Loners are pitied in our up-with-people culture. But the introvert reaps secret joy from the solitary life.在人人至上的文化氛围中孤独者常常受到同情。但是内向者会从独处的生活中收获到秘密的快乐。 By Elizabeth Svoboda, published on March 01, 2007 - last reviewed on May 31, 2011 作者：伊丽莎白·斯沃博达（Elizabeth Svoboda），发表于2007年3月1日，最后修订于2011年5月31日 Miina Matsuoka lives by herself in New York City. She owns two cats and routinely screens her calls. But before you jump to conclusions, note that she is comfortable hobnobbing in any of five languages for her job as business manager at an international lighting-design firm. She just strongly prefers not to socialize, opting instead for long baths, DVDs, and immersion in her art projects. She does have good, close friends, and goes dancing about once a month, but afterward feels a strong need to "hide and recoup." In our society, where extroverts make up three-quarters of the population, loners (except Henry David Thoreau) are pegged as creepy or pathetic. But soloists like Matsuoka can function just fine in the world—they simply prefer traveling through their own interior universe. 松岗美穗（Miina Matsuoka）独自一人居住在纽约。她养了两只猫，总是例行公事地过滤掉电话。不过在你想直接下结论之前，请注意，作为一名国际灯饰设计企业的业务经理，她能够自如地用五种语言跟人打交道。她只是对社交有非常强烈的抵触情绪而已，相反，自己更愿意选择久久地泡在浴缸里，看看DVD，并沉浸在自己的艺术项目中。她也有自己很好很亲密的朋友，每一个月也会出去跳一次舞，只不过随后会产生强烈的感觉需要“躲起来恢复一下”。在我们这个外向者占四分之三的社会里，孤独者（亨利·戴维·梭罗（Henry David Thoreau）除外）被视为令人毛骨悚然或可悲可怜的。不过像松岗那样的独奏者在这个世界里一样也能活得很好——只不过他们更喜欢在自己的内心宇宙中穿梭罢了。 Loners often hear from well-meaning peers that they need to be more social, but the implication that they're merely black-and-white opposites of their bubbly peers misses the point. Introverts aren't just less sociable than extroverts; they also engage with the world in fundamentally different ways. While outgoing people savor the nuances of social interaction, loners tend to focus more on their own ideas—and on stimuli that don't register in the minds of others. Social engagement drains them, while quiet time gives them an energy boost. 孤独者常常从好心人那里得到劝告，他们需要更合群一点，但是暗示孤独者只不过是活力四射的他们的黑白对立面，这种想法显然不得要领。跟外向者比起来，内向者不仅仅是不那么合群而已；他们也在跟世界打交道，只是接触方式有着根本性的不同而已。外向者尽情享受着社交的微妙之处，孤独者则倾向于把注意力更多地放在自己的思想上以及他人并未想过的刺激上。参与社交活动会令其无精打采，而安静的时光则能令他们充满能量。 Contrary to popular belief, not all loners have a pathological fear of social contact. "Some people simply have a low need for affiliation," says Jonathan Cheek, a psychologist at Wellesley College. "There's a big subdivision between the loner-by-preference and the enforced loner." Those who choose the living room over the ballroom may have inherited their temperament, Cheek says. Or a penchant for solitude could reflect a mix of innate tendencies and experiences such as not having many friends as a child or growing up in a family that values privacy. 与大众观点相反，并非所有的孤独者对于社会接触都存在病态恐惧的。“有的人只是归属感不强而已”，威尔斯利学院的心理学家乔纳森·区克（Jonathan Cheek）说：“偏好独处和强迫孤独之间是有很大的差别的”。那些喜欢客厅超过舞厅的人秉承的是自己的性格，区克说。喜欢清静可能是先天倾向和经历的集中体现，如儿时就没有太多的朋友，或在一个重视隐私的家庭中长大。 James McGinty, for one, is a caseworker who opted out of a career as a lawyer because he didn't feel socially on-the-ball enough for the job's daily demands. He has a small circle of friends, but prefers to dine solo. "I had a bad cold over the Thanksgiving holiday, but that spared me from having to go to my brother-in-law's," he says. "I'm not a scrooge; it's the gatherings I dread." Matsuoka feels his pain: "I can't do large crowds with a lot of noise," she says. "It's stressful to maintain positive interactions and introduce yourself 20 times. I really have to turn on my motor to do that." 詹姆斯·麦克金蒂（James McGinty）是一名社会工作者，由于觉得自己在社交方面不够机灵来满足工作的日常需求，他放弃了律师的职业。他有一个很小的朋友圈，但是还是喜欢自己用餐。“感恩节那天我得了重感冒，不过我也因此免于不得不到我姐夫那里去”，他说：“我不是吝啬鬼，但是我害怕聚会”。松岗对他的痛苦感同身受：“我受不了大庭广众之下闹哄哄的”，她说：“保持良性的互动，然后自我介绍20次，这令我很紧张。我得发动汽车才能那么做”。 Solitary Pleasures 独处的快乐 Matsuoka, who is divorced, is open to romantic relationships, but "whomever I'm with must know that at least one day a week I need to lock myself in my room and stick feathers on a sculpture," she warns. Artwork is a form of meditation for her. "I get completely sucked in. It clears my mind until nothing disturbs me." While a few studies have shown a correlation between creativity, originality, and introversion, perhaps more striking is the greater enjoyment introverts seem to reap from creative endeavors. 