C.He fails to receive some of his expected emails

D.He forgets to claim his luggage at the airport

A.It is a lure

B.It is a joke

C.It is a trend

D.It is a routine

A.Satisfy their customers' needs

B.Expand their business scope

C.Innovate their facilities

D.Generate great profits

A.The customers' scores

B.The customers' suggestions

C.The customers' experiences

D.The customers' backgrounds

A.Those about their facilities

B.Those about their room service

C.Those about their food offering

D.Those about their online booking

Becky Evans,a psychology graduate student at the University of Liverpool,recently devised a survey for cat owners who think their cats are psychopaths（精神病患者）.The survey asks owners to describe the allegedly psychopathic behaviors,and so far they have included bullying other pets,and waiting on the kitchen counter to jump on unsuspecting family members.

There's always a comparison when we talk about cats,says Mikel Maria Delgado from the University of Califomia,And that comparison is with dogs,which humans have spent thousands more years domesticating（驯化）.“We like things that remind us of us，＂Delgado said.“We like smiling.We like dogs doing what we tell them.We like that they attend to us very quickly.”

Cats,she pointed out,simply don't have the facial muscles to make the variety of expressions a dog can.So when we look at a cat staring at us with no feelings,it looks like a psychopath who cannot show emotion.But that's just its face.Cats communicate not with facial expressions but through the positions of their ears and tails.

Dogs,on the other hand,have learned to imitate humans.They pull their mouths back into something resembling a smile. They hang their heads in a way that looks super guilty. Dogs that repeatedly raise their eyebrows to make cute puppy faces are more likely to be adopted out of shelters.

As to pet-owner attachment,Delgado said cats are no different from dogs.But she noted that dogs are used to their owners taking them to new places,while cats are territorial,so what looks like indifference to their owners might just be overwhelming anxiety about a new, strange environment.

There're terrifying cats,but there're also cats who just want to stay somewhere allday. Evans has a lovely cat,who definitely is not a psychopath.

The survey,Evans hopes, is just the first step in devising a way to measure psychopathy in cats.She'd like to eventually study cats in their natural habitat-their house-so as not to rely on the word of their owners.The ultimate goal of the research is to devise a test for shelters so they can better match cats with owners.Whether it's fair to call a cat a psychopath, we naturally do it,and it affects how well new owners and their cats will get along.

A.Being aggressive

B.Being amusing

C.Being gentle

D.Being quiet

A.Making facial expressions

B.Playing with other pets

C.Attending to other pets

D.Giving us greetings

A.their mouths

B.their eyes

C.their ears

D.their legs

A.An indifferent owner

B.A poor shelter

C.A new place

D.A fierce dog

A.What cats'shelters look like

B.Whether cats are psychopaths

C.Where owners can find their cats

D.Why pet stores should be assessed

Newton resident David Porat wants to set an example for his community.Shrugging off heat waves,insect bites,and parking tickets,the 84-year-old retired electrical engineer and consultant spends his days scraping,cleaning,and repainting some of the city's many fire hydrants（消防栓）.

The inspiration came on a visit to Medford,when he was struck by the difference between the hydrants there and those in Newton. "It's an old town but all the hydrants on the highway look good,painted nicely,taken care of," he said.“And you come to Newton and you don't see that.You see a lot of them are neglected."

Porat reached out to the Newton Parks,Recreation,and Culture Department to obtain permission and get his materials.Then,he began the hard work of restoring each hydrant.

“It's a three-step process,"he said."First scraping most of the paint by hand with scrapers and sandpaper,things like that.Then I free-paint them with a cleaner and paint."

By his own estimate,he has repainted over 520 of Newton's more than 2,500 fire hydrants,many of which had not been painted or cleaned for years.

Porat retired two years ago,but he said he still does occasional consulting."Some people hate work,you know,some people can dread Mondays," Porat said.“I couldn't wait for Monday.”

This past winter,Porat said,he paused because paint cannot set at lower temperatures. But with warm1 weather here and a fresh supply of paint from the city government,he has started up again and plans to continue for the foreseeable（可预见的）future.

