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科学美国人60秒 SSS 背景音乐可能会扼杀创造力

时间:2019-12-10 08:59:32

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(单词翻译)

 

This is Scientific American — 60-Second Science. I'm Christopher Intagliata.

Let's play a word game. What word can be put in front of the words "stick," "maker1," and "point" to make three new compound words? Again...stick, maker, and point.

(five-second silence)

Ready for the answer? "Match. So that would then combine to make the words matchstick, matchmaker, and matchpoint." Emma Threadgold, a cognitive2 psychologist at the University of Central Lancashire in England. And the point of tasks like these, she says, is to measure creativity. (And if you didn't get it right away, don't worry, neither did I.)

Maybe you had music playing as you thought about the words. And, of course, many listen to music while they work. So Threadgold and her colleagues recently used such word puzzles to investigate whether listening to music affects creativity.

They asked volunteers to solve 19 puzzles, while listening to either a foreign-language tune3 (Spanish version of "King of Wishful Thinking," by Go West); an instrumental version of the same song (instrumental of "King of Wishful Thinking"); a familiar English-language tune (Pharrell's "Happy"); or silence.

The results? In every case, volunteers listening to music solved fewer puzzles than their counterparts in total quiet. Suggesting that background music does not really aid this kind of creative task. Maybe because these puzzles require some sort of mental speech rehearsal—trying out different word combos using your inner voice.

"And therefore they're more susceptible4 to changing state sounds such as music, in comparison to steady state sounds such as library noise."

And in fact, the researchers tested library noise too, (library noise) like the sounds of typing and rustling5 papers. And none of those noises impaired6 volunteers' performance at all, compared to the silent control group. The results are in the journal Applied7 Cognitive Psychology8.

Still, if you do insist on listening to music while working, you might try something a little more low-key than Lady Gaga, says Threadgold's colleague John Marsh9:

"So if you have a sound with a lot of changing state information in it, changes in pitch or in timbre10, that's more disruptive than a sound with fewer of those changes. So if you compared a modern pop song with some classical music you'd expect less disruption from that classical music."

Even better, though, would be the sound of silence. (Simon and Garfunkel's "Sound of Silence" clip briefly11 then stops) As in, actual silence.

Thanks for listening for Scientific American — 60-Second Science. I'm Christopher Intagliata.


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点击收听单词发音收听单词发音  

1 maker DALxN     
n.制造者,制造商
参考例句:
  • He is a trouble maker,You must be distant with him.他是个捣蛋鬼,你不要跟他在一起。
  • A cabinet maker must be a master craftsman.家具木工必须是技艺高超的手艺人。
2 cognitive Uqwz0     
adj.认知的,认识的,有感知的
参考例句:
  • As children grow older,their cognitive processes become sharper.孩子们越长越大,他们的认知过程变得更为敏锐。
  • The cognitive psychologist is like the tinker who wants to know how a clock works.认知心理学者倒很像一个需要通晓钟表如何运转的钟表修理匠。
3 tune NmnwW     
n.调子;和谐,协调;v.调音,调节,调整
参考例句:
  • He'd written a tune,and played it to us on the piano.他写了一段曲子,并在钢琴上弹给我们听。
  • The boy beat out a tune on a tin can.那男孩在易拉罐上敲出一首曲子。
4 susceptible 4rrw7     
adj.过敏的,敏感的;易动感情的,易受感动的
参考例句:
  • Children are more susceptible than adults.孩子比成人易受感动。
  • We are all susceptible to advertising.我们都易受广告的影响。
5 rustling c6f5c8086fbaf68296f60e8adb292798     
n. 瑟瑟声,沙沙声 adj. 发沙沙声的
参考例句:
  • the sound of the trees rustling in the breeze 树木在微风中发出的沙沙声
  • the soft rustling of leaves 树叶柔和的沙沙声
6 impaired sqtzdr     
adj.受损的;出毛病的;有(身体或智力)缺陷的v.损害,削弱( impair的过去式和过去分词 )
参考例句:
  • Much reading has impaired his vision. 大量读书损害了他的视力。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》
  • His hearing is somewhat impaired. 他的听觉已受到一定程度的损害。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》
7 applied Tz2zXA     
adj.应用的;v.应用,适用
参考例句:
  • She plans to take a course in applied linguistics.她打算学习应用语言学课程。
  • This cream is best applied to the face at night.这种乳霜最好晚上擦脸用。
8 psychology U0Wze     
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。
9 marsh Y7Rzo     
n.沼泽,湿地
参考例句:
  • There are a lot of frogs in the marsh.沼泽里有许多青蛙。
  • I made my way slowly out of the marsh.我缓慢地走出这片沼泽地。
10 timbre uoPwM     
n.音色,音质
参考例句:
  • His voice had a deep timbre.他嗓音低沉。
  • The timbre of the violin is far richer than that of the mouth organ.小提琴的音色远比口琴丰富。
11 briefly 9Styo     
adv.简单地,简短地
参考例句:
  • I want to touch briefly on another aspect of the problem.我想简单地谈一下这个问题的另一方面。
  • He was kidnapped and briefly detained by a terrorist group.他被一个恐怖组织绑架并短暂拘禁。

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