松冈现已离婚，她接受浪漫的关系，但是“跟我呆在一起的人必须知道，每周至少有一天我得把自己关进房子里，给一个雕塑粘上羽毛”，她警告说。艺术品对她来说是沉思的一种形式。“我完全投入进去了。它会清醒我的头脑直至没有东西打扰到我”。尽管一些研究已经表明了创造性、原创性与内向存在联系，不过也许更让人吃惊的是，从创造性的努力中内向者似乎能够获得更多的乐趣。 Amanda Guyer, a psychologist at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland, has found that socially withdrawn people have increased sensitivity to all kinds of emotional interactions and sensory cues, which may mean that they find pleasure where others do not. Guyer separated child subjects into "outgoing" and "reserved" groups and then had them play a game in which they had to press a button in order to win money. The reserved subjects showed two to three times more activity in the striatum region of the brain, which is associated with reward, than did the more outgoing ones. 阿曼达·盖伊（Amanda Guyer）是位于马里兰州贝塞斯达市的美国国立卫生研究院的一名心理学家，他已经发现，不愿与人交往的人，对各种感情交流及感官刺激越来越敏感，这意味着他们能发现他人发现不了的快乐。盖伊把儿童受试者分成了“外向”组和和“含蓄”组，然后让他们玩一个游戏，游戏要求孩子们按一个按钮来赢钱。结果显示，含蓄受试者大脑的纹状体区域，也即与奖赏相关的区域，其活跃度是外向组的两到三倍。 Previous MRI studies have shown that during social situations, specific areas in the brains of loners experience especially lively blood flow, indicating a sort of overstimulation, which explains why they find parties so wearying. But Guyer's results suggest that introverts may be more attuned to all sorts of positive experiences as well. This added sensitivity, she speculates, could mean that people who are reserved have an ability to respond quickly to situations—such as coming to your aid in a moment of need—or show unusual empathy to a friend, due to their strong emotional antennae. 之前的核磁共振成像研究已经表明，在社交场合下，孤独者大脑特定的区域的血流会很活跃，表明存在着一种刺激过度，这也就解释了为什么他们会感觉到聚会是如此之疲惫。不过盖伊的结果表明，内向者也许一样更习惯于各种积极的体验。她推断，这增加了敏感性，可能意味着含蓄的人拥有对情况作出快速反应的能力——比如在急需的时候助你一臂之力，或对朋友展现出非同寻常的同理心，这都是源于他们强烈的情感直觉。 Research by psychotherapist Elaine Aron bears out Guyer's hunch, demonstrating that withdrawn people typically have very high sensory acuity. Because loners are good at noticing subtleties that other people miss, Aron says, they are well-suited for careers that require close observation, like writing and scientific research. It's no surprise that famous historical loners include Emily Dickinson, Stanley Kubrick, and Isaac Newton. 心理医生伊莱恩·阿伦（Elaine Aron）的研究证实了盖伊的预感，研究显示，孤僻者通常有着很高的感觉敏锐度。由于孤独者很擅长于注意到他人忽略的微妙之处。阿伦说，他们很适合于需要近距离观察的职业，比如写作和科学研究。因此一些著名的历史人物，如艾米莉·迪金森（Emily Dickinson，美国十九世纪著名女诗人）、斯坦利·库布里克（Stanley Kubrick，《发条橙》的导演）以及伊萨克·牛顿（Isaac Newton）等都是孤独者也就不足为奇。 The Unhealthy Case of the Lonely Loner 孤寂者的非健康案例 The content introverts' camp closely borders the land of the socially anxious. Matsuoka, for example, says she was "pathologically shy" as a child, which likely laid the groundwork for her current lifestyle, even though she grew much more confident in her 20s. Those who remain "enforced loners" long to spend time with people, but shyness and anxiety inhibit them from doing so. "Introverts are people who like to be alone," says Paula Montgomery, an accountant from St. Louis. "I prefer to be around other people, but because of my shyness, it's difficult for me to join groups and make friends." 内向者的营地将社交焦虑的领地壁垒森严地包围起来。比如说，松冈就说她小时候就存在“病理上的害羞”，这很可能奠定了她目前生活方式的基础，即便她20多岁的时候已经成长得自信得多了。那些依然是“强迫型孤独者”渴望花时间跟人呆在一起，但是羞怯和焦虑抑制了他们这样做。“内向者指喜欢独处的人”，圣路易斯的一位会计人员保拉·蒙哥马利（Paula Montgomery）说：“我喜欢走访其他人，但由于我的害羞，我很难加入他们的团体并跟他们交上朋友”。 Such loners have several stress-inducing strikes against them: They may get butterflies whenever they have to face in-person encounters, and they are subject to outside pressure to be sociable. When major life problems crop up, loners are also less likely to seek out social support. 此类孤独者存在若干压力诱导令其处于不利位置：当他们需要跟人面对面接触的时候他们也许会感到不舒服，他们容易受到外部让他们学会交际的压力的影响。一旦重大的生活问题突然出现，孤独者也可能更难以找到社会支持。 John Cacioppo, a psychologist at the University of Chicago, has highlighted social isolation as a health-risk factor on par with obesity and smoking. "Loneliness is like hunger and thirst—a signal to help your genes survive," Cacioppo says. "When you're lonely, there's a stress response in your body, and it's not healthy to sustain that for a long time." 约翰·卡西奥波（John Cacioppo）是芝加哥大学的一位心理学家，他已经把社交孤立突出作为一项与肥胖和吸烟程度相同的健康风险因素。“孤独就跟饥饿和饥渴一样”，卡西奥波说：“孤独的时候，你的身体会产生压力反应，长期维持这种状态是不健康的”。 版权声明：
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