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【导读】也许人们一直认为，身体好，才会精神好；不过现在可能反过来了。
Psychosomaticmedicine 身心医学
Thinkyourself well Youcan. But it helps to think well of yourself in the first place 你可以拥有很好的体魄。但首先，你要“自我感觉好”，这会有帮助的。
THE link between mind and body is terraininto which many medical researchers, fearing ridicule, dare not tread. Butperhaps more should do so. For centuries, doctors have recognised the placeboeffect, in which the illusion of treatment, such as pills without an activeingredient, produces real medical benefits. More recently, respectable researchhas demonstrated that those who frequently experience positive emotions livelonger and healthier lives. They have fewer heart attacks, for example, andfewer colds too.
许多医学研究者都不敢探究躯体和心理的关系，因为他们害怕，踏进这一领域会受人嘲笑。但也许，研究这方面的人应该多一些才好。几个世纪以来，医生已逐渐认可了安慰剂效应。因为患者会产生错觉，认为自己在接受治疗。比如，服用无活性成分的药片也能产生实际疗效。根据最近的可靠的研究表明，平时积极乐观的人会活得更长久、更健康。比如，他们心脏病发作的次数更少，也很少感冒。
Why this happens, though, is only slowlybecoming understood. What is needed is an experiment that points out specificand measurable ways in which such emotions alter an individual’s biology. And astudy published in Psychological Science, by Barbara Fredrickson and BethanyKok at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, does precisely that.
然而，人们才开始慢慢了解这种情况发生的原因。人们需要的是做一场实验，明确这样的情绪是通过怎样具体的、可测量的方式来改变人的生理状况。北卡罗来纳大学教堂山分校（University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill）的芭芭拉·弗雷德里克松（BarbaraFredrickson）和贝瑟尼·可可（Bethany Kok）就是按照这个思路做了一项研究，并在《心理科学》（Psychological Science）上发表了相关论文。
Dr Fredrickson and Dr Kok concentratedtheir attentions on the vagus nerve. This nerve (illustrated right, in an earlyanatomical drawing) starts in the brain and runs, via numerous branches, toseveral thoracic and abdominal organs including the heart. Among its jobs is tosend signals telling that organ to slow down during moments of calm and safety.
弗雷德里克松博士和可可博士把注意力集中在迷走神经（vagus nerve）上。这对神经（见右图，源自早期绘制的人体解剖图）起于颅腔，通过无数分支与胸腔、腹腔的几个脏器（包括心脏）相连。它的其中一项工作就是为器官发送信号，让它们在躯体平静、安宁的状态下放缓节奏。
How effectively the vagus nerve is workingcan be tracked by monitoring someone’s heart rate as he breathes in and out.Healthy vagal function is reflected in a subtle increase in heart rate while breathingin and a subtle decrease while breathing out. The difference yields an index ofvagal tone, and the value of this index is known to be connected with health.Low values are, for example, linked to inflammation and heart attacks.
他们通过监测一个人吸气、呼气时的心率，追踪记录迷走神经如何有效地工作。如果吸气时心率略微增加，呼气时略微下降，则说明迷走神经工作正常。两次心率之差构成迷走神经张力指数（index of vagal tone）。人们都知道该指数与健康程度有关。例如，低指数就与炎症、心脏病发作几率有联系。
What particularly interested Dr Fredricksonand Dr Kok was recent work that showed something else about the vagal-toneindex: people with high tone are better than those with low at stopping badfeelings getting overblown. They also show more positive emotions in general.This may provide the missing link between emotional well-being and physicalhealth. In particular, the two researchers found, during a preliminary studythey carried out in 2010, that the vagal-tone values of those who experiencepositive emotions over a period of time go up. This left them wondering whetherpositive emotions and vagal tone drive one another in a virtuous spiral. Theytherefore conducted an experiment on 65 of the university’s staff, to try tofind out.