Porat said something that often strikes him while painting is the different reactions he gets from passersby in different neighborhoods."Some sections when you come there and they see you doing it,they come to talk to you,"he said."They come bring me bottled water. They offer me a bench to sit on.On the oter hand if you go to a public place like Newton Centre,you're invisible."

Porat said he does the work to give back to the community ad set a good example. “That's why I want to volunteer, and I want to show other people that youI can help if you care and you think about it，＂he said.“It＇s not a chore（乏味无聊的工作）for me.”

A.dog bites

B.hot weather

C.lack of materials

D.high parking fees

A.as an electrical engineer

B.as a fire hydrant designer

C.for the government

D.for his community

A.His family

B.His community

C.A local business

D.The local government

A.They treated him with water

B.They asked him to take a break

C.They paid little attention to him

D.They were curious about his work

A.To show his potential for a new job

B.To inspire others to follow his example

C.To relieve the boredom of his retirement

D.To increase his popularity in the community

Elements of the Garifuna culture-including music,dance,and language-were listed as a UNESCO Masterpiece of Oral and Intangible（非物质的）Heritage of Humanity in 2001． Around that same time,Garifuna musicians and cultural activists had a plan:Create irresistible melodies,sung entirely in Garifuna,to rally young Garinagu to embrace the culture and learn the language.

Or,as Garifuna singer,songwriter,and UNESCO Artist of Peace Andy Palacio of Belize said in a 2007 interview:Make the Garifuna culture “cool.”

Punta rock did just that.Traditional punta relies heavily on drums and maracas（响葫芦）， with sounds that echo that of the Garinagu's African ancestors.Paranda,another classic Garifuna music style, adds guitar to the melodies,which hints at the culture's Central American influence.

Punta rock is “the one that really blows up,"says Alvin Laredo,a Garifuna tour guide. It's similar to punta,but with a keyboard,electric guitar,and horns-the perfect mix to appear on the world stage.

Palacio,a leader in the cultural renaissance,gathered Garifuna musicians across Central America to form the Garifuna Collective band in 2007.Their Garifuna lyrics sent a powerful message:It's time to defend our culture.

"Music made me fascinated with the culture; it became an identity,"says Kevin Ramirez, a Garifuna musician and producer based in New York,where his parents,both Garifuna, immigrated from Honduras.Ramirez grew up learning about his family's culture,but, as a Garifuna American,he struggled to understand his identity. "T'm Black,but the Black Americans didn't embrace me because I spoke Spanish;I spoke Spanish,but Latinos didn't embrace me because I'm Black."

He found a sense of belonging after visiting Honduras and attending live Garifuna music shows;these travels inspired him to start Hagucha Records,one of today's top Garifuna record labels.His story of promoting and spreading the culture and language through song mirrors the path of many contemporary Garifuna artists.

Take musician James Lovell,who adopted the language at age 16 to follow in the footsteps of his favourite Belizean musician and cultural revivalist,Pen Cayetano,"the king of punta rock."Lovell became part of a larger grassroots effort to teach the language in New York.Increasingly,many Garifuna language lessons are now available online.

Will music save the Garifuna language?Time will tell.Garifuna remains on UNESCO's endangered-language list,last updated in 2010.And, as the Hawaiians learned from reviving their own language after colonization（殖民化），this kind of revival is a long， multi-generational road.

A.protect Garifuna musical instruments

B.produce Garifuna melodies

C.learn the Garifuna language

D.revive the Garifuna dance

A.The keyboard

B.The maraca

C.The guitar

D.The drum

A.He differed from others in spreading the Garifuna culture

B.He was confused about his identity before visiting Honduras

C.He had low self-esteem because he grew up in Honduras

D.He learned about the Black culture in Honduras

A.Andy Palacio

B.Alvin Laredo

C.James Lovell

D.Pen Cayetano

A.To suggest that reviving a language is a long-term project

B.To illustrate that music has the power to revive a language

C.To imply that colonization has little effect on native languages

D.To highlight that UNESCO plays a vital role in saving languages