听力原文及答案4.docxVIP

Conversation 1 Listen to a conversation between a student and a professor. Professor: Ok, Carl, how can I help you? Student: It’s about my term paper for the urban planning class. Instead of just doing library research, I was thinking of doing a survey of my own and using the data in the report. Professor: That’s a nice idea. I think doing this kind of hands-on project is great experience, especially if you decide to go to graduate school. Student: But, I’ve been having a lot of problems designing the survey. Professor: Ahh… It’s not as easy as it looks is it? Student: No, now I’m not even sure if I should stick with my plan or switch back to a more traditional paper. Professor: Well, you might as well get some experience sooner rather than later. What’s your topic again? Student: Nothing really complex. I just wanted to survey local people about the proposal to widen Route 62 from a two lane road to a four lane highway. Professor: Ok… Student: So, how do I go about selecting the people I want to survey? A lot of what I read has stressed having a representative sample, but I’m not sure how to do it. Professor: Well, yes a representative sample is crucial. You want the people you survey to be as close to an accurate reflection of the larger population you’re interested in as possible. Imagine that the town is a cake with raisins in it and imagine that for some reason most of the raisins end up on one side of the cake. If you cut a piece from the other side, would that be truly representative? Would it be an accurate reflection of the cake? Student: No, you’d be missing the raisins. Professor: Exactly, so for your project what if you only surveyed people who lived in houses along Route 62? Do you think that would be useful? Student: Well, no because everyone there would probably be opposed to the widening. Professor: Yes, and that’s why a representative sample is important. You don’t want a sample that’s biased too strongly one way or the other, so how do you d