VOA常速英语2013--研究探索音乐对大脑的影响（在线收听）

Studies Explore Impact of Music and the Brain 研究探索音乐对大脑的影响

Hospitals employ many therapeutic methods.  In addition to medication, there are interventions like massage therapy and hypnosis.  So why use music? “There’s a  couple of reasons for music.  One - it’s very inexpensive,” said Dr. Sandra Siedliecki, a senior scientist at the Nursing Institute of Cleveland Clinic in Ohio.  

医院使用很多疗法，除了药物，还有诸如按摩疗法和催眠术这样的干预手段。那么，为什么使用音乐呢？Sandra Siedliecki博士是俄亥俄州克利夫兰诊所护理学院的高级科学家，“用音乐是 出于多种原因，其中一个就是音乐很便宜。”

Also, she says we’ve done a lot of research on music's impact on pain.

她说已经就音乐对疼痛的影响做了大量研究。

“Especially Dr. Marian Good who did an awful lot on acute pain and music," she said. "She did a lot of studies looking at abdominal surgery patients and the use of  music.”

“尤其是玛丽安·古德博士，她就剧痛和音乐做了大量研究，对腹部手术病人和音乐使用做了大量研究。”

In those studies, as in many others, patients listened to relaxing music.

在这些研究中，病人聆听放松的音乐。

Good found that her surgery patients took fewer opioids drugs when they listened to music.  Taking fewer drugs is beneficial, Siedliecki says, because pain drugs are  limited by their side effects.  “You get to the point where one more pill and the side effects aren’t quite worth it,” she said.

古德发现自己的手术病人在听音乐时服用更少的阿片药物，少服药是有好处的。因为止痛药有副作用。“多吃一片药带来的副作用根本不值得。”

While Good had looked at acute pain, no one had ever studied chronic pain - the kind that just won’t go away.

古德研究了剧痛，但没有人研究过慢性痛，这种疼不会马上消失。

“People with chronic pain feel powerless.  They’ve already tried everything," Siedliecki said. "There’s no choices left, so they feel powerless to do anything that ’s going to make it better.”

“慢性痛的病人感觉无力，他们已经试了一切办法，没有什么可尝试的，所以在做能好转的事时他们感到无力。”

Siedliecki was looking to address that powerlessness as well as patients’ depression, disability and - of course - pain. For Dr. Linda Chlan the problem wasn’t  patients’ pain, it was anxiety.  Chlan, who is a professor of symptom management research in the Nursing School at Ohio State University, has spent a lot of time with  people who are in the hospital because they can’t breathe.  People in this condition are often put on mechanical ventilators, and she says, “I was always struck by  the profound distress that these patients experience regardless of the amount of medications that we gave them.”

Siedliecki开始解决病人的抑郁、无力感、能力受限和疼痛。对Linda Chlan博士来说，问题并不是病人的疼痛，而是焦虑。Chlan是俄亥俄州立大学护士学院症状研究教授，她在病人身上花 了大量时间，因为他们无法呼吸。这种状态的病人通常要用机械呼吸机，她说，“不管我们给病人多少药物，我总是被他们经历的深刻痛苦所震惊。”

It wasn’t just that the sedatives sometimes didn’t work, she said, “sometimes they would get more anxious and more anxious.”

她说，这并不是因为镇定剂有时不起作用，“有时病人会越来越焦虑。”

And just like with Siedliecki's pain patients, the drugs these people are taking have nasty side-effects.  “We had two primary aims of this study: To reduce anxiety  as well as sedative exposure," Chlan said. "If they can control a non-pharmacological intervention in the form of relaxing, preferred music, can that have a beneficial  effect?”

就像Siedliecki的疼痛病人，病人服用的药物有糟糕的副作用。“我们做这个研究有两个基本目的：减少镇定剂使用，减少焦虑。如果能控制诸如放松、喜欢的音乐这样的非药物干预，那么 会产生好的作用吗？”

Chlan had nurses remind patients that music was an option and they also posted signs near their beds that said “Listen to your music at least twice today.”

Chlan让护士提醒病人，音乐是一种选择，还在病床旁边贴上标语“每天听至少听两次音乐。”

Another group in her study used noise-cancelling headphones with no music.  A third group got standard care.  Siedliecki's study also had three groups: A standard  music group, who listened to music from past studies, another group who were allowed to pick their own music and a group that got standard treatment.  The results were  positive in both studies. For Siedliecki's patients “when you look at it overall, power, pain, depression and disability as a group improved in the music groups,”  she said.   Chlan’s study looked to decrease both the intensity and the frequency of the drugs people had to take.  She also found that music worked.

她研究中的另一组病人使用没有音乐的消噪音耳机，第三组获得标准化的护理。Siedliecki的研究也有三个组：一个标准音乐组，病人会收听过去研究中用的音乐，另一组可自己挑选音乐， 第三组获得标准化护理。两个研究的结果都很不错。对Siedliecki的病人来说，“整体来看，音乐组的力量、疼痛、抑郁和能力受限这样的问题得到改善。”Chlan的研究着眼于减少病人服用 药物的量和次数，她也发现音乐有帮助。

“We could reduce anxiety in mechanically-ventilated patients who were in this study, while we could also reduce the amount and the frequency of medication that these  patients received,” she said.

“在这个研究中，我们减少了使用机械呼吸机的病人的焦虑，还能减少病人服用的药物的量和次数。”

The people who listened to music needed fewer sedative doses and had a 36 percent reduction in the intensity or the amount of medication they received.  In addition,  their anxiety was reduced by 36.5 percent.  Both doctors had similar explanations for why music was so successful.

听音乐的病人需要更少的镇定剂，所获得的药物的量或次数减少了35%。另外，焦虑也减少了36.5%。两位博士对音乐如何如此成功也有类似的解释。

“Music operates on many levels," said Chlan. "It can be a very powerful distractor in the brain, where we’re listening to something that is pleasing and then it  interrupts those stressful thoughts.”

“音乐在很多方面都起作用，能有力地分散大脑注意力，听愉悦的音乐能干扰令人不安的想法。”

“Music can be a distraction," Siedliecki said. "And if you’re doing something you enjoy, time seems to go by faster.”

“音乐能起到干扰作用，如果做些自己喜欢的事，时间就似乎过得快一些。”

These doctors seem to agree with that old line from the Bob Marley song, “One good thing about music, when it hits you, you feel no pain.”

两位博士似乎都认同鲍勃·马利歌曲中的一句老歌词，“音乐的妙处之一是：当它打动了你，你便不会感到痛楚。”