题目内容
Friendship and Living Longer
Do you want to be healthier and live longer？ Spend time with your friends. That is the prescription given by several medical studies. These surveys show that people with strong social ties--to friends, family and loved ones, even pets live longer and enjoy better health than lonely people.
One study in California, for example, followed 7,000 people over a period Of nine years. The subjects were asked to describe their social ties. Some said that they were isolated from others. These subjects had death rates two or three times higher than people with families and friends.
The stronger the social ties to others, the study found, the lower the death rate. The pattern held true for men and women, young and old, rich and poor. The race of the subject did not change the result. It also applied to people with different life styles. Cigarette smokers who had friends lived longer than friendless smokers. Joggers involved with other people lived longer than joggers who lived isolated lives.
Another study confirms this result. The University of Michigan looked at 2,754 adults in Tecumseh, Michigan. The researchers carefully measured their subjects' health at the beginning of the study. The lonely, isolated people started out as healthy as the others. But over ten years, they were two to four times as likely to die.
Other findings also show the health value of personal ties. Married men and women tend to live longer than single, divorced or widowed people of the same age. In nursing homes, patients became more aware and responsive when they played with cats and dogs. Pet owners are more likely to survive heart attacks than people without pets.
Another kind of proof that social ties support good health comes from Japan. Most Japanese people live hectic lives in cities as crowded, noisy, and polluted as ours. Such a way of life seems unhealthy. Yet the Japanese are among the healthiest and longest-lived people in the world. One reason may be their diet. Another reason, though, is the way of life. The Japanese have strong ties to family and co-workers. These ties are rarely broken. For example, companies tend to move co-workers as a group, rather than one at a time. Thus the work groups remain the same.
Studies of Japanese-Americans support the importance of the role of Japanese social life in preserving their health. Japanese-Americans who live in strongly Japanese neighborhoods and have mainly Japanese friends tend to live longer than those who do not. Both groups eat mostly American-style. food and many in both groups smoke and drink. Thus it appears to be the strong social ties of Japanese communities that keep their members healthy.
Why is it more healthy to have friends and loved ones？ We don't know exactly. But it is probably a combination of several explanations. In part, people with strong social ties may simply have more to live for. They have loved ones or family who share their lives. They have friends who call them and ask them how they are doing. They have get-togethers to look forward to.
Social contacts also provide us with a buffer against the shocks of life. At some point, each of us moves, changes a job, or loses a loved one. Such abrupt changes tend to cause increase in the rates of many diseases. These include heart disease, cancer, strokes, and mental illnesses. Accidents are also more likely to happen to people whose lives have suddenly changed. Friends, loved ones, even a loyal dog can help us to get through the otherwise very rough changes that we must deal with in life.
Finally, friends and loved ones can affect our health in still another way. If we are smokers, they may help us to quit. If we overeat, they may urge us to cut back. They can remind us to go for medical checkups. And if we have fears or sadness bottled up inside us, friends
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听力原文： Many children first learn the value of money by receiving an allowance. Parents often give their children an amount of money that they may spend as they wish. The purpose is to let the children learn from experience at an age when financial mistakes are not very costly.
A child may receive an allowance each week or each month. The amount is not so important. But parents should make clear what, if anything, the child is expected to pay for with the money.
At first, young children may spend all of their allowance soon after they receive it. If they do this, they will learn the hard way that spending must be done within a budget. Parents should not offer more money until the next allowance is to be paid.
Older children may be responsible enough to budget larger costs like those for clothing. The object is to show young people that a budget demands choices between spending and saving.
And paying children to do extra work around the house can be useful. It can even provide an understanding of how a business works.
Allowances give children a chance to experience the three things they can do with money. They can share it with others. They can spend it by buying things they want. Or they can save it.
Saving helps children understand that costly goals require sacrifice: you have to cut costs and plan for the future.
(33)
Close human ties may make life longer, but not fuller.
M: Yes. The last thing we want is to cause inconvenience to the general public. Our quarrel is not with the general public, it is with the employers and the government.
Q: What does the man mean？
(19)
Imagine eating everything delicious you want -with none of the fat. That would be great, wouldn't it？
New "fake fat" products appeared on stone shelves in the United States recently, but not everyone is happy about it. Makers of the products, which contain a compound called olestra, say food manufacturers can now eliminate fat from certain foods. Critics, however, say the new compound can rob the body of essential vitamins and nutrients (营养物) and can also cause unpleasant side effects in some people. So it's up to consumers to decide whether the new fat-free products taste good enough to keep eating.
Chemists discovered olestra in the late 1960s, when they were searching for a fat that could be digested by infants more easily. Instead of finding the desired fat, the researchers created a fat that can't be digested at all.
Normally, special chemicals in the intestines (肠) "grab" molecules of regular fat and break them down so they can be used by the body. A molecule of regular fat is made up of three molecules of substances called fatty acids.
The fatty acids are absorbed by the intestines and bring with them the essential vitamins A, D, E and K. When fat molecules are present in the intestines with any of those vitamins, the vitamins attach to the molecules and are carried into the bloodstream.
OIestra, which is made from six to eight molecules of fatty acids, is too large for the intestines to absorb. It just slides through the intestines without being broken down. Manufacturers say it's that ability to slide unchanged through the intestines that makes olestea so valuable as a fat substitute. It provides consumers with the taste of regular fat without any bad effects on the body. But critics say olestras can prevent vitamins A, D, E and K from being absorbed. It can also prevent the absorption of carotenoids (类胡萝卜素), compounds that may reduce the risk of cancer, heart disease, etc.
Manufacturers are adding vitamins A, D, E and K as well as carotenoids to their products now. Even so, some nutritionists are still concerned that people might eat unlimited amounts of food made with the fat substitute without worrying about how many calories they are consuming.
we learn from the passage that olestra is a substance that ______.
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