托福阅读背景材料：Are You Looking at Me?

 　　眼睛是心灵的窗户，人与人的目光交流有时候胜得过千言万语。下面通过小编为大家带来的托福阅读背景材料，来看一看目光交流为什么很重要。

　　You know how eye contact is a pretty important component¹ of interacting with people,right? So scientists recently tested this by measuring people’s brain activity as they responded to pictures of angry people and pictures of people who look afraid. It turns out that eye contact plays an important role when people are evaluating potential threats.

　　If we measured your brain activity, we’d see that the part of their brain that regulates emotions and detects potential threats is hard at work. On the other hand, if I've been scowling² at something else, like this microphone, this wouldn’t have bothered you nearly as much. And the exact opposite is true for fear. If I was staring at something and looking really frightened, your brain would work harder to figure out if whatever is scaring me may also pose a danger to you.

　　Eye contact means different things in different situations. If you’re mad and looking at someone, you might be a threat. But if you’re scared and looking at me, it’s unlikely that you’re going to attack. So what the study suggests is that when you’re studying emotions, you have to take eye contact into consideration. It also suggests that in ambiguous situations, your brain has to do more work to process other people’s facial expressions in order to be able to evaluate the situation and respond appropriately.

　　以上就是小编为大家分享的托福阅读背景材料。

1 component   

n.组成部分，成分，元件；adj.组成的，合成的

参考例句：

• Each component is carefully checked before assembly.每个零件在装配前都经过仔细检查。
• Blade and handle are the component parts of a knife.刀身和刀柄是一把刀的组成部分。

2 scowling   

怒视，生气地皱眉( scowl的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• There she was, grey-suited, sweet-faced, demure, but scowling. 她就在那里，穿着灰色的衣服，漂亮的脸上显得严肃而忧郁。 来自英汉文学 - 嘉莉妹妹
• Scowling, Chueh-hui bit his lips. 他马上把眉毛竖起来。 来自汉英文学 - 家（1-26） - 家（1-26）