2021年6月~六级听力~第一套

2021年6月英语六级考试听力原文（第1套）

Listening Comprehension

Section A

Conversation One

Man: (1) It's mylast day at work tomorrow. I'll start my new job in 2 weeks. My human resourcesmanager wants to conduct an interview with me before I leave.

Woman: Ah, anexit interview. Are you looking forward to it?

Man: I'm notsure how I feel about it. I resigned because I've been unhappy at that companyfor a long time, but I'm not sure if I should tell them how I really feel.

Woman: To my wayof thinking, there are two main potential benefits that come from unleashingand agitated stream of truth during an exit interview. The first is release.Unburdening yourself of frustration, and perhaps even anger to someone whoisn't a friend or close colleague can be wonderfully free.

Man: Let meguess. The second is that the criticism will, theoretically, help theorganization I'm leaving to improve, making sure employees of the future areless likely to encounter what I did?

Woman: That'sright. But the problem with the company improvement part is that very often itdoesn't happen. An exit interview is supposed to be private, but often isn't.In my company, the information gained from these interviews is often notconfidential. (2) The information is used as dirt against another manager, orcan be traded among senior managers.

Man: Now you'vegot me rethinking what I'll disclose in the interview. (3) There is always achance that it could affect my reputation and my ability to network in theindustry. It is a pretty small industry after all.

Woman: Anythingyou initially gained from the instant satisfaction of telling it like it is,you might lose down the track by injuring your future career prospects.

Man: Right. (4)Perhaps I would be better getting things off my chest by going to one of thoserate-your-employer websites.

Woman: Youcould. And don't do the interview at all. Exit interviews are not mandatory.

Q1: What do we learn about the man from theconversation?

Q2: What does the woman think of the informationgained from an exit interview?

Q3: Why does the man want to rethink what he will sayin the coming exit interview?

Q4: What does the man think he had better do?

Conversation Two

Man: Today, I’mtalking to the renowned botanist, Jane Foster.

Woman: Thank youfor inviting me to join you on the show, Henry.

Man: Recently,Jane, you’ve become quite a celebrity, (5) since the release of your latestdocumentary. Can you tell us a little about it?

Woman: Well, itfollows my expedition to study the vegetation indigenous to the rain forest inequatorial areas of southeast Asia.

Man: Youcertainly get to travel to some very exotic locations.

Woman: It wasfar from glamorous, to be honest. The area we visited was accessible only bycanoe and the living conditions in the hut were primitive to say the least. (6)There was no electricity. Our water supply was a nearby stream.

Man: How werethe weather conditions while you were there?

Woman: Theweather was not conducive to our work at all, since the humidity was almostunbearable. At midday, we stayed in the hut and did nothing. (6) It was toohumid to either work or sleep.

Man: How longdid your team spend in the jungle?

Woman:Originally, we planned to be there for a month. But in the end, we stayed foronly 2 weeks.

Man: Why did youcut the expedition short?

Woman: Halfwaythrough the trip, (7) we received news that a hurricane was approaching. We hadto evacuate on very short notice.

Man: That soundslike a fascinating anecdote.

Woman: It wasfrightening. The fastest evacuation route was through river Rapids. We had tonavigate them carrying all of our equipment.

Man: (8) Sooverall was the journey unsuccessful?

Woman: (8)Absolutely not. We gathered a massive amount of data about the local plantlife.

Man: Why do youput up with such adverse conditions?

Woman: Botany isan obsession for me. Many of the destinations I visit have a stunning scenery.I get to meet a variety of people from all over the world.

Man: So wherewill your next destination be?

Woman: I haven'tdecided yet.

Man: Then we canleave it for another vacation. Thanks.

Questions 5 to 8are based on the conversation you have just heard.

Q5: What does the man want Jane Foster to talk about?

Q6: Why does the woman describe her experience as farfrom glamorous?

Q7: Why did the woman and those who went with her endtheir trip halfway?

Q8: What does the woman think of the journey?

Passage One

Scientists oftenuse specialized jargon terms while communicating with laymen. (9) Most of themdon't realize the harmful effects of this practice. In a new study, peopleexposed to jargon when reading about subjects like autonomous vehicles andsurgical robots. Later said they were less interesting in science than otherswho read about the same topics, but without the use of specialized terms. Theyalso felt less informed about science and less qualified to discuss sciencetopics. It's noteworthy that it made no difference if the jargon terms weredefined in the text. Even when the terms were defined, readers still felt thesame lack of engagement as readers who read jargon that wasn't explained.