让弗雷德里克松博士和可可博士特别感兴趣的是最近的研究，因为它显示了迷走神经张力指数的另一个性质：与张力指数低的人相比，指数高的人能更好地防止不良情绪失控。研究也显示，指数高的人大体上情绪更乐观。这也许弥补了心理健康与生理健康之间缺失的环节。尤其值得注意的是，两位研究人员在2010年的初步探究中发现，人们如果体验一段时间的积极情绪，迷走神经张力指数会就增加。这为他们留下了疑念，积极情绪与迷走神经张力是否处于一个良性循环之中，互相促进？因此，他们对本校的65名员工展开实验，一探究竟。
They measured all of their volunteers’vagal tones at the beginning of the experiment and at its conclusion nine weekslater. In between, the volunteers were asked to go each evening to a websiteespecially designed for the purpose, and rate their most powerful emotionalexperiences that day. Dr Fredrickson and Dr Kok asked their volunteers toconsider nine positive emotions, such as hope, joy and love, and 11 negativeones, including anger, boredom and disgust. They were asked to rate, on afive-point scale, whether—and how strongly—they had felt each emotion. Onepoint meant “not at all”; five meant “extremely”. In addition, half theparticipants, chosen at random, were invited to a series of workshops run by alicensed therapist, to learn a meditation technique intended to engender in themeditator a feeling of goodwill towards both himself and others. This group wasencouraged to meditate daily, and to report the time they spent doing so.
他们在实验开始时测量了所有志愿者的迷走神经张力指数，九周后实验结束时又再次测量。在实验期间，他们要求志愿者每天晚上登录一家专门为此设计的网站，为当天所经历的各种最强烈情绪评定等级。弗雷德里克松博士和可可博士为志愿者提供了九种可供考虑的积极情绪选项，如期待、开心、热爱，还有十一种消极情绪，包括愤怒、疲倦、厌恶。两位博士要求他们以五分制一一打分：是否有这样的情绪、情绪有多强烈。1分代表“完全没有”，5分代表“非常强烈”。此外，他们还随机邀请了一半志愿者到一个注册治疗师开的一系列工作坊中，学习冥想的技巧，旨在让冥想者产生一种善待自己、善待他人的情绪。他们鼓励这组人每天冥想，并向他们报告冥想用的时间。
Dr Fredrickson and Dr Kok discovered thatvagal tone increased significantly in people who meditated, and hardly at allin those who did not. Among meditators, those who started the experiment withthe highest vagal-tone scores reported the biggest increases in positiveemotions. Meditators who started with particularly low scores showed virtuallyno such boost.
弗雷德里克松博士和可可博士发现，冥想的人的迷走神经张力显著增加，而那些不冥想的人几乎没有任何变化。在众多冥想者之中，那些实验一开始就拥有最高指数的人，积极情绪增加的幅度最大；而一开始指数就很低的人，几乎没有这样的奇效。
Taken as a whole, these findings suggesthigh vagal tone makes it easier to generate positive emotions and that this, inturn, drives vagal tone still higher. That is both literally and metaphoricallya positive feedback loop. Which is good news for the emotionally positive, butbad for the emotionally negative, for it implies that those who most need apsychosomatic boost are incapable of generating one. A further (as yetunpublished) experiment by Dr Kok suggests, however, that the grumpy need notgive up all hope. A simpler procedure than meditation, namely reflecting atnight on the day’s social connections, did seem to cause some improvement totheir vagal tone. This might allow even those with a negative outlook on lifeto “bootstrap” their way to a mental state from which they could then advanceto the more powerful technique of meditation.
作为一个整体来看，这些发现意味着，这迷走神经张力指数越高，越容易产生积极情绪；反过来，积极情绪又能促进指数的提升。无论是从直观还是隐含的角度看，这都是一个正反馈循环。对于情绪乐观的人来说，这是个好消息；但对于消极的人来说，情况正好相反，因为它意味着，那些最需要振作精神的人却往往无法产生积极情绪。然而可可博士的进一步研究（还未发表）表明，脾气不好的人也尚存希望。有一种比冥想简单的方法，即每天晚上对白天的社交活动进行反思，似乎能在一定程度上提高迷走神经张力指数。就算是对生活不抱希望的人，也可能通过这种方式“自我解脱”，达到另一种精神状态，然后他们可以进一步使用效果更好的冥想技巧。
Whether, besides improving general health,the mechanism Dr Fredrickson and Dr Kok have discovered helps explain theplacebo effect remains to be investigated. But it might, because part of thateffect seems to be the good feeling engendered by the fact of being treated.More generally, doctors in the ancient world had a saying: “a healthy mind in ahealthy body”. This sort of work suggests that though this proverb is true, abetter one might be, “a healthy mind for a healthy body”.
除了提高综合健康水平，弗雷德里克松博士和可可博士发现的机制是否有助于解释安慰剂效应，还有待进一步研究。但这的确有可能，因为安慰剂效应就包括实验中因治疗产生的良好情绪。更为普遍的是，古代的医生就有个说法：“身体好，精气儿足。”而这个实验则启发人们，尽管谚语说得有理，但“精气儿足，身体好”可能才更准确。 |
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