2024《世界幸福报告》发布 芬兰连续第七年位列榜首

The 2024 UN World Happiness Report ranked Denmark the world’s second happiest country for a sixth consecutive year. Denmark came just behind Finland, a country that has now held the top spot for seven years in a row. You might tend to think of the former consistently being runner-up. But that would mean you probably don’t understand the Danish way of thinking.

People in Denmark have a way of reframing (重新定义) situations that others might see as less than ideal. Simply put, Danish people are taught to reframe negative situations into positive ones. For instance, the headlines about the World Happiness Report don’t focus on the fact that Danes came second to Finland again, but that Denmark came in first in the 60 years and older category. And news reports don’t dwell on the fact that Finland once again comes first, but instead highlight that the gap between the two countries was smaller this year than last.

Denmark achieved an overall score this year of 7.586. Finland’s was just a tiny bit higher at 7.804. These scores are mainly calculated from the Gallup World Poll (盖洛普全球民意调查), where around 100,000 people in 130 countries are asked to score their lives on a scale of zero to 10 — zero being the worst possible life and 10 being the best. The Happiness Report then takes an average of the numbers given by those surveyed in each nation across the last three years from 2021. Data is also analyzed from a country’s GDP per capita (人均), social support, healthy life expectancy, freedom, generosity and corruption.

When I asked Catarina Lachmund, a senior analyst at Denmark’s Happiness Research Institute, what makes Finland happier than Denmark, she jokingly replied, “saunas (桑拿房).” Finland does have an impressive 3 million saunas for its population of 5.5 million, plus 188,000 lakes and forests that cover 75% of the land, according to Visit Finland. And then there are the Northern Lights, which you can see around 200 nights a year from Lapland, incidentally where Santa Claus lives. 

1.What does the underlined word “runner-up” probably refer to?

A The UN World Happiness Report.

B The country coming in second place.

C The happiest country of every year.

D The Finnish’s unique way of thinking.

解析：选B。B 词义猜测题。根据第一段第一、二句可知，丹麦连续六年被评为世界第二幸福的国家，紧跟在第七年被评为世界第一幸福的国家芬兰之后。划线句“You might tend to think of the former consistently being runner-up”中的the former指的是丹麦，结合前文可知，你可能会认为丹麦一直是“老二”。由此可知，runner-up指的是位居第二的国家。故选B。

2.What does the second paragraph focus on?

A Danish people are optimistic.

B Danish people are taught to be creative.

C Danish people don’t care about the report.

D Danish people are confident about their future.

解析：选A。A 段落大意题。根据第二段第二句“Simply put, Danish people are taught to reframe negative situations into positive ones.”简单地说，丹麦人被教导要把消极的情况重新塑造成积极的情况；并结合后文所列举的两个例子：关于世界幸福报告的头条新闻并没有关注丹麦再次仅次于芬兰的事实，而是关注丹麦在60岁及以上人群中排名第一的事实；新闻报道并没有详述芬兰再次排名第一的事实，而是强调两国今年的差距比去年要小。由此可知，第二段主要描述丹麦人积极乐观的心态。故选A。

3.What can we learn from the Happiness Report?

A Denmark scored 0.218 higher than Finland.

B Its data came from all countries around the world.

C It was based on data between 2021 and 2023.

D Finland scored perfect scores in many categories.

解析：选C。C 细节理解题。根据第三段第一、二句可知，A项表述错误；根据第三段中第三句中的“where around 100,000 people in 130 countries are asked to score their lives”可知，数据来自全球130个国家，并非世界上所有国家，B项不正确；根据第三段倒数第二句“The Happiness Report then takes an average of the numbers given by those surveyed in each nation across the last three years from 2021.”可知，这次报告的数据来自从2021年开始的过去三年，即2021至2023年，C项表述正确；D项“芬兰在很多方面获得满分”并未在文章中提及，D项错误。故选C。

4.What does the author convey in the last paragraph?

A Denmark is totally different from Finland.

B Finland is the birthplace of Christmas.

C People in Finland gain happiness from saunas.

D There are many pleasurable things in Finland.

解析：选D。D 推理判断题。根据最后一段中提到，芬兰有550万人口却拥有300万间桑拿房，加上18.8万个湖泊和森林，覆盖了75%的国土，每年有大约200个夜晚可以在拉普兰看到北极光，并且圣诞老人住在拉普兰。由此可知，芬兰有许多值得人们喜爱的地方。故选D。