“回程效应”如何让回程变短

Most people returning from holiday feel that the journey home passes by much quicker than the outward leg, even though both distances and journey are usually the same。

Scientists believe this "return trip effect" is not caused by being more familiar with the route on a return journey, as previously thought, but because of different expectations。

Lead researcher Niels van de Ven, of Tilburg University in the Netherlands, said: "People often underestimate how long the outward journey takes and this is therefore experienced as long."

He said："Based on that feeling, the traveler expects the return journey to be long as well, and this then turns out to be shorter than expected."

This conclusion was based on three short studies where 350 people either took a trip by bus, by bicycle or watched a video of a person taking a bicycle ride。

Respondents thought that the return journey on average went by 22 percent faster than the outward journey。

The return trip effect was largest for participants who reported that the initial trip felt disappointingly long。

Furthermore, when one group of participants was told that the upcoming trip would seem long, the return trip effect disappeared。

Co-author Michael Roy, from Elizabethtown College in Pennsylvania, said: "The return trip effect also existed when respondents took a different, but equidistant, return route."

The research is published in the journal Springer's Psychonomic Bulletin & Review。

据英国《每日邮报》8月31日报道，度假归来后，很多人都会有这样的感觉：返程路上的时间好像比去时的过得快一些，即使来回的距离和行程是一样的。

以前我们认为产生这种“回程效应”的原因是我们对回程的路线更加熟悉，而科学家们却认为是因为期望的不同。

负责这项研究的荷兰蒂尔堡大学研究员尼尔斯•范德•冯说：“人们往往以为去的时候花不了多长时间，(所以他们就一直会有那种‘怎么还没到’的感觉)，同时也会认为时间已经过去了很久。”

他说：“基于这种感觉，旅行者们就想着回程应该也要花很长时间，而结果往往是回程并没有想象的那么远。”

研究人员通过对350人进行三组小实验后得出了这个结论。他们中有的乘车旅行，有的骑车旅游，还有的负责观看那些骑车旅行的视频。

这些调查对象认为回程所用时间相对于去程少了22%。

“回程效应”在那些认为去程格外漫长的人身上体现的最明显。

此外，如果一组研究对象被(事先)告知去程将会比较远，那么“回程效应”就会消失。

来自美国宾夕法尼亚州伊丽莎白城学院的研究员迈克尔•罗伊说：“当调查对象采用一条距离相同而路线不同的回程路线时，回程效应也会出现。”

该研究发表在《施普林格心理环境通报和评论》期刊上。