2016年12月大学英语四级阅读暑期练习及答案(二十五)

　　[F ] Researchers report that women’s magazines have ten and one-half times more ads and articles promoting weight loss than men’s magazines do, and over three-quarters of the covers of women’s magazines include at least one message about how to change a woman’s bodily appearance—by diet, exercise or cosmetic surgery. Television and movies reinforce the importance of a thin body as a measure of a woman’s worth. Canadian researcher Gregory Fouts reports that over three-quarters of the female characters in TV situation comedies are underweight, and only one in twenty are above average in size. Heavier actresses tend to receive negative comments from male characters about their bodies (“How about wearing a sack?，，)，and 80 percent of these negative comments are followed by canned audience laughter.

　　[G] There have been efforts in the magazine industry to buck (才氐制，反抗)the trend. For several years the Quebec magazine Coup de Pouce has consistently included full-sized women in their fashion pages and Chatelaine has pledged not to touch up photos and not to include models less than 25 years of age. In Madrid, one of the world’s biggest fashion capitals, ultra-thin models were banned from the runway in 2006. Furthermore Spain has recently undergone a project with the aim to standardize clothing sizes through using a unique process in which a laser beam is used to measure real life women’s bodies in order to find the most true to life measurement.

　　[ H] Another issue is the representation of ethnically diverse women in the media. A 2008 study conducted by Juanita Covert and Travis Dixon titled “A Changing View: Representation and Effects of the Portrayal of Women of Color in Mainstream Women’s Magazines” found that although there was an increase in the representation of women of colour, overall white women were overrepresented in mainstream women’s magazines from 1999 to 2004.

　　[I] The barrage of messages about thinness, dieting and beauty tells “ordinary” women that they are always in need of adjustment—and that the female body is an object to be perfected. Jean Kilbourne argues that the overwhelming presence of media images of painfully thin women means that real women’s bodies have become invisible in the mass media. The real tragedy, Kilbourne concludes, is that many women internalize these

　　stereotypes, and judge themselves by the beauty industry’s standards. Women learn to compare themselves to

　　other women, and to compete with them for male attention. This focus on beauty and desirability “effectively destroys any awareness and action that might help to change that climate.”

　　46. A report in Teen magazine showed that 50% to 70% girls with normal weight think that they need to lose weight.

　　47. On the whole, for 6 years white women had been occupying much more space in mainstream women’s magazines since 1999.

　　48. Some negative effects such as depression and unhealthy eating habits in females are related to their being exposed to images of thin and young female bodies.

　　49. The mass media has helped boost the cosmetic and the diet industries.

　　50. It is reported that there is at least one message about the methods for women to change their bodily appearance on more than three-quarters of the covers of women’s magazines.

　　51. Some film and television actresses even faint on the scene due to eating too little.

　　52. Too much concern with appearance makes it impossible to change such abnormal trend.

　　53. Researchers found that a real woman with Barbie-doll proportions would eventually die from malnutrition.

　　54. The Quebec magazine Coup (e Pouce resists the trend by consistently including full-sized women in their fashion pages for several years.

　　55. According to some analysts, the fundamental reason of imposing standards of beauty on women is economic profits.