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This episode is brought to you by Squarespace.
本集节目由Squarespace赞助。
You know that warm, fuzzy feeling you get when you boot up an old 8-bit Nintendo game like Legend of Zelda, or Super Mario 3?
当你启动一款老式的8位任天堂游戏《塞尔达传说》或《超级马里奥3》时，你会有一种温暖模糊的感觉吗?
Or maybe when you think back to celebrating the holidays as a kid, something magical just seems to be missing now.
或者，当你回想起小时候庆祝节日的情景时，你会发现现在似乎缺少了某些神奇的东西。
That's nostalgia: a bittersweet longing to return to something in your past.
就是怀旧之情：苦乐参半，渴望回归过去。
We're still learning exactly how nostalgia works and why it could be useful,
我们还在确切地了解怀旧是如何起作用的以及它为什么有用，
but researchers do have a few ideas -- including some things you should watch out for.
但研究人员确实有一些想法——包括某些你应该注意的事情。
Psychologists consider nostalgia a complex emotion, which means it has what's called positive and negative valence.
心理学家认为怀旧是一种复杂的情感，这意味着它具有所谓的正面和负面效价。
Basically, it's good and bad feelings wrapped up all in once.
基本上，良好的感觉和不良的情绪交织在一起。
Unlike joy or sadness, which are pretty straightforward, nostalgia has all the happiness of a fond memory,
与非常直接的喜悦或悲伤不同，怀旧的所有美好回忆都洋溢着幸福，
along with the sad realization that you might never get to experience that thing again.
但也渗透着悲哀：可能再也不会经历那件事了。
A lot of what we know about nostalgia comes from the University of Southampton in England,
我们对怀旧的了解大部分来自英格兰南安普敦大学，
where they did a bunch of different studies about nostalgia in 2006.
2006年，他们做了一系列关于怀旧的不同研究。
In two experiments with a few dozen subjects each,
两个实验中，每个实验有几十个主题，
researchers found that making people feel lonely or sad made them significantly more likely
研究人员发现，给人感觉孤独或悲伤的人，
to get all nostalgic than people who felt cheerful or neutral, even if they weren't asked about their memories.
比那些感到高兴或情绪中立的人更容易怀旧，即使他们没有被问及记忆。
The experiments were too small to draw broad conclusions,
这些实验范围太小，无法从广义上下定论，
but the researchers proposed that nostalgia could exist to help us deal with negative emotions.
但是研究人员提出怀旧可以帮助我们处理消极情绪。
Specifically, since they noticed from those experiments that lonely people often became nostalgic,
具体来说，既然经实验观察，孤独的人经常怀旧，
they thought nostalgia could be used to form social bonds, improve self-esteem,
那么研究人员认为，怀旧可以用来形成社会纽带，提高自尊心，
or improve your mood -- although there could be other benefits, too.
或改善心情——虽然也可能有其它好处。
To test this out, they conducted a few slightly larger studies,
为了验证这一点，他们进行更大规模的研究，
where 50 to 120 people were either asked to think about something nostalgic from their past
要求50~120人回想他们过去的一些往事，
or to just think about something ordinary they did that week,
或者想想他们那周做的寻常事，
like picking up their dry cleaning. Then they did some surveys.
比如去取他们的干洗衣物，然后他们做了一些调查，
According to the surveys, the people who'd felt nostalgic had improved moods and self-esteem,
根据调查结果，那些怀旧人的情绪和自尊得到改善，
and they also felt less anxious about their relationships and more bonded with people in general.
此外，他们对自己的人际关系也不那么焦虑，而且更容易与他人建立联系。
Which is cool! But the people in these studies weren't necessarily feeling sad or lonely,
很酷！但这些研究中的人并不一定感到悲伤或孤独，
so the researchers also wanted to figure out if nostalgia could protect you from being in a bad mood,
所以研究人员还想弄清楚怀旧是否能让人摆脱坏心情，
even when you think about really upsetting things -- like your own death.
甚至当你想到真正令人难过的事情——比如自己死去。
And the answer was essentially yes. In an experiment, 75 people wrote about their own deaths,
答案基本上是肯定的。在一项实验中，有75人写了自己的死亡，
and then half of those people thought about something nostalgic.
然后有一半人想到怀旧的事物。
Afterwards, all the participants did a word completion task,
之后，所有参与者都做了一个词干补全任务，
where they were asked to complete different words based on their first few letters.
他们被要求根据前几个字母完成不同的单词。
So, if they were given a six-letter word starting with C-O-F-F,
给他们一个以C-O-F-F开头的六个字母的单词
they might say the word was coffin if they were still thinking about death, or coffee, which is just pretty neutral.
