Unfortunately, life isn’t like that, and the role of lifestyle and diet in diseases has been greatly exaggerated. Many people’s lives have been made a misery by faddish, short-term, impractical and ultimately useless diets – and others have become very rich. Diseases are due to our ancient natural defence mechanisms either breaking down under stress or overreacting to our environment. We all inherit these defences from our ancestors through the transfer of genes. Many modern diseases are due to a crucial interaction between our ancient genes and recent changes to our environment and lifestyle – which they weren’t designed to cope with. A good example we shall explore later is being fat: Genes that allowed you to maintain weight in times of hardship were a great advantage, but, now we are surrounded by too much food, they can be a major disadvantage. If you know at an early age that you are predisposed to obesity, avoiding certain foods and knowing you need to burn more calories could prevent the weight gain that may change your body’s metabolism forever. Overall, your family history is an infinitely better indicator of your future risks of disease than how many carrots or vitamins you eat per week.The word “faddish” (Para. 2) probably means ________.A. convenient to cookB. widely-known and acceptedC. very healthyD. fashionable only for a short time
Unfortunately, life isn’t like that, and the role of lifestyle and diet in diseases has been greatly exaggerated. Many people’s lives have been made a misery by faddish, short-term, impractical and ultimately useless diets – and others have become very rich. Diseases are due to our ancient natural defence mechanisms either breaking down under stress or overreacting to our environment. We all inherit these defences from our ancestors through the transfer of genes. Many modern diseases are due to a crucial interaction between our ancient genes and recent changes to our environment and lifestyle – which they weren’t designed to cope with. A good example we shall explore later is being fat: Genes that allowed you to maintain weight in times of hardship were a great advantage, but, now we are surrounded by too much food, they can be a major disadvantage. If you know at an early age that you are predisposed to obesity, avoiding certain foods and knowing you need to burn more calories could prevent the weight gain that may change your body’s metabolism forever. Overall, your family history is an infinitely better indicator of your future risks of disease than how many carrots or vitamins you eat per week.
The word “faddish” (Para. 2) probably means ________.
A. convenient to cook
B. widely-known and accepted
C. very healthy
D. fashionable only for a short time
题目解答
答案
解析
本题考查根据上下文猜测词汇含义的能力。解题的关键在于结合词汇所在句子以及上下文语境来推断其意思。
- 文中提到“Many people’s lives have been made a misery by faddish, short - term, impractical and ultimately useless diets”，这里描述了一些饮食的特点，“faddish”与“short - term（短期的）”“impractical（不切实际的）”“useless（无用的）”并列，说明这些饮食具有某种负面且短暂的特性。
- 接着分析各个选项：
- A选项“convenient to cook（烹饪方便）”，在原文中并没有任何信息表明这些饮食与烹饪方便有关，所以A选项不符合。
- B选项“widely - known and accepted（广为人知且被接受）”，原文强调的是这些饮食带来的负面效果以及其短暂性，并非强调其被广泛接受，所以B选项不正确。
- C选项“very healthy（非常健康）”，原文说这些饮食是“useless”，与“非常健康”意思相悖，所以C选项错误。
- D选项“fashionable only for a short time（仅流行一时）”，与“short - term”相呼应，符合原文中对这些饮食短暂且负面的描述，所以D选项正确。