Decision-making under Stress

    A new review based on a research shows that acute stress affects the way the brain considers the advantages and disadvantages, causing it to focus on pleasure and ignore the possible negative (负面的) consequences of a decision.

     The research suggests that stress may change the way people make choices in predictable ways.

    “Stress affects how people learn,” says Professor Mara Mather. “People learn better about positive than negative outcomes under stress.”

    For example, two recent studies looked at how people learned to connect images(影像) with either rewards or punishments. In one experiment, some of the participants were first stressed by having to give a speech and do difficult math problems in front of an audience; in the other, some were stressed by having to keep their hands in ice water. In both cases, the stressed participants remembered the rewarded material more accurately and the punished material less accurately than those who hadn't gone through the stress.

    This phenomenon is likely not surprising to anyone who has tried to resist eating cookies or smoking a cigarette while under stress –at those moments, only the pleasure associated with such activities comes to mind. But the findings further suggest that stress may bring about a double effect. Not only are rewarding experiences remembered better, but negative consequences are also easily recalled.

    The research also found that stress appears to affect decision-making differently in men and women. While both men and women tend to focus on rewards and less on consequences under stress, their responses to risk turn out to be different.

    Men who had been stressed by the cold-water task tended to take more risks in the experiment while women responded in the opposite way. In stressful situations in which risk-taking can pay off big, men may tend to do better, when caution weighs more, however, women will win.

    This tendency to slow down and become more cautious when decisions are risky might also help explain why women are less likely to become addicted than men: they may more often avoid making the risky choices that eventually harden into addiction.

    The Healthy Habits Survey shows that only about one third of American seniors have correct habits. Here are some findings and expert advice.

    ⒈How many times did you brush your teeth yesterday?

    Finding: A full 3% of seniors brush their teeth only once a day

    Step: Remove the 300 types of bacteria in your mouth each morning with a battery-operated toothbrush. Brush gently for 2 minutes at least twice a day.

    ⒉How many times did you wash your hands or bathe yesterday?

    Finding: Seniors, on average, bathe fewer than 3 days a week. And nearly 30% wash their hands only 4 times a day—half of the number doctors recommend.

    Step: We touch our faces around 3,000 times a day—often inviting germs（病菌）to enter our mouth, nose, and eyes. Use toilet paper to avoid touching the door handle. And, most importantly, wash your hands often with hot running water and soap for 20 seconds.

    ⒊How often do you think about fighting germs?

    Finding: Seniors are not fighting germs as well as they should.

    Step: Be aware of germs. Do you know it is not your toilet but your kitchen sponge（海绵）that can carry more germs than anything else? To kill these germs, keep your sponge in the microwave for 10 seconds.

    Will it matter if you don't take your breakfast? Recently a test was given in the United States. Those testes included people of different ages, from 12 to 83. During the experiment, these people were given all kinds of breakfast, and sometimes they got no breakfast at all. Special tests were set up to see how well their bodies worked when they had eaten a certain kind of breakfast. The results show that if a person eats a proper breakfast, he or she will work with better effort than if he or she has no breakfast. This fact appears to be especially true if a person works with his brains. If a student eats fruit, eggs, bread and milk before going to school, he will learn more quickly and listen with more attention in class. Contrary to what many people believe, people become so hungry at noon that they eat too much for lunch, and end up gaining weight instead of losing. You will probably lose more weight if you reduce other meals.

News 1

    Yuan Longping, the father of hybrid rice, won the World Food Prize on Monday. Yuan developed the world's first popular and widely known hybrid rice. Hybrid rice plants can make more rice than regular ones.

News 2

    Have you ever got angry at books that are full of mistakes? Don't worry, things will get better soon. Last week, China started checking textbooks, dictionaries and children's books all over the country. The government said the results of the check would come out at the end of June.

News 3

    People will see a new "star" in the sky soon. China plants to send a satellite into space by December 2006.It will stay in space for one year. It will go around the moon and take pictures. It must be very expensive, right? That's for sure; 1.4 billion yuan!

News 4

    Have you ever thought of being able to fly around the world in a few hours? One day, maybe you can. Last Saturday, the American X­43A airplane made its first flight. It reached a speed of 8,000 kilometers per hour. This makes it the fastest plane in the world. X­43A is only three to four meters long, but it's very heavy. It weighs 1,270 kilograms.

An international team of astronomers used a database combining observations from the best telescopes in the world {#blank#}1{#/blank#} (detect) the signal from the active supermassive black holes of dying galaxies（星系） in the early universe. The {#blank#}2{#/blank#} (appear) of these active supermassive black holes is related to changes in the host galaxy. This means a black hole could have far reaching effects {#blank#}3{#/blank#} the evolution of its host galaxy.

The Milky Way Galaxy {#blank#}4{#/blank#} we live includes stars of various ages, including stars still forming. But in some other galaxies,{#blank#}5{#/blank#} (know) as elliptical（椭圆的） galaxies, all of the stars are old and about the same age. This indicates that early in {#blank#}6{#/blank#} (they) histories elliptical galaxies had a period of rich star formation that suddenly ended. Why this star formation stopped in some galaxies {#blank#}7{#/blank#} not others is not well understood. One possibility is that a supermassive black hole disrupts（瓦解） the gas in some galaxies,{#blank#}8{#/blank#} (create) an environment unsuitable for star formation.

To test this theory, astronomers look at distant galaxies. Due to the limited speed of light, it takes time for light to travel across the void of space. The light we saw last night from an object 10 billion light years away {#blank#}9{#/blank#} (travel) for 10 billion years to reach Earth. Thus the light we see today shows us what the galaxy looked like when the light left that galaxy 10 billion years ago. So looking at distant galaxies is like looking back in time. But the longer distance also means that distant galaxies look {#blank#}10{#/blank#} (small), making study more difficult.

Teamwork Doubles the Strength

Admittedly, teamwork is literally important for any class or team to achieve its goals and objectives. Let me give three reasons why it is advantageous.

As individuals, we possess diverse talents, strengths, weaknesses and experiences. A team is just like a tapestry（织锦） that weaves what each of us possesses, resulting in an end product that is diverse yet homogenous（同种类的）. As team members exchange thoughts and experiences, there can be more efficiency and effectiveness at problem-solving. This pooling of talents can also lead to greater innovation and success. {#blank#}1{#/blank#}. It won the Premier League in 2016, to the utter disbelief of many soccer fans. Leicester City, previousl regarded as the underdog of the League, displayed extremely impressive teamwork, which led to its unbelievable victory in soccer history.

Next, teamwork means members share the workload. When work is distributed and each of us in a team specializes in specific tasks, the stress on each of us is reduced and the completion of tasks before deadline is ensured: {#blank#}2{#/blank#}

 {#blank#}3{#/blank#}. Team members learn from more experienced members who may offer deeper insights and perspectives. Newer members may also contribute new ideas. Besides encouraging the sharing of knowledge and experiences, teamwork also develops soft skills like communication and interpersonal skills. {#blank#}4{#/blank#}.

Some may think that working in isolation（单独） is more efficient since more time is taken when cooperating with others. For more talented individuals, working alone means being the star of a project. {#blank#}5{#/blank#}. But, the loss of synergy（协同作用） that only team effort can generate may also prevent the team from reaching its full potential.

A．Take Leicester City for example

B．Thus we can expect greater job satisfaction

C．Team members can also be divided in opinions

D．They don't need to share the success with others

E．Let's not wave away the chance to work in teams

F．And finally working in a team multiplies learning opportunities

G．We learn to respect differences in working styles and opinions, and develop trust