The problem isthat the mere presence of jargon sends a discouraging message to readers.Hillary Schulman, the author of the study, asserts that specialized words are asignal. Jargon tells people that the message isn't for them. There's an evendarker side to how people react to jargon. (10) In another study, researchersfound that reading scientific articles containing jargon led people to doubtthe actual science. They found the opposite, when a text is easier to read.Then. People are more persuaded. Thus, it's important to communicate clearlywhen talking about complex science subjects. This is especially true withissues related to public health, like the safety of new medications and thebenefits of vaccines. （11）Schulmanconcedes that the use of jargon is appropriate with scientific audiences. Butscientists who want to communicate with the general public need to modify theirlanguage. They need to eliminate jargon.

Questions nineto eleven are based on the passage you have just heard.

Q 9: What does the passage say about the use of jargonterms by experts?

Q10: What do researchers find about people readingscientific articles containing jargon terms?

Q11: What does Schulman suggest scientists do whencommunicating with the general public?

Passage Two

At the beginningof the twentieth century, on the Gulf coast in the US state of Texas, there wasa hill where gas leakage was so noticeable that schoolboys would sometimes setthe hill on fire.

(12) PatioHiggins, a disreputable local businessman, became convinced that there was oilbelow the gassy hill. Oil wells weren't drilled back then. They wereessentially dug. (13) The sand under the hill defeated several attempts byHiggins’ workers to make a proper hole. Higgins had forecast oil at 1000 feet,a totally made-up figure. Higgins subsequently hired a mining engineer, captainAnthony Lucas. (14) After encountering several setbacks, captain Lucas decidedto use a drill, and his innovations created the modern oil drilling industry.In January 1901, at 1020 feet, almost precisely the depth predicted by HigginsWild Gas, the well-roared and suddenly ejected mud and six tons of drillingpipe out of the ground, terrifying those present. For the next nine days untilthe well was capped, the well poured out more oil than all the wells in Americacombined.

In those days,Texas was almost entirely rural, with no large cities and practically noindustry. Cotton and beef were the foundation of the economy. (15) Higgins’well changed that. The boom made some prospectors millionaires, but the suddensurplus of petroleum was not entirely a blessing for Taxes. In the 1930s,prices crashed to the point that in some parts of the country, oil was cheaperthan water. That would become a familiar pattern of the boom or bust Texaseconomy.

Q12: What did Texas businessmen Patio Higgins believe?

Q13: What prevented Higgins’ workers from digging aproper hole to get the oil?

Q14: What does the passage say about Captain Lucas'drilling method?

Q15: What do we learn about Texas's oil industry boom?

Recording One

Most peopledislike their jobs. It's an astonishing but statistical fact, [16] a primarycause of employed dissatisfaction, according to fresh research, is that manybelieve they have terrible managers. Few describe their managers as maliciousor manipulative, though, while those types certainly exist, they are minority.The majority of managers seemingly just don't know any better. They're oftenemulating bad managers they've had in the past, is likely they've never read amanagement book or attended a management course. They might not have evenreflected on what good management looks like and how it would influence theirown management style. The researchers interviewed employees about theirmanagers. Beginning with a question about the worst manager they had ever had.From this, the researchers came up with four main causes of why some managersare perceived as being simply awful at their jobs.

[17]The firstcause was company culture, which was seen by employees as enabling poormanagement practices. It was specifically stressful work environments, minimaltraining, and a lack of accountability that were found to be the most blameworthy. Often a manager superiors can effectively encourage a manager'sdistasteful behavior when they fail to discipline the persons wrong doings.Such workplaces are sometimes described as toxic. The second cause wasattributed to the managers characteristics: those deemed to be most destructivewere odd people, those without drive, those allow personal problems into theworkplace, and those with an unpleasant temperament or personality in general.The third cause of poor management was associated with their deficiency ofqualifications. Not so much the form of variety one obtains from a university.But the informal variety that comes from credible work experience andprofessional accomplishments. The fourth course concerned managers who've beenpromoted for reasons other than potential. One reason in particular why thesepeople had been promoted was that they had been around the longest. It wasn'ttheir skill set, or other merits that got them the job, it was their tenure.

A point worthmaking is that the study [18] was based only on the perspective of anemployee's. The researchers didn't ask senior leaders what they thought of theirfront-line managers. It's quite possible, their content with how theindividuals they promoted are now performing. Merrily ignorant of the damagethey're actually causing. Which might explain why, as the researchers conclude,those same middle managers are usually unaware that they are a bad manager.

Question 16: What is a primary cause of employeedissatisfaction according to recent research?

Question17: What is one of the causes for poormanagement practices?

