《考研英语阅读理解100篇 基础版》第4章　科学研究类 Unit 46

In a Cairo school basement，two dozen women analyze facial expressions on laptops，training the computers to recognize anger，sadness and frustration．At Cambridge University，an eerily realistic robotic head named Charles sits in a driving simulator，furrowing its brows，looking interested or confused．And in a handful of American middle school classrooms this fall，computers will monitor students’ emotions in an effort to track when they are losing interest and when they are getting excited about lessons．All three are examples of an emerging approach to technology called affective computing，which aims to give computers the ability to read users’ emotions，or“affect.” 
Yet until recently，our machines could not identify even seemingly simple emotions，like anger or frustration．The GPS device chirps happily even when the driver is ready to hurl it out the window．The online class keeps going even when half the students are lost in confusion．The airport security system can’t tell whether someone is behaving as if he were concealing something or is just anxious about flying. 
Technology that masters these skills could also help people who struggle to read the emotions of others，like those on the autism spectrum，or provide companionship and encouragement for nursing home residents．Without a grasp of emotions，some researchers argue，computers will never reach their full potential to support people. 
“Our digital world is for the most part devoid of rich ways of expressing our emotions,” said Rosalind Picard，director of the affective computing research group at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Media Lab．She has been working for more than two decades to translate emotions into 1's and 0’s，the language of machines．One early project，with a collaborator，Rana el Kaliouby，was to design glasses for people with Asperger syndrome，a mild variant of autism，that warned them when they were boring someone. People with Asperger's often fixate on particular topics and find it hard to read the social cues，like yawning，fidgeting and looking away，that indicate the listener is bored. 
More recently，Dr．Picard and Dr．el Kaliouby have been developing software that maps 24 points on the face to intuit an emotion．In the past，computer algorithms have had trouble distinguishing among genuine smiles，smirks and the gritted teeth that come with frustration，Dr．el Kaliouby said，because they are often fleeting and result in only very small changes to the overall configuration of the face. 
注（1）：本文选自The New York Times; 
注（2）：本文习题模仿对象：本文习题的第1题模仿2009年真题Text 2的第1题；第2、4题模仿2010年真题Text 2的第2、3题；第3、5题模仿2011年真题Text 3第2题、Text 1的第5题。 
1．In paragraph 1，the text shows that ______. 
A) women analyze facial expressions on computer in a Cairo school basement 
B) computers will supervise students’ emotions to check their behavior in America 
C) a robot siting in a driving simulator looks interested or confused 
D) there emerges a new technology called affective computing 
2．Which of the following is true? 
A) The machines can tell simple personal moods. 
B) The GPS doesn’t function，so the driver throws it out of the window. 
C) The online class continues though 50% students can’t follow. 
D) The airport security system can identify passengers’ personal thoughts. 
3．According to the author，one of the distinctive functions of the technology is ______. 
A) to help people understand others’ inner feelings 
B) the residents in the nursing home feel encouraged and not isolated 
C) computers can’t help people without catching the emotions 
D) to endow people with rich ways to express their feelings 
4．The phrase“Asperger syndrome” （Line 5，Paragraph 4）most probably means ______. 
A) complicated feelings 
B) various emotions 
C) a kind of disease 
D) symptom 
5．From the text we can see that the writer seems ______. 
A) positive 
B) negative 
C) uncertain 
D) neutral