2. 外语
  3. Speaking two languages rather than just one has obvious practical benefits. In recent years, scientists have begun to show that

Speaking two languages rather than just one has obvious practical benefits. In recent years, scientists have begun to show that

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问题     Speaking two languages rather than just one has obvious practical benefits. In recent years, scientists have begun to show that being bilingual makes you smarter. It can have a profound effect on your brain, improving cognitive skills not related to language and even shielding against dementia in old age.
    Researchers, educators and policy makers in 20 century considered a second language to be an interference, cognitively speaking, that hindered a child’s academic and intellectual development. There is ample evidence that in a bilingual’s brain both language systems are active even when he is using only one language, thus creating situations in which one system obstructs the other. But this interference isn’t so much a handicap as a blessing in disguise. It forces the brain to resolve internal conflict, giving the mind a workout that strengthens its cognitive muscles. The collective evidence from a number of such studies suggests that the bilingual experience improves the brain’s so-called executive function. These processes include ignoring distractions to stay focused, switching attention willfully from one thing to another and holding information in mind—like remembering a sequence of directions while driving.
    Why does the tussle between two simultaneously active language systems improve these aspects of cognition? Researchers thought the bilingual advantage stemmed primarily from an ability for inhibition that was honed by the exercise of suppressing one language system. But that explanation increasingly appears to be inadequate, since studies have shown that bilinguals perform better than monolinguals even at tasks that do not require inhibition, like threading a line through an ascending series of numbers scattered randomly on a page.
    The key difference between bilinguals and monolinguals may be more basic: a heightened ability to monitor the environment. "Bilinguals have to switch languages quite often, " says Albert Costa, a searcher at the University of Pompeu Fabra in Spain. "It requires keeping track of changes around you in the same way that we monitor our surroundings when driving. "In a study comparing German-Italian bilinguals with Italian monolinguals on monitoring tasks, Mr. Costa and his colleagues found that the bilingual subjects not only performed better, but they also did so with less activity in parts of the brain involved in monitoring, indicating that they were more efficient at it.
    The bilingual experience appears to influence the brain from infancy to old age, and there is reason to believe that it may also apply to those who learn a second language later in life.
According to the text, which of the following is TRUE?
选项 A、People believe that monolingual learning positively affects the brain.
B、Monolinguals need to neglect brains’ internal conflict and stay focused.
C、Bilinguals could do better in observing the changes of environment.
D、Bilingual experience affects children more than old people.
答案C
解析 细节题。题干中并未提及与段落相关的关键词，需要纵览全文。C项“双语者在观察环境变化方面做得更好。”与文中第四段句首表述一致。A项“人们相信单语学习会对大脑产生积极的影响”与原文表述矛盾。B项“单语者需要忽视大脑内部的冲突并保持专注”并未在原文提及。D项“双语体验对儿童的影响比老年人更大”并不符合最后一段表述的内容，故选C。
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