Question

Elephants are able to differentiate between ethnicities(種族) and sexes, and can tell an adult from a child --- all from the sound of a human voice.

This is according to a study in which researchers played voice recordings to wild African elephants.

The animals showed more fear when they heard the voices of adult Masai men.

Livestock-herding Masai people do come into conflict with elephants, and this suggests that animals have adapted to specifically listen for and avoid them.

The study is published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Prof Karen McComb and Dr Graeme Shannon from the University of Sussex led the study. They explained that in previous research they had used similar playback experiments to show that elephants could tell --- from the sound of a lion’s roar --- whether the animal was a female or a more dangerous male.

Prof McComb wanted to find out if the animals used their very sharp sense of hearing to identify a potential danger from humans.

The scientists recorded Masai men, women and children saying, in their own language, “Look, look over there, a group of elephants is coming”.

They also recorded Kamba men saying this phrase.

While cattle-herding Masai people often come across free-ranging elephants, which can result in violent conflict, the Kamba people’s more agricultural lifestyle does not generally bring them into aggressive touch with the animals.

When the team played recordings of these different voices through a hidden loudspeaker, they found that elephant family groups reacted more fearfully in response to the voice of a Masai man, than to a Kamba man’s voice.

And the adult male Masai voices encouraged far more of these defensive reactions than the voices of women or boys.

1.An elephant can tell a man from a woman by sense of ________.

A. touch B. sight C. smell D. hearing

2.How did the researchers get to know the elephants’ special ability of identification?

A. By observing the elephants in the zoo.

B. By playing voice recordings to them.

C. By recording the behaviours of elephants.

D. By communicating with them in a special way.

3.We can learn from the passage that elephants are especially afraid of ________.

A. Masai men B. Masai women

C. Kamba men D. Kamba women

4.What is the best title for the passage?

A. Elephants and human beings

B. Differences between human voices

C. Elephants recognise human voices

D. Elephants conflict with human beings

Answer 1

1.D

2.B

3.A

4.C

【解析】

試題分析:一項(xiàng)研究證明了大象能根據(jù)人類說話的聲音判斷出人類是成年人還是小孩子，以及性別的不同，也證明了對(duì)于人類不同的聲音對(duì)他們可能帶來的危險(xiǎn)也不同。

1. 細(xì)節(jié)理解題。從文中第六段elephants could tell --- from the sound of a lion’s roar --- whether the animal was a female or a more dangerous male.從獅子的吼叫聲，就可以判斷動(dòng)物是雌性還是雄性，故可知大象通過聽覺，來判斷男人還是女人。故選D。

2. is according to a study in which researchers played voice recordings to wild African elephants.這是根據(jù)一項(xiàng)研究，研究者給野生非洲大象播放錄制的聲音。故選B。

3.The animals showed more fear when they heard the voices of adult Masai men.當(dāng)他們聽到成年的Masai男人的聲音時(shí)，動(dòng)物們就顯得更加害怕。以及最后一段And the adult male Masai voices encouraged far more of these defensive reactions than the voices of women or boys.成年的Masai男人的聲音比女人和男孩的聲音會(huì)引發(fā)大象更多防御性地反應(yīng)。故選A。

4. 主旨分析題。結(jié)合全文可知，研究表明大象可以根據(jù)人類說話的嗓音來判別是成年人還是小孩，以及可能有的危險(xiǎn)，足以說明，大象能識(shí)別人類聲音。故選C。

考點(diǎn)：考察科普說明類閱讀