奥运金牌：快乐和忧愁天注定？

Olympic Gold-Medal: Is the Body Language of Triumph (or Defeat) Biological?
奥运金牌：获胜（或者失败）的肢体语言是天生的吗？

When watching the Olympics over the next two weeks we'll recognize the signs of a winning athlete: raised arms with closed fists shot into the air—and the loser, who stands unassuming, yet betraying deflation with a subtle slump in posture.
在欣赏奥运会的两周里，我们会发现运动员获胜以及失败后的不同表情：赢者握拳振臂高呼，败者即使表面虽显从容，但其略显弯腰驼背的不振姿态仍难掩失意。

Recently, researchers from the University of British Columbia wanted to find out if we, whenever we win or lose, are biologically driven to display the result.
最近，英属哥伦比亚大学的研究者想发现我们对胜利和失败的肢体语言表达是否受生理上的驱使。

After all, similar exhibitions are recorded in monkeys, rabbits, elephants, crayfish and other species.
毕竟面对胜利和失败，猴子、兔子、大象、龙虾以及其它动物也表现出类似于人类的行为。

They measured the spontaneous behavior in response to winning and losing at the 2004 Olympic and Paralympic Games in 140 athletes from 37 countries.
研究者观察了来自37个国家的140名运动员面对胜利和失败的自然行为，这些运动员参加了2004年雅典奥运会或者残奥会。

What they found was that all winning athletes showed more expositions of pride: heads tilted back, chests puffed out, arms raised punching the air. The losers narrowed their chests, and their shoulders slumped.
他们的研究显示，所有获胜的运动员表现出更多的骄傲和自豪：高昂的头颅、挺起的胸膛、挥舞的手臂。相反，失败者则含胸垂肩。

But here's the interesting variable that provides evidence for possible biological underpinnings: 53 of the studied competitors were blind. And still, they displayed identical responses without having seen pride and shame expressions.
而且研究中的一个有趣变量还可能对这种现象的生理学基础提供证据，那就是被研究的运动员中有53名运动员是盲人。这些盲人在没有看到骄傲和遗憾的表情的情况下，他们仍然表现出和正常人的相同的反应。

Curiously, the congenitally blind athletes revealed the greatest response to losing, but sighted Olympians showed a weaker reaction to defeat. Perhaps the latter were more conscious of trying to hide visual clues that exposed their broken confidence.
令人好奇的是，天生就失明的运动员对失败的反应最为明显，那些视力正常的运动员对失败的反应反而要弱一些。或许那些视力正常的运动员更有意识去隐藏他们那受伤的自信心。

Vocabulary
Unassuming：谦逊的；不装腔作势的
Betray：显露
Deflation：放气；通货紧缩（在文中是比喻用法）
Slump：衰落；低沉
Crayfish：龙虾
Paralympic：残疾人奥运会
Congenital：（指疾病）先天的（编辑：胡慧）

（英语原文来自SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN《科学美国人》http://www.sciam.com）