2014年5月托福考试模拟试题及答案(第八套)_第7页

　　Narrator

　　Now read the passage about animal domestication. You have 45 seconds to read the passage. Begin reading now.

　　Reading Time: 45 seconds

　　Animal Domestication

　　For thousands of years, humans have been able to domesticate, or tame, many large mammals that in the wild live together in herds. Once tamed, these mammals are used for agricultural work and transportation. Yet some herd mammals are not easily domesticated. A good indicator of an animal's suitability for domestication is how protective the animal is of its territory. Non-territorial animals are more easily domesticated than territorial animals because they can live close together with animals from other herds. A second indicator is that animals with a hierarchical social structure, in which herd members follow a leader, are easy to domesticate, since a human can function as the "leader".

　　Narrator

　　Now listen to part of a lecture on this topic in an ecology class.

　　Question

　　The professor describes the behavior of horses and antelope in herds. Explain how their behavior is related to their suitability for domestication.

　　Important Points(答题要点)

　　1. Horses are hierarchical in their social structure. They naturally follow a leader. Hierarchical animals will accept a human as their leader.

　　2. Horses are not territorial, so they can live close together/don't fight other herds that enter the same territory.

　　3. Antelopes are not hierarchical.

　　4. Antelopes are territorial and will fight fiercely with each other.

　　5. Application: Thus horses have the traits that make them suitable for domestication while antelopes are not suitable.

　　Notes: Many people carefully describe the examples but do not really sum it up in the higher-level application. There are two results of the horses' hierarchical nature: the ability to harness them together is in the lecture; the consequence for human leadership is in the reading. Few people mention them both. One method of answering is to focus on the presence of traits in the species and skip the negatives, i.e. horses are hierarchical and antelopes are territorial, without mentioning the absence of these traits in each other.

　　Both horses/ and antelopes /are herd animals// but they are differ/ in the um domestication//horses are fo/ um/tend to follow /one horse at a time/ to/ in a herd //because they understand the hierarchy/ of the leader /of the group// whereas antelope/ does not follow/ this same pattern//this could be seen/ by the example of /um/ putting two males together /in the/ in the group of antelopes /and they will not/ let render the leadership /to another male antelope/ until they/one of them/wins in the fight//that means that/ it is not natural/ for the antelopes /to follow human/ as their leaders// and domestication/ efforts/they would fight/ and not easily tamed/ as horses do Txt

　　So we’ve been discussing the suitability of animals for domestication...　particularly animals that live together in herds. Now, if we take horses,　for example... in the wild, horses live in herds that consist of one male　and several females and their young. When a herd moves, the dominant male　leads, with the dominant female and her young immediately behind him. The　dominant female and her young are then followed immediately by the second　most important female and her young, and so on. This is why domesticated　horses can be harnessed one after the other in a row. They’re “programmed” to follow the lead of another horse. On top of that, you often find　different herds of horses in the wild occupying overlapping areas--they　don’t fight off other herds that enter the same territory. But it’s　exactly the opposite with an animal like the uh, the antelope... which...　well, antelopes are herd animals too. But unlike horses, a male antelope　will fight fiercely to prevent another male from entering its territory　during the breeding season, ok--very different from the behavior of horses.　Try keeping a couple of male antelopes together in a small space and see　what happens. Also, antelopes don’t have a social hierarchy--they don’t　instinctively follow any leader. That makes it harder for humans to control　their behavior.