為什么假笑并不總是讓你快樂

為什么假笑并不總是讓你快樂

Since childhood, we've been told that if we slap on a smile, happiness will come. And that doesn't just come from your mom trying to make you look more pleasant. The idea that smiling can make you happier and frowning can make you sadder hearkens back to Charles Darwin in the 1800s, NPR points out. Later called "the facial feedback hypothesis," scientists believed that when you change the expression on your face, you can change your mood.

從童年起，我們就被告知，只要我們微笑，幸福就會到來。這不僅僅是因為你媽媽想讓你看起來更討人喜歡。美國國家公共電臺指出，微笑會讓你更快樂，皺眉會讓你更悲傷，這讓人想起19世紀的查爾斯·達爾文。后來被稱為“面部反饋假說”，科學家們認為，當你改變面部表情時，你可以改變你的心情。

But new research finds that the truth isn't that simple. In a recent paper published in Psychological Bulletin, researchers analyzed the results from 138 studies that tested more than 11,000 participants from all over the world. The data covered more than 50 years of experiments.

但新的研究發(fā)現(xiàn)，事實并非如此簡單。在最近發(fā)表在《心理學公報》上的一篇論文中，研究人員分析了138項研究的結果，這些研究對來自世界各地的1.1萬多名參與者進行了測試。這些數(shù)據(jù)涵蓋了50多年的實驗。

After breaking down the studies, they found that smiling does have an impact on emotions — but only a negligible one.

在分解了這些研究之后，他們發(fā)現(xiàn)微笑確實對情緒有影響——但只是微不足道的影響。

 (Photo: Tiko Aramyan/Shutterstock)

They discovered, for example, that if 100 people smiled — and the circumstances surrounding the smile was the same with all of them — only about seven would likely feel happier than if they hadn't smiled, NPR says.

例如，他們發(fā)現(xiàn)，如果100個人笑了——而且所有人的笑的環(huán)境都是一樣的——只有7個人可能會比沒有笑的人更快樂，NPR說。

The researchers also looked into frowning and scowling to see if there was a connection between those forced expressions and feeling angry or mad. In both cases, the connections were small.

研究人員還研究了皺眉和愁眉苦臉，看看這些強迫的表情和生氣或憤怒之間是否有聯(lián)系。在這兩種情況下，聯(lián)系都很小。

"We don't think that people can smile their way to happiness," said lead researcher Nicholas Coles, University of Tennessee Knoxville Ph.D. student in social psychology, in a statement.

研究負責人、田納西大學諾克斯維爾分校社會心理學博士生尼古拉斯·科爾斯在一份聲明中說：“我們認為人們無法通過微笑獲得幸福。”

"But these findings are exciting because they provide a clue about how the mind and the body interact to shape our conscious experience of emotion. We still have a lot to learn about these facial feedback effects, but this meta-analysis put us a little closer to understanding how emotions work."

“但這些發(fā)現(xiàn)令人興奮，因為它們提供了一條線索，說明大腦和身體如何相互作用，從而塑造我們對情感的有意識體驗。”關于這些面部反饋效應，我們還有很多需要了解，但這項薈萃分析讓我們更接近于理解情緒是如何工作的。”

(Photo: vectorfusionart/Shutterstock)

More recently, a study published in the Journal of Occupational Health Psychologyfound that there may be a negative to putting on a happy face when you're not feeling it.

最近，《職業(yè)健康心理學雜志》上發(fā)表的一項研究發(fā)現(xiàn)，當你不開心的時候，假裝開心可能會有負面影響。

People who have to smile a lot for their jobs — especially in retail and service industry jobs — end up drinking more when they're off the clock.

那些工作時必須經(jīng)常微笑的人——尤其是在零售業(yè)和服務業(yè)——下班后會喝得更多。

So maybe sometimes, turning that frown upside down isn't such a great idea after all.

所以，也許有時候，把眉頭翻過來假裝開心并不是一個好主意。