《宋氏快译》英汉对照（39）：男人比女人更健谈

《宋氏快译》英汉对照（39）：男人比女人更健谈


Men Talk More Than Women

男人比女人更健谈

By Andrea Thompson , LiveScience Staff Writer
29 November 2007 07:56 am ET

《生命科学》在编作家 安德烈-汤普森 文

宋德利 译


Women may have a reputation as the chattier gender, but research into the matter shows that men may actually be a little more talkative than women—though it all depends on the situation.

女性可能享有“更健谈性别”之誉，但对此展开的研究表明，男性实际上可能比女性更健谈一些 - 尽管这一切都要视情况而定。


Psychologist Campbell Leaper of the University of California Santa Cruz conducted a review of research into the topic spanning from the 1960s to today and which is detailed in the November issue of the journal Personality and Social Psychology Review . The studies Leaper examined looked at talkativeness and different types of speech under a range of social situations and comparing mixed-gender and same-gender conversations.

美国加州大学圣克鲁斯分校心理学家坎贝尔-里波对以往的调研做了一次回顾，话题范围从1960年代直至今天，话题内容详细地深入到《人格与社会心理学研究》杂志锁定的11月问题。里波在回顾中审视了在一系列社会状况下健谈的程度以及谈话的不同方式，并对异性交谈及同性交谈一一加以比较。


One clear point that emerged from all the studies was that the type of activity people were engaged in influenced how much they talked.

在所有的研究中都出现一个明显的问题，人们从事活动的方式影响着他们谈话的多少。


"So even though on the average we're finding a slight trend toward men being more talkative than women, we found larger differences when you looked at particular situations," Leaper said. "

“因此，尽管研究的是一般情况，但我们却正在发现一个不太明显的趋势，男人要比女人更健谈，同时我们也发现当你面对特殊情况时，就会发现更大的差异。”里波说。


During decision-making tasks, men were more talkative than women, the studies showed, but when talking about themselves or working with children, women were more talkative than men.

研究表明，在执行做决策的任务中，男人比女人更健谈，但在谈到人们自己或同儿童一起做事时，女人要比男人更健谈。


Leaper said that these gender differences could have to do with differences in gender socialization; typically, women are socialized to be more comfortable talking about their feelings, while men are socialized to be dominant and take charge.

里波说，这些性别差异，可能都与性别社会化的差异相关；典型的一点就是，女人追求社会化，为的是在谈到她们的情感时会感到更舒适；而男人追求社会化，为的是获得对事物的支配权及掌管权。


"One gender isn't inherently more talkative than the other, it's just that a lot of times it depends on the situation and gender role influences," Leaper said. "

“一种性别并非天生就比另一种性别更健谈，在很多时候，那要取决于具体情况以及某种性别所扮演角色的影响，”里波说。


A recent study in the journal Science that recorded conversations of university students supports Leaper's idea, finding that on average, men and women used about the same number of words per day. (Leaper said that studies that used this measure of talkativeness tended to find less difference between men and women than studies that looked at how much time people spent talking. In these latter studies, men used up more time in the conversation than women, Leaper said.)

最近对记录大学生交谈内容的科学杂志所做的一项研究证实了里波的观点，调查发现，一般来讲，男人和女人每天所使用的词汇量大致是相同的。（里波说，有两种调查，第一种就是采取上述健谈衡量标准的调查，着眼点在于每天究竟使用多少词汇，而第二种调查的着眼点则在于每天究竟用多少时间说话。在探讨男女之间差异的时候，以这两种调查相比，就会有这样的倾向，即前者调查出的差异，比后者调查出的差异要少。在以后者方式做出的调查显示，在交谈时，男人所花去的时间要比女人多，里波说。）

注释：
括号里的第一句话有点麻烦，我采取解析的方式翻译，虽然句子多了些，但读者看起来可能比较容易。其实这句话就是在某个方面拿两种调查相比较。“某个方面”就是“男女之间的差异”（difference between men and women）。第一种调查就是着眼点在每天用多少词汇量（studies that used this measure of talkativeness， 具体讲就是上文提到的number of words per day），第二种调查就是着眼点在每天说话用多少时间（studies that looked at how much time people spent talking）。这句话之所以不易看懂，就是因为相互比较的两者都是句子，如果只是两个简单的名词，那就会一目了然。比如说：the first study tended to find less difference than the second study. 其实，对这个臃肿的复合句，如果把肥肉都剔出干净，不究只剩下这个简单的骨架了吗？


Talkativeness was also influenced by whether a person was talking to someone of their same gender or the opposite gender.

健谈程度受影响的原因也在于一个人是在与同性交谈，还是与异性交谈。


"Men tend to be more talkative than women, but particularly when they're interacting in mixed-gender settings," Leaper said, explaining that this could also be a result of men traditionally being socialized to dominate. "

有趋向表明，男人比女人更健谈，特别是当他们在男女混杂情况下进行人际交往的时候，”里波还解释说，这也可能是男人在按照传统方式追求社会化，以便获得主导作用所产生的一种结果。


The situation was reversed when looking at different types of speech, specifically assertive (used to achieve dominance and goals) and affiliative (used to connect to others): differences emerged in how much these types of speech were used when comparing two men talking to each other to two women conversing than when a man and a woman were talking.

当人们着眼于不同类型的讲话时，情况就发生了逆转性变化，尤其那种充满自信的讲话（往往能够获取主导地位或实现目标）以及交际性的讲话（往往能够与他人建立联系）：于是差异就出现了，主要表现在，在下面两种情况下这些类型的谈话究竟会被使用多少次，一种情况是用两个正在互相讲话的男人和两个正在交谈的女人相比较，另一种情况是一个男人和一个女人在谈话。


These differences have actually declined with time though.

不过这些差异实际上已经随着时间的推移逐渐减少了。


"In terms of styles of communication, gender differences are decreasing," Leaper said. "My interpretation is that it reflects the historical changes in gender roles," with women coming into the workplace more and men being more open about their feelings.

“从交流方式的角度来谈，性别差异正在减少，”里波说。“ 我的理解是，它反映了随着越来越多的女性进入职场以及男性对自己情感的越来越开放，性别作用所发生的历史性变化。