大腦跟我們玩的4個小把戲

It's different than your husbands.

女人的大腦有別于男人的大腦。

You say: "My husband can drive or be driven somewhere once and remember the route months later, even if it's in another state. I, on the other hand, continue to get lost in my own city unless I follow a known route. Is there a sense-of-direction centre in the brain? Or does he just have a better general memory (even though he can't remember to buy milk)?"

你說：“一旦開車或乘車去某地，即使這個地方位于另一個州，我丈夫幾個月之后仍能記得路線。可是，我呢，除非走已經知道的路線，否則在自己的城市仍會不斷地迷路。大腦里有方向感中心嗎?還是他的綜合記憶力比我強呢(雖然他記不得買牛奶)?”

From brain expert David Perlmutter, MD, FACN: Good observation! In fact, the right parietal lobe and other areas of the brain are specifically involved in the process of learning and remembering directions and orientation. And men seem to have a better ability at this skill than women. Women, on the other hand, are more skilled at reading human emotional cues. Different people, different talents.

腦科專家兼醫學博士大衛佩爾穆特(美國營養學會會員)：觀察力不錯!事實上，在識別和記憶方向以及定位的過程中，尤其要涉及腦右頂葉和其它大腦區域。似乎男人在這方面要勝過女人。而另一方面，女人在閱讀人類情感方面更具洞察力。人各有所長。

It confuses itself.

大腦自己跟自己過不去。

You say: " About a year and a half back, I booked a last-minute flight to a business meeting. I slept for most of the flight and awoke abruptly when the plane touched down. After several minutes, I finally reached into my briefcase and checked my calendar. Aha! A meeting in Toronto. It was only during the 7-minute drive across the airfield that I realized I was at a completely different airport than I thought I was. I know I may have been a little disoriented after waking up, but why didn't I get a clue from announcements on the plane, signs in the airport, or even the layout of the airport itself?"

你說：“大約一年半以前，我預定了飛往一個商務會議的緊急航班。差不多睡了一路，飛機著陸時我才突然醒了。經過幾分鐘的搜索，我終于找到了公文包，查看了日程表。啊哈!會場在多倫多。就在乘車穿過機場的7分鐘里，我意識到，這個機場完全不是我預想的那個。我知道，剛睡醒時，可能有點方向錯亂，可是為什么我沒有從飛機上的公告，機場上的標志，或者機場本身的布局上看出來點眉目呢?”

Dr. Perlmutter: You've already mentioned one important reason for your confusion-it's common to be confused after awakening, especially when you've slept at a time during the day that is unusual for your biological clock.

佩爾穆特博士：你剛才已經提到導致你困惑的一個重要原因，那就是剛睡醒時失去判斷力，這很常見，尤其在白天睡覺時，因為這有悖于你的生物鐘。

Another important factor rings clear in your query. Your descriptions of the "last-minute flight" and preoccupation with the time constraints are clear explanations of why your mind was elsewhere. With all that going on, you were obviously relieved to find the answer to your confusion in your planner, so the rest of your brain relaxed. With less stress, you probably won't experience this again.

另一個重要因素在你的問題中也明顯地體現出來。你對“緊急航班”的描述和對時限的高度關注清楚地說明，你的心思不在這里。在這種情況下，很明顯，你放心地認為解決困惑的辦法都在日程表上，所以，大腦的其余部分就放松下來。如果不太緊張，你可能不會再有同樣的遭遇。

It puts itself on autopilot.

大腦自行進入自動導航模式。

You say: "As I pulled into the office parking lot this morning, I realized I couldn't remember anything about the drive. How is the brain able to work on autopilot like this?"

你說：“今天早晨，我把車駛入辦公室停車場，卻不記得是怎樣一路來到停車場的。大腦怎么能夠如此這般自動導航呢?”

Dr. Perlmutter: The monarch butterfly has a brain smaller than a pinhead, and yet it can migrate more than 3,000 kilometres to a specific location. Your big brain can certainly allow you to drive to your office without conscious involvement-although I'm not advocating brain-dead driving. Repeated activities and behaviours create packages of information stored in the brain that, over time, become instructions when those activities are repeated. Under normal conditions, we call upon these instructions for familiar tasks and then make minor modifications moment to moment as our environment changes. If you had seen a large object in the road in front of you, your brain would click back on and you would consciously be able to steer around the hazard.

佩爾穆特博士：帝 王蝶的大腦比針頭還小，但它能遷徙3000多公里到達特定地點。盡管我不提倡不動腦子的駕駛，但在沒有意識參與的情況下，你聰明的大腦確實能指導你將車開 到辦公室。重復的活動和行為產生信息包，貯存在大腦里，時間長了，這些信息包在活動被重復時會轉化為指令。正常條件下，在做熟悉的工作時，我們喚醒這些指 令，當環境發生變化時，會隨時進行一些小的調整。如果看到前面的路上有個大障礙物，你的大腦會立即警覺，使你能自覺地繞過它。

It has trouble with familiar faces.

面對熟悉的面孔，卻叫不出名字。

You say: "Why do I sometimes blank on the names of totally familiar people when I try to introduce them? This happened once when I was in the mall with my best friend, and met up with another friend. I looked at the two of them, realized I couldn't remember either of their names, and finally said, 'Would you two please introduce yourselves?' Why did this happen?"

你說：“有時候，當我想介紹老熟人時，為什么卻忘了他們的名字?有一次，我和最要好的朋友購物時，碰到另一個朋友，就發生了這種事情。我看著她倆，發現她們的名字我全想不起來了，最后只好說，‘請你們互相介紹一下，好嗎?’ 這是怎么回事呢?”

Dr. Perlmutter: The information was encoded firmly in your brain; the problem was with retrieving it. It could be that spotting your other friend in the mall shocked you in some small way, or you worried about how to handle the situation, and the emotion temporarily jammed your retrieval system. Totally normal. Now, here's the bad news: Because this has happened to you and the experience was embarrassing, any situation that requires introductions could become a source of anxiety. Then, the brain "jam" could happen again and again. It is an everyday form of stage fright. Like any actor, try to rehearse your "lines" as you see the scenario about to unfold, and you'll be just fine.

佩爾穆特博士：這 些信息已被編譯并牢牢地記錄在你的大腦中，只是信息檢索時出了問題。可能在這個商場里碰到其他朋友有些讓你吃驚，或許，你為如何應付這個局面而煩惱，你的 情感暫時阻塞了檢索系統。這完全正常。但還有個壞消息：因為你遭遇過這樣的事，并體驗了尷尬，所以任何需要介紹的情境都可能引發你的焦慮。于是，大腦“阻 塞”可能會一再發生。這就是怯場的日常表現形式。可以像演員一樣，當看到這種情況臨近時,盡力演練“臺詞”，這樣你將會有不錯的表現。