当前位置：七七学习网 →文档大全 → 考试文库 → 外语考试 → 职称英语考试试题→2017年全国职称英语理工类阅读理解模拟八» 正文

2017年全国职称英语理工类阅读理解模拟八

[05-11 15:21:50] 来源：http://www.77xue.com 职称英语考试试题 阅读：8533次

概要：Single-parent Kids Do BestSingle mums are better at raising their kids than two parents—at least in the bird world. Mother zebra finches have to work harder and raise fewer chicks on their own, but they also produce more attractive sons who are more likely to get a mate.The finding shows that family conflict is as important an evolutionary driving force as ecological factors such as hunting and food supply. With two parents around, there's al

2017年全国职称英语理工类阅读理解模拟八,标签：职称英语考试试题,职称英语考试答案,http://www.77xue.com
Single-parent Kids Do Best
　　Single mums are better at raising their kids than two parents—at least in the bird world. Mother zebra finches have to work harder and raise fewer chicks on their own, but they also produce more attractive sons who are more likely to get a mate.
　　The finding shows that family conflict is as important an evolutionary driving force as ecological factors such as hunting and food supply. With two parents around, there's always a conflict of interests, which can have a detrimental effect on the quality of the offspring.
　　In evolutionary terms, the best strategy for any parent in the animal world is to find someone else to care for their offspring, so they can concentrate on breeding again. so it's normal for parents to try to pass the buck to each other. But Ian Hartley from the University of Lancaster and his team wondered how families solve this conflict, and how the conflict itself affects the offspring.
　　To find out, they measured how much effort zebra finch parents put into raising their babies. They compared ingle females with pairs, by monitoring the amount of food each parent collected, and removing or adding chicks so that each pair of birds was raising four chicks, and each single mum had two—supposedly the same amount of work.
　　But single mums, they found, put in about 25 per cent more effort than females rearing with their mate. To avoid being exploited, mothers with a partner hold back from working too hard if the father is being lazy, and it's the chicks that pay the price. “The offspring suffer some of the cost of this conflict,” says Hartley.
　　The cost does not show in any obvious decrease in size or weight, but in how attractive they are to the opposite sex. When the chicks were mature, the researchers tested the “fitness” of the male offspring by offering females their choice of partner. Those males reared by single mums were chosen more often than those from two-parent families.
　　Sexual conflict has long been tough to affect the quality of care given to offspring, says zoologist Rebecca Kilner at Cambridge University, who works on conflict of parents in birds. “But the experimental evidence is not great. The breakthrough here is showing it empirically.”
　　More surprising, says Kilner, is Hartley's statement that conflict may be a strong influence on the evolution of behaviour, clutch size and even appearance. “People have not really made that link,” says Hartley. A female's reproductive strategy is usually thought to be affected by hunting and food supply. Kilner says conflict of parents should now be taken into account as well.
　　1. With which of the following statements would the author probably agree?
　　A. Single mums produce stronger sons.
　　B. Single mums do not produce daughters.
　　C. Two-parent families produce less attractive children.
　　D. Two-parent families produce more beautiful offspring.
　　2.According to the passage, in what way does family conflict affect the quality of the offspring?
　　A. The young males get less care.
　　B. The young females will decrease in weight.

[1] [2] 下一页

Tag:职称英语考试试题，职称英语考试试题,职称英语考试答案，考试文库 - 外语考试 - 职称英语考试试题

上一篇：2017年全国职称英语理工类阅读理解模拟七

2017年全国职称英语理工类阅读理解模拟八

《2017年全国职称英语理工类阅读理解模拟八》相关文章