2020年12月四级第2套仔细阅读 Passage 1 原文翻译及答案解析

Boredom has, paradoxically, become quite interesting to academics lately. In early May, London's Boring Conference celebrated seven years of delighting in dullness. At this event, people flocked to talk about weather, traffic jams, and vending-machine sounds, among other sleep-inducing topics.

矛盾的是，无聊最近对学者们变得相当有趣。五月初，伦敦的无聊大会庆祝了七年来对单调乏味的欣赏。在这个活动中，人们聚集谈论天气、交通堵塞和自动售货机的声音，以及其他令人昏昏欲睡的话题。

What, exactly, is everybody studying? One widely accepted psychological definition of boredom is "the distasteful experience of wanting, but being unable, to engage in satisfying activity." But how can you quantify a person's boredom level and compare it with someone else's? In 1986, psychologists introduced the Boredom Proneness Scale, designed to measure an individual's overall tendency to feel bored. By contrast, the Multidimensional State Boredom Scale, developed in 2008, measures a person's feelings of boredom in a given situation.

究竟，大家都在研究什么？一个被广泛接受的无聊心理定义是“渴望但无法参与令人满意的活动的不愉快体验。”但是，你如何量化一个人的无聊程度并与他人比较呢？1986年，心理学家引入了无聊倾向量表，旨在测量个人感到无聊的整体倾向。相比之下，2008年开发的多维状态无聊量表则测量特定情境下个人的无聊感受。

Boredom has been linked to behavior issues including inattentive driving, mindless snacking, excessive drinking, and addictive gambling. In fact, many of us would choose pain over boredom. One team of psychologists discovered that two-thirds of men and a quarter of women would rather self-administer electric shocks than sit alone with their thoughts for 15 minutes. Researching this phenomenon, another team asked volunteers to watch boring, sad, or neutral films, during which they could self-administer electric shocks. The bored volunteers shocked themselves more and harder than the sad or neutral ones did.

无聊与行为问题相关，包括驾驶不专心、无意识吃零食、过度饮酒和成瘾性赌博。事实上，我们许多人宁愿选择痛苦而非无聊。一个心理学家团队发现，三分之二的男性和四分之一的女性宁愿自我电击，也不愿独自坐着思考15分钟。为了研究这一现象，另一个团队让志愿者观看无聊、悲伤或中性电影，期间他们可以自我电击。感到无聊的志愿者比悲伤或中性的志愿者电击自己更多、更用力。

But boredom isn't all bad. By encouraging self-reflection and daydreaming, it can spur creativity. An early study gave participants abundant time to complete problem-solving and word-association exercises. Once all the obvious answers were exhausted, participants gave more and more inventive answers to combat boredom. A British study took these findings one step further* asking subjects to complete a creative challenge (coming up with a list of alternative uses for a household item). One group of subjects did a boring activity first, while the others went straight to the creative task. Those whose boredom pumps had been primed were more productive.

但无聊并非全是坏事。通过鼓励自我反思和白日梦，它可以激发创造力。一项早期研究给参与者充足的时间来完成问题解决和词汇联想练习。一旦所有明显的答案都用尽，参与者给出了越来越有创意的答案来对抗无聊。一项英国研究将这些发现更进一步*，要求受试者完成一项创造性挑战（列出家居物品的替代用途）。一组受试者先做一个无聊的活动，而其他组直接进行创造性任务。那些无聊感被激发的人更富有成效。

In our always-connected world, boredom may be a hard-to-define state, but it is a fertile one. Watch paint dry or water boil, or at least put away your smartphone for a while, and you might unlock your next big idea.

在我们这个始终连接的世界中，无聊可能是一种难以定义的状态，但却是一种富有成效的状态。看着油漆变干或水烧开，或者至少把你的智能手机放一会儿，你可能会开启下一个重大创意。