为什么超人戴上眼镜别人就认不出来了？

By day, Clark Kent is a dedicated journalist who strives to shine truth and fight for the little man in Metropolis. But when the shy, small-town man removes his glasses, Clark Kent is gone. In his stead lies Superman, who no one in Metropolis seems to suspect is actually Clark Kent. Not even his co-workers, including close confident Lois Lane, who often report stories about Superman, realize that the flying superhero works in an adjacent cubicle.

白天，克拉克·肯特是一个敬业的资讯记者，他致力于发掘大都市里的真相并为小人物而战。但当夜幕降临的时候，这个土里土气的男人摘掉了他的眼镜之后，克拉克·肯特不见了。取他而代之的是超人，大都市里的人没一个怀疑克拉克·肯特就是超人。就连他的同事也没有，包括最接近他的路易斯·莱恩，这个经常报道潮人资讯的人也不知道飞行的英雄与她近在咫尺。

Personally, I’ve always found Superman’s “disguise” hilarious, but then again it’s just something you learn to phase out and accept as part of the Superman universe. But apparently wearing glasses does indeed make it hard for people to recognize you, according to a recent study.

从个人角度来看，我总觉得超人的伪装很滑稽，不过这件事你只要渐渐忘掉，记住它是超人世界设定的一部分即可。然而最近的一项研究表明，戴眼镜确实会让人们更难认出你。

Researchers from University of York’s Department of Psychology showed participants faces of people in a natural pose, similar to headshots you often see on Facebook or other social networks. The images were presented in pairs by three categories: glasses-wearing faces; a pair with only one person wearing glasses; and finally a pair with no one wearing glasses. Each participant had to judge whether the faces shown in each pair depict the same person or not.

英国约克大学心理学系的研究人员们给参与者们看了一系列照片，照片里的人姿态自然，与你在脸书或其它社交媒体上看到的大头照非常相似。这些照片呈现的方式有三种：一种是人们戴着眼镜的；一种是两个人中只有一个人戴眼镜的；最后一种是两个人都不戴眼镜的。每位参与者都必须判断每两张照片里出现的人脸是否属于同一个人。

In those cases where both of the faces wore glasses or where neither wore glasses, participants were right 80 percent of the time. When one face wore glasses, and the other didn’t, participants were significantly less able to identify when the same person was there, scoring about six percent lower.

在那项两个人都戴眼镜或者两个人都不戴眼镜的照片中，参与者们的判断有百分之八十的几率正确。而等到参与者们判断只有一个人戴眼镜而另外一个人不戴眼镜的照片时，参与者们的正确率大约下降了百分之六，显然他们判断两张照片里是否为同一人的能力被削弱了。

These findings published in Applied Cognitive Psychology suggest that, generally, people find it difficult to match strangers’ faces. When they wear glasses, the challenge is even greater.

这些发现被发表在《应用认知心理学》上，它们说明，一般而言，人们在识别陌生人的脸时会有困难。而当这些陌生人戴上了眼镜之后，这一挑战甚至增强了。

Besides proving Clark Kent could have actually pulled it off, the results could be useful to improve the security of passports and other ID cards.

这些发现除了证明克拉克·肯特的伪装成功了之外，它们对于提升护照和其它身份证件的安全性也非常有用。