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Are People Who Speak More than One Language Smarter?
會(huì)多種語(yǔ)言的人更聰明嗎？
In the early nineteen fifties, researchers found that people scored lower on intelligence tests if they spoke more than one language. Research in the sixties found the opposite. Bilingual people scored higher than monolinguals-people who speak only one language. So which is it?
20世紀(jì)50年代早期，研究人員發(fā)現(xiàn)掌握超過(guò)一門(mén)語(yǔ)言的人在智力測(cè)試上得分更低。而60年代研究的發(fā)現(xiàn)則恰恰相反，“雙語(yǔ)者”比只懂一種語(yǔ)言的“單語(yǔ)者”得分更高。那么，哪個(gè)發(fā)現(xiàn)是正確的呢？
Researchers presented their newest studies last month at a meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. The latest evidence shows that being bilingual does not necessarily make people smarter. But researcher Ellen Bialystock says it probably does make you better at certain skills.
研究人員上個(gè)月在美國(guó)科學(xué)促進(jìn)會(huì)的一次會(huì)議上介紹了他們的最新研究成果。最新證據(jù)表明，通曉雙語(yǔ)并不能使人更聰明。但研究人員艾倫·比亞斯表示，它會(huì)使你在某些技能上表現(xiàn)更好。
Ellen Bialystock:"Imagine driving down the highway. There are many things that could capture your attention and you really need to be able to monitor all of them. Why would bilingualism make you any better at that?"
比雅利斯托克：“想像一下在高速公路上開(kāi)車(chē)，可能會(huì)有很多吸引你注意力的東西，你必須能夠同時(shí)關(guān)注所有這一些。為什么雙語(yǔ)環(huán)境可能會(huì)讓你在這方面表現(xiàn)更好呢？”
And the answer, she says, is that bilingual people are often better at controlling their attention - a function called the executive control system.
她表示，答案就是“雙語(yǔ)者”更善于控制自己的注意力，這種能力也被稱(chēng)為行為控制系統(tǒng)。
Ellen Biaystock:'It's quite possibly the most important cognitive system we have because it's where all of your decisions about what to attend to, what to ignore, what to process are made."
艾倫·比亞斯托：“這可能是人類(lèi)具備的最重要的認(rèn)知系統(tǒng)。因?yàn)槟阕龀鰧?zhuān)注、忽略、執(zhí)行的決定時(shí)都離不開(kāi)它。”
Ms. Biaystock is a psychology professor at York University in Toronto, Canada. She says the best method to measure the executive control system is called the Stroop Test. A person is shown words in different colors. The person has to ignore the word but say the color. The problem is that the words are all names of colors.
比亞斯托是加拿大約克大學(xué)的心理學(xué)教授。她表示，衡量行為控制系統(tǒng)能力最好的辦法是斯特魯測(cè)驗(yàn)（Stroop Test）。該測(cè)試向被測(cè)試者展示各種不同顏色的單詞。被測(cè)試者需要忽略單詞本身，說(shuō)出字體的顏色。難點(diǎn)在于，這些單詞都是一些顏色的名稱(chēng)。
Ellen Bialystock:"So you would have the word blue written in red, but you have to say red. But blue is so salient, it's just lighting up all these circuits in your brain, and you really want to say blue. So you need a mechanism to override that so that you can say red. That's the executive control system."
艾倫·比亞斯托：“因此，‘藍(lán)色’這個(gè)單詞可能是用紅色書(shū)寫(xiě)的，而你必須說(shuō)‘紅色’。但‘藍(lán)色’這兩個(gè)字非常突出，它一直閃現(xiàn)在你的大腦中，你很想說(shuō)‘藍(lán)色’。這時(shí)你就需要一種抑制該想法的系統(tǒng)，你才能說(shuō)出‘紅色’。這就是行為控制系統(tǒng)。”
Her work shows that bilingual people continually practice this function. They have to, because both languages are active in their brain at the same time. They need to suppress one to be able to speak in the other.
她的研究表明，“雙語(yǔ)者”在不斷鍛煉這種能力，因?yàn)閮煞N語(yǔ)言同時(shí)都在他們大腦中活躍，他們必須抑制一種語(yǔ)言，才能用另一種語(yǔ)言表達(dá)。
