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Text 1
①Come on—Everybody’s doing it.②That whispered message, half
invitation and half forcing, is what most of us think of when we hear the words peer pressure. ③It usually leads to no good—drinking, drugs and casual sex. ④But in her new book Join the
Club, Tina Rosenberg contends that peer pressure can also be a positive
force through what she calls the social cure, in which organizations and
officials use the power of group dynamics to help individuals improve their
lives and possibly the world.
①Rosenberg, the recipient of a
Pulitzer Prize, offers a host of examples of the social cure in action: In
South Carolina, a state-sponsored antismoking program called Rage Against the
Haze sets out to make cigarettes uncool. ②In South Africa, an HIV-prevention initiative known as LoveLife
recruits young people to promote safe sex among their peers.
①The idea seems promising, and
Rosenberg is a perceptive observer. ②Her critique
of the lameness of many pubic-health campaigns is spot-on: they fail to
mobilize peer pressure for healthy habits, and they demonstrate a seriously
flawed understanding of psychology. ③“Dare to be
different, please don’t smoke!” pleads one billboard campaign aimed at reducing
smoking among teenagers—teenagers, who desire nothing more than fitting in.④Rosenberg argues convincingly that public-health advocates ought to
take a page from advertisers, so skilled at applying peer pressure.
①But on the general
effectiveness of the social cure, Rosenberg is less persuasive. ②Join the Club is filled with too much irrelevant detail and not enough
exploration of the social and biological factors that make peer pressure so
powerful. ③The most glaring flaw of the
social cure as it’s presented here is that it doesn’t work very well for very
long. ④Rage Against the Haze failed
once state funding was cut. ⑤Evidence that the LoveLife
program produces lasting changes is limited and mixed.
①There’s no doubt that our peer
groups exert enormous influence on our behavior. ②An emerging body of research shows that positive health habits—as well as negative ones—spread through networks of friends
via social communication.③This is a subtle form of peer pressure: we unconsciously imitate the
behavior we see every day.
①Far less certain, however, is
how successfully experts and bureaucrats can select our peer groups and steer
their activities in virtuous directions. ②It’s like the teacher who breaks up the troublemakers in the back
row by pairing them with better-behaved classmates. ③The tactic never really works. ④And that’s the problem with a social cure engineered from the
outside: in the real world, as in school, we insist on choosing our own
friends. [432 words]
21. According to the first paragraph, peer
pressure often emerges as
[A] a supplement to the social cure.
[B] a stimulus to group dynamics.
[C] an obstacle to school progress.
[D] a cause of undesirable behaviors.
22. Rosenberg holds that public-health
advocates should
[A] recruit professional advertisers.
[B] learn from advertisers’ experience.
[C] stay away from commercial advertisers.
[D] recognize the limitations of
advertisements.
23. In the author’s view, Rosenberg’s book
fails to
[A] adequately probe social and biological
factors.
[B] effectively evade the flaws of the
social cure.
[C] illustrate the functions of state
funding.
[D]produce a long-lasting social effect.
24. Paragraph 5 shows that our imitation of
behaviors
[A] is harmful to our networks of friends.
[B] will mislead behavioral studies.
[C] occurs without our realizing it.
[D] can produce negative health habits.
25. The author suggests in the last
paragraph that the effect of peer pressure is
[A] harmful.
[B] desirable.
[C] profound.
[D] questionable.
Text 121.D22.B23.A24.C25.D
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