Question 18: What do we learn about the study on jobdissatisfaction?

Recording Two

With the use ofdriver-less vehicles seemingly inevitable, [19]mining companies in the vastAustralian desert state of Western Australia are definitely taking the lead.Iron ore is a key ingredient in steel-making. The mining companies here producealmost 300 million tons of iron ore a year. The 240 giant autonomous trucks inuse, in the Western Australian mines, can weigh 400 tons, fully loaded. Andtravel at speeds of up to sixty kilometers per hour. They are a technologicalleap, transporting iron ore along routes which run for hundreds of kilometersfrom mines to their destinations. Here when the truck arrives at itsdestination, staff in the operation center direct it precisely where to unload.Vast quantities of iron ore are then transported by autonomous trains to oceanports. Advocates argue these automated vehicles will change mining forever. Itmay only be five years before the use of automation technology leads to a fullyrobotic mine. A range of factors has pushed Western Australia's desert regionto the lead of this automation revolution. These include the huge size of theminds, the scale of equipment and the repetitive nature of some of the work.Then there's the area's remoteness, at 502,000 square kilometers. It cansometimes make recruiting staff a challenge. Another consideration is the riskswhen humans interact with large machinery. There are also the financialimperatives. The ongoing push by the mining corporations to be more productiveand more efficient is another powerful driver in embracing automationtechnology. The concept of a fully autonomous mind is a bit of a misleadingterm, however. This is because the more technology is put into the field, themore people are needed to deploy, maintain and improve it. [20] The automationand digitization of the industry is creating a need for different jobs. Theseinclude data scientists and engineers in automation and artificialintelligence. The mining companies claim automation and robotics presentopportunities to make mining more sustainable and safer. Employees will beoffered a career that is even more fulfilling and more rewarding. [21] Workers'union have accepted the inevitability of the introduction of new technology.But they still have reservations about the rise of automation technology. Theirmain concern is the potential impact on remote communities. As automationspreads further, the question is how these remote communities will survive whenthe old jobs are eliminated? And this may well prove to be the most significantimpact of robotic technology in many places around the world.

Questions 19 to21 are based on the recording you have just heard.

Question 19: What does the passage say about themining industry in Western Australia?

Question 20: What is the impact of the digitization ofthe mining industry?

Question 21: What is the attitude of workers' uniontowards the introduction of new technology?

Recording 3

According toofficial statistics, (22) Thailand’s annual road death rate is almost doublethe global average. Thai people know that their roads are dangerous, but theydon’t know this could easily be changed. Globally, road accidents kill morepeople every year than any infectious disease. Researchers at the institute forhealth metrics and evaluation in America put the death toll in 2017 at 1.24million. According to the institute, (23) the overall number of deaths has beenmore or less static since the turn of the century. But that disguises a lot ofchanges in individual countries. In many poor countries, road accidents arekilling more people than ever before. Those countries have swelling, youngpopulations are fast-growing fleet of cars and motorbikes and a limited supplyof surgeons. It is impossible to know for sure, because official statistics areso inadequate. But deaths are thought to have risen by 40% since 1990 in manylow income countries. In many rich countries, by contrast, roads are becomingeven safer. In Estonia and Ireland, for example, the number of deaths hasfallen by about two thirds since the late 1990s. (24)But the most important andintriguing changes are taking place in middle income countries, which containmost of the world’s people. And have some of the most dangerous roads.According to researchers in China and South Africa, traffic deaths have beenfalling since 2000. and in India since 2012, and the Philippines reached itspeak four years ago. The question is whether Thailand can soon follow suit. RobMckinney, head of the International Road Assessment Program, says that allcountries tend to go through three phases. They begin with poor, slow roads. Inthe second phase, as they grow wealthier, they pave the roads, allowing trafficto move faster and pushing up the death rate. Lastly, in the third phase,countries act to make their roads safer. The trick, then, is to reach the thirdstage sooner by focusing earlier and more closely on fatal accidents. How to dothat? (25)The solution lies not just in better infrastructure, but in bettersocial incentives. Safe driving habits are practices which people know theyshould follow that often don’t. Dangerous driving is not a fixed culturaltrait, as some imagine. People respond to incentives such as traffic laws thatare actually enforced.

Questions 22 to25 are based on the recording you have just heard.

Questions 22: What does the speaker say about trafficaccidents in Thailand?

Question 23: What do we learn from an Americaninstitutes statistics regarding road deaths?

Question 24: What is said about middle incomecountries?

Question 25: What else could be done to reduce fatalroad accidents in addition to safer roads?