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  3. 请阅读 Passage 2，完成小题。 Passage 2 Several

请阅读 Passage 2，完成小题。 Passage 2 Several

书海库2019-12-17  57
问题 请阅读 Passage 2，完成小题。Passage 2 Several research teams have found thatnewborns prefer their mothers' voices over those of other people. Now a team ofscientists has gone an intriguing step further: they have found that newbornscry in their native language. "We have provided evidence that languagebegins with the very first cry melodies," says Kathleen Wermke of theUniversity of Wurzburg, Germany, who led the research.?"The dramatic finding of this study isthat not only are newborns capable of producing different cry melodies, butthey prefer to produce those melody patterns that are typical for the?ambientlanguage they have heard during their fetal life, within the lasttrimester," said Wermke. "Contrary to orthodox interpretations, thesedata support the importance of human infants' crying for seeding languagedevelopment."???Ithad been thought that babies' cries are constrained by-their breathing patternsand respiratory apparatus, in which case a crying baby would sound like acrying baby no matter what the culture is, since babies are anatomically identical."The prevailing opinion used to be that newborns could not activelyinfluence their production of sound," says Wermke. This study refutes thatclaim: since babies cry in different languages, they must have somecontrol?? (presumably unconscious) overwhat they sound like rather than being constrained by the acoustical propertiesof their lungs, throat, mouth, and larynx. If respiration alone dictated what a crysounded like, all babies would cry with a falling-pitch pattern, since that'swhat happens as you run out of breath and air pressure on the throat'ssound-making machinery decreases. French babies apparently didn't get thatmemo. "German and French infants produce different types of cries, eventhough they share the same physiology," the scientists point out."The French newborns produce ‘nonphysiological' rising patterns," showingthat the sound of their cries is under their control.????Although phonemes-speech sounds such as "ki" or"sh"-don't cross the abdominal barrier and reach the fetus, so-calledprosodic characteristics of speech do. These are the variations in pitch,rhythm, and intensity that characterize each language. Just as newbornsremember and prefer actual songs that they heard in utero, it seems, so theyremember and prefer both the sound of Mom’s voice and the melodic signature ofher language.?The idea of the study wasn't to make the sound of a screaming baby more interestingto listeners-good luck with that-but to explore how babies acquire speech. Thatacquisition, it is now clear, begins months before birth, probably in the thirdtrimester: Newborns "not only have memorized the main intonation patternsof their respective surrounding language but are also able to reproduce thesepatterns in their own [sound] production," conclude the scientists. Newborns'"cries are already tuned toward their native language," giving them ahead start on sounding French or German (or, presumably, English or American orChinese or anything else: the scientists are collecting cries from morelanguages). This is likely part of the explanation for how babies developspoken language quickly and seemingly without effort. Sure, we may come into the world wired for language (thank you, Noam Chomsky), but we also benefitfrom the environmental exposure that tells us which language.??Until this study, scientists thought that babies became capable of vocal imitation noearlier than 12 weeks of age. That's when infants listening to an adultspeaker producing vowels can parrot the sound. But that's the beginning of truespeech. It's sort of amazing that it took this long for scientists to realizethat if they want to see what sounds babies can perceive, remember, and playback, they should look at the sound babies produce best. So let the littleangel cry: she's practicing to acquire language.What does Kathleen Wermke's research indicate?
选项 A.Babies are unable to do vocal imitation.B.Babies’ cries could be their early language acquisition.C.Babies start speech acquisition months after their birth.D.A crying baby is a crying baby no matter what the culture is.
答案B
解析细节题。根据“scientists thought that babies became capable of vocal imitation noearlier than 12 weeks of age”可知，A项说法错误。根据“We have provided evidence that language begins with the very firstcry melodies”及后文可知，Kathleen Wermke的研究是用婴儿哭声声调的不同来说明婴儿语言的习得可能在子宫中就开始了，婴儿的哭声可能就是他们早期语言习得的体现。B项说法正确。根据“That acquisition，it is now clear, begins months before birth，probablyin the third trimester”可知，C项与原文不符。D项在文中直接进行了说明，不符合题目要求。故本题选B。
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