题型：阅读理解 题类：常考题 难易度：普通
浙江省稽阳联谊学校2020届高三下学期英语4月联考试卷（含听力音频）
On some level, offices exist to inspire in-person collaboration. But many of the basic technologies that employees now used to work together often encourage them to work virtually independent of one another.
"They wear their headphones—headphones are the new walls—to signal they are involved in high-concentration work and not available for chat," says Stowe Boyd, a social critic whose research focuses on the future of work.
Such behavior is indicative of a wider workplace trend. As office-communication technologies have become more advanced, more and more employees are avoiding direct interaction with their co-workers. Experts say this is a shift that is likely to continue. Emerging technologies even suggests a future—perhaps decades away, but maybe sooner—in which offices are populated by employees who engage in virtually no work-focused, face-to-face contact whatsoever.
It isn't to say co-workers won't connect. Even as employees make the transition to "individual" work, they may begin to communicate in new ways that are as engaging as real-life interactions. Virtual reality, for example, could "hold 3-D meetings around a digital meeting table where employees are not physically in" says Martin Ford, an author who studies artificial intelligence and robots, among other things.
What's the upside of a chat-free future, in which colleagues work together in close physical space but never need to talk person-to-person? For one, it may make work experiences more efficient by stopping gossipy distractions that can get in the way of serious affairs. It also may safeguard employees from physical disturbance, a growing workplace concern, says Jamais Cascio, an author and futurist.
But there are possible problems. Virtual environments have the potential to reduce social inhibitions (抑制), which could lead to conflicts. It's also possible that technology will create a more impersonal atmosphere. Without the water cooler-style chat that can make work life more vibrant—research suggests informal office jokes can boost productivity—office relationships could start to resemble the interactions we have with strangers in public spaces.
Eventually, some experts believe, with technologies making their way into offices, humans may remove themselves from the workplace altogether, though not in the sense that they will be replaced by robots, as many have predicted.
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