美国国家公共电台 NPR The Science Of Smiles, Real And Fake

 

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

Just to let you know, I'm smiling right now. In theory, this is good for me. And smiling can be good for you. Back in the 1800s, Charles Darwin suggested that smiling could improve your mood, and that idea is still taught in psychology¹ class. But researchers are now finding this phenomenon is more complicated than they thought. Maanvi Singh reports.

MAANVI SINGH, BYLINE²: Scientists call it the facial feedback hypothesis. Here's Dick Van Dyke³ explaining how it works.

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "PUT ON A HAPPY FACE")

DICK VAN DYKE: (Singing) Gray skies are going to clear up. Put on a happy face. Brush off the clouds and cheer up. Put on a happy face.

SINGH: The idea is, physically⁴ expressing an emotion intensifies⁵ the feeling. So if you smile, you feel happier. If you frown, you feel angrier.

NICK COLES: This has sort of been a textbook psychological phenomenon.

SINGH: That's Nick Coles, a social psychologist at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville.

COLES: I feel like a lot of people have heard at one point in their lives that they can smile their way to happiness, but psychologists have actually disagreed about this for, really, over a hundred years - since the dawn of psychology, really.

SINGH: So Coles decided⁶ to analyze⁷ 50 years of data, including nearly 300 separate experiments that tested the facial feedback theory. He and his colleagues found that smiling did increase happiness, but only a tiny bit. The data suggests that if 100 people smiled, only about seven would experience that mood boost.

COLES: These effects are extremely tiny. They're fascinating from the scientific perspective.

SINGH: Coles' study isn't the only one to question the facial feedback theory. Recently, researchers cast doubt on one of the seminal⁸ studies in the field.

COLES: It was the first study that demonstrated that smiling could influence emotions, even if the participants were not aware that they were actually smiling.

SINGH: Seventeen labs across the globe failed to replicate⁹ the findings, and only one succeeded. And there's more bad news. It seems that in some cases, forced smiling can backfire. Another recent study found that service workers who were compelled to slap on a smile for customers were more likely to drink heavily after work.

Paula Niedenthal, a psychologist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, wasn't involved in these recent studies. She says part of the problem may be that there are lots of different kinds of smiles.

PAULA NIEDENTHAL: There are multiple kinds of smiles, and they don't all relate to feelings of joy.

SINGH: Some smiles are sarcastic¹⁰, more like smirks¹¹. Some smiles beam; others simper. And scientists are still trying to tease apart the relationship between genuine, joyful¹² smiles and genuine joy. Until then, here's Coles' take.

COLES: I'm personally of the opinion that smiling is not going to make any important differences in your life.

SINGH: So for now, maybe hold back from telling people to turn their frowns upside down.

COLES: Because I know when I'm sad and people tell me to just smile through it, it just makes me more angry.

SINGH: For NPR News, I'm Maanvi Singh.

1 psychology   

n.心理，心理学，心理状态

参考例句：

• She has a background in child psychology.她受过儿童心理学的教育。
• He studied philosophy and psychology at Cambridge.他在剑桥大学学习哲学和心理学。

2 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

3 dyke   

n.堤，水坝，排水沟

参考例句：

• If one sheep leap over the dyke,all the rest will follow.一只羊跳过沟，其余的羊也跟着跳。
• One ant-hole may cause the collapse of a thousand-li dyke.千里长堤，溃于蚁穴。

4 physically   

adj.物质上，体格上，身体上，按自然规律

参考例句：

• He was out of sorts physically,as well as disordered mentally.他浑身不舒服，心绪也很乱。
• Every time I think about it I feel physically sick.一想起那件事我就感到极恶心。

5 intensifies   

n.（使）增强， （使）加剧( intensify的名词复数 )v.（使）增强， （使）加剧( intensify的第三人称单数 )

参考例句：

• A clear atmosphere intensifies the blue of the sky. 纯净的空气使天空变得更蓝。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Blowing on fire intensifies the heat. 吹火使热度加强。 来自《简明英汉词典》

6 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

7 analyze   

vt.分析，解析 (=analyse)

参考例句：

• We should analyze the cause and effect of this event.我们应该分析这场事变的因果。
• The teacher tried to analyze the cause of our failure.老师设法分析我们失败的原因。

8 seminal   

adj.影响深远的；种子的

参考例句：

• The reforms have been a seminal event in the history of the NHS.这些改革已成为英国国民保健制度史上影响深远的一件大事。
• The emperor's importance as a seminal figure of history won't be diminished.做为一个开创性历史人物的重要性是不会减弱的。

9 replicate   

v.折叠，复制，模写；n.同样的样品；adj.转折的

参考例句：

• The DNA of chromatin must replicate before cell division.染色质DNA在细胞分裂之前必须复制。
• It is also easy to replicate,as the next subsection explains.就像下一个小节详细说明的那样，它还可以被轻易的复制。

10 sarcastic   

adj.讥讽的，讽刺的，嘲弄的

参考例句：

• I squashed him with a sarcastic remark.我说了一句讽刺的话把他给镇住了。
• She poked fun at people's shortcomings with sarcastic remarks.她冷嘲热讽地拿别人的缺点开玩笑。

11 smirks   

n.傻笑，得意的笑( smirk的名词复数 )v.傻笑( smirk的第三人称单数 )

参考例句：

• Eighteenth-century wigs are still worn by the judiciary and nobody smirks. 法官至今还戴18世纪的假发套而没有人嘲笑。 来自互联网
• Once a league laughingstock, nobody even much as smirks at the Hornets anymore. 曾经联盟的笑柄，没人再去嘲笑蜜蜂了。 来自互联网

12 joyful   

adj.欢乐的，令人欢欣的

参考例句：

• She was joyful of her good result of the scientific experiments.她为自己的科学实验取得好成果而高兴。
• They were singing and dancing to celebrate this joyful occasion.他们唱着、跳着庆祝这令人欢乐的时刻。