6．In Japan a chain of convenience shops called RanKing RanQueen has been ordering its products according to sales data from department stores and research companies．The shops sell only the most popular items in each product category，and the rankings are updated weekly．Icosystem，a company in Cambridge，Massachusetts，also aims to exploit knowledge of social networking to improve sales．
7．And the psychology that works in physical stores is just as potent on the internet．Online retailers such as Amazon are adept at telling shoppers which products are popular with like-minded consumers．Even in the privacy of your home，you can still be part of the swarm．
(644 words)
Questions 1-6
Complete the sentences below with words taken from the reading passage． Use NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS for each answer．
1．Shopowners realize that the smell of _______________ can increase sales of food products．
2．In shops, products shelved at a more visible level sell better even if they are more _______________．
3．According to Mr． Usmani, with the use of “swarm intelligence” phenomenon, a new method can be applied to encourage _______________．
4．On the way to everyday items at the back of the store, shoppers might be tempted to buy _______________．
5．If the number of buyers shown on the _______________ is high, other customers tend to follow them．
6．Using the “swarm-moves” model, shopowners do not have to give customers _______________ to increase sales．
Questions 7-12
Do the following statements agree with the information given in the reading passage? For questions 7-12 write
YES if the statement agrees with the information
NO if the statement contraicts the information
NOT GIVEN if there is no information on this in the passage
7．Radio frequency identification technology has been installed experimentally in big supermarkets like Wal-Mart．
8．People tend to download more unknown songs than songs they are familiar with．
9．Songs ranked high by the number of times being downloaded are favored by customers．
10．People follow the others to the same extent whether it is convenient or not．
11．Items sold in some Japanese stores are simply chosen according to the sales data of other shops．
12．Swarm intelligence can also be observed in everyday life．
Answer keys:
1．答案：(freshly baked) bread. （第1段第2行：Shoppers know that filling a store with the aroma of freshly baked bread makes people feel hungry and persuades them to buy more food than they intended.）
2．答案：expensive. （第1段第4行： Stocking the most expensive products at eye level makes them sell faster than cheaper but less visible competitors.）
3．答案：impulse buying. （第2段第1句：At a recent conference on the simulation of adaptive behaviour in Rome, Zeeshan-ul-hassan Usmani, a computer scientist from the Florida Institute of Technology, described a new way to increase impulse buying using this phenomenon.） |
