Question

E

New research at Yale University has provided the strongest evidence that humans are evolving（進化）- and suggests that women of the future will be shorter, heavier, and healthier, and will have children for longer.

As medicine has allowed people who would previously have died young to live to childbearing age and beyond, many have assumed that natural selection no longer works on our species. But Prof Stephen Stearns, the evolutionary biologist at Yale University behind the study, says: "That's just plain false." While survival to reproductive age（生育年齡） is no longer such a barrier（障礙） for humans, other evolutionary pressures – including sexual selection and reproductive fitness – are still working away in full force. If the trends the research detected are representative and continue for another 10 generations, Prof Stearns says that the average woman in 2409AD will be 2cm shorter and 1kg  heavier, will bear her first child five months earlier.

Prof Stearns and his team studied the medical histories of 14,000 residents of the Massachusetts town of Framingham, using medical data from a study going back to 1948 and spanning three generations. It looked at 2,238 women past reproductive age – so that they had had all the children they were going to – and tested their height, weight, cholesterol（膽固醇）, blood pressure, and other traits, to see if there was a correlation with the number of children they had borne. It found that shorter, heavier women had more children than lighter, taller ones. Women with lower blood pressure and cholesterol were also more likely to have large families. Women who gave birth early or had a late menopause were likely to have more children as well. More importantly, however, these traits were then passed on to their daughters, who also, on average, had more children.

The study has not determined why these factors are linked to reproductive success, but it is likely that they indicate genetic, rather than environmental, effects. Prof Stearns’ team controlled for other factors, including social and cultural change.

Research suggesting humans are evolving has been carried out before, but this is believed to be the first that directly compares reproductive success of individuals with physiological changes（生理變化）.

72. What is the main idea of the passage?

A. Natural selection no longer works on our species, especially the woman.

B. Woman of the future will be shorter, heavier, and healthier, and will have children for longer

C. Some genetic, rather than environmental effects has more influence on the evolvement of the humans.

D. Evolutionary pressures are still working in full force on the evolvement of the humans.

73. Which of the following statements is False about the women’s evolvement according to the research?

A. women will shorter

B. women will be fatter

C. The time for the women to have baby will be longer

D. women will be cleverer

74. Which factor is the most promising related to reproductive success?

A. Genetic        B. Social         C. Environmental        D. Cultural

75. This passage may most likely be taken from           .

A. a geography magazine

B. a medicine and technology research journal

C. a daily newspaper

D. an entertainment book

 

Answer 1

【答案】

72—75   BDAB  

【解析】略