如果他们还在思考死亡，他们可能会说出“棺材”这个词，或者中性词——“咖啡”。
The people who thought about dying but didn't get nostalgic answered with way more death-related words,
那些考虑过死亡但没有怀旧情绪人回答的词汇更多与死亡相关，
while the nostalgic people gave more neutral answers, almost as if they'd never thought about death in the first place.
虽然怀旧的人给出的答案更中性，就像他们几乎从未想过死亡一样。
The researchers think that could mean nostalgia has even more benefits than just social bonding or a better mood --
研究人员认为，这可能意味着怀旧比单纯的社交或较好的情绪更有益处——
it could also remind us about what we find meaningful in life and help us be less concerned about our lives ending.
它还能提醒我们在生活中发现的有意义的事儿，并帮助我们减少对生命结束的关注。
These studies were pretty limited, though, and there's still a lot we don't know about nostalgia.
然而，这些研究相当有限，我们仍对怀旧知之甚少。
For example, since most of the subjects were young university students,
例如，因为大多数的研究对象都是年轻的大学生，
we don't know if older people experience the feeling the same way.
所以我们不知道老年人是否有同样的感受。
Still, these studies support the idea that nostalgia has a purpose: If you're feeling down,
尽管如此，这些研究仍然支持这样一种观点：怀旧带有一种目的性：如果你情绪低落，
it might cheer you up by helping you feel closer to people and focus on the things that are important to you.
怀旧可能会让你感觉与人更亲近，更专注于对你来说重要的事情，从而让你振作起来。
But there are also some less-helpful side effects.
但也有一些副作用，对人益处不大。
For one thing, nostalgia can screw with your memory a bit.
首先，怀旧会让你的记忆有些混乱。
When people are asked to rate TV shows from different decades,
当被要求对不同年代的电视节目进行评分时，
they generally say that shows from the past are better than the ones today,
人们通常说过去的节目比今天的节目好，
even when they're reminded of current TV shows they like just as much or even more.
即使人们提醒他们，他们喜欢的现在电视节目和过去电视节目相比一样好或者更好。
It's like they just forget all the really, really bad TV that used to be out there.
就好像他们只是忘记了过去那些糟糕透顶的电视节目。
People also tend to rate the movies from the year they graduated high school as better than what's currently being made,
人们也往往认为他们高中毕业那年的电影比现在制作的要好，
no matter how old they are.
不管电影多么老旧。
Plus, nostalgia can make you part with your cash more easily,
此外，怀旧还能让你更容易花钱，
which advertisers knew long before scientists started studying it.
早在科学家开始研究之前，广告商就知道这一点。
There's a reason why it was basically impossible to get your hands on an NES Classic.
这就是为什么你根本不可能得到一部任天堂NES Classic的原因。
Studies have shown that nostalgia in ads makes you willing to pay more for the same product,
研究表明，广告中的怀旧情结使您愿意为同一产品花更多的钱，
or even just give your money away.
或者干脆把钱给别人。
Researchers think that might be because nostalgia makes you feel more connected to people,
研究认为，这可能是因为怀旧会让你感觉与人的联系更紧密，
which some studies have shown could make money seem less important.
一些研究表明，金钱似乎不那么重要。
But we'll have to do more research to figure out why that is.
但是我们必须做更多的研究才能找出原因。
So, nostalgia might cheer you up and make you feel closer to the people around you.
所以，怀旧可能会让你振作起来，让你感觉和周围的人更亲近。
But it's not all sugar cookies and Triforces.
但并不都是糖饼干和Triforces。
This episode was made possible by Squarespace which is a company that makes it really easy to create a custom,
本集是由Squarespace公司制作，这家公司制作的网站个性、
professional, dynamic website that works on both mobile and desktop.
专业、动态，移动端和电脑端皆可运行。
Once upon a time, when I first move to Montana, I did this professionally,
曾几何时，当我第一次搬到蒙大拿州时，我做到了这一点，
I made websites people can give me thousand of dollars for websites,
我做的网站可以拿到几千美元，
that are much less cool and less good than Squarespace's award winning templates.
这远不如Squarespace获奖的模板酷炫优良。
Whether you're an entrepreneur, a musician, an artist, or just looking to sell NES Classics on the internet, maybe you're scientists
无论您是企业家，音乐家，艺术家，还是只想在互联网上销售NES Classics，也许您就是科学家
and you wanna level up your website presents.
想要升级网站，
Squarespace can help you get taken seriously, get clients, and get hired, and sell those Nintendos.
Squarespace可以帮助你吸引客户，预定商品，并出售这些“任天堂”。
Make your next move by visiting Squarespace.com, and use the offer code “SCISHOWPSYCH” to get 10% off your first order.
访问Squarespace.com，使用“SCISHOWPSYCH”的报价代码，新客户享九折优惠。
