原文及注释

Y: Today, on a Moment of Science, it's time for another round of Baby Skills, that fun and wacky guessing game that shows your baby is up to more than crying and napping. And today's question is: What can six-month-olds do better than nine-month-olds? Don, care to take a stab at it?

D: Hmmm! well! I really don't know, Yael. I thought nine-month-olds would be better at just about everything.

Y: Sorry, Don. It turns out that six-month-olds are better than nine-month-olds at recognizing certain faces. In a recent study, scientists observed that six-month-olds are equally good at distinguishing between non-human faces, as they are at distinguishing between human faces.

D: By non-human, do you mean animal faces?

Y: Exactly. Six-month-olds apparently have no trouble telling apart animal faces, but then they lose that ability by the time they turn nine months old. In contrast, as they get older, they just get better at distinguishing between human faces.

D: Hmm! I guess that makes sense. After all, even babies know which side their bread is buttered on.

Y: That's right—it doesn't take babies long to learn that it's more important to pay attention to human faces than to animal faces. Scientists call this phenomenon cognitive narrowing. The more human faces babies look at, the better they get at noticing individual features. At the same time, as they grow older, and their knowledge becomes more specialized, babies lose the ability to recognize animal faces, because they don't see nearly as many. And, as you might expect, when scientists tested this on monkeys, the opposite was true.

D: The monkey babies got better at recognizing monkey faces?

Y: Exactly.

【词汇注释】
wacky adj. 古怪的

take a stab at vt. 试做

recognize v.识别

distinguish v.区别

butter vt.涂黄油于…上

phenomenon n.现象

cognitive narrowing 认知缩小

specialized a.特化的, 专化的
参考译文
Y: 今天，在《科学时刻》栏目，来谈谈婴儿技能，那个好玩的古怪游戏表明婴儿不只是哭闹和打盹儿。今天的问题是：6个月大的婴儿在什么方面强过9个月大的婴儿？Don,来谈下好吗？

D: Yael，我真的不知道。我本以为9个月大的婴儿在什么方面做得都更好。

Y: Don,很遗憾。结果表明6个月大的婴儿在辨别某类型的脸部方面胜过9个月大的婴儿。在最近的研究中，科学家观察到在辨认非人脸方面和辨认人脸方面的能力是一样的。

D: 非人脸,你是说动物的脸？

Y: 是的。6个月大的应儿子在区别动物的脸方面没有问题，但是到9个月大时，他们就失去那种能力，相反，年龄越大，他们辨认人脸方面的能力就越强。

D: 我觉得有道理，毕竟，连婴儿都知道所吃的面包那边涂黄油了。

Y: 是的，婴儿不用多长时间就知道注意人脸比注意动物的脸更重要。科学家管这种现象叫做“认知缩小”，婴儿看到的人脸越多，他们月擅长辨认每个人的脸。同事，随着年龄的增长，他们的知识越来单一，婴儿失去了辨认动物的脸得能力，因为他们看到的动物的脸远没有人脸多。你也许会想到，当科学家在猴子身上测试的时候，结果正相反。

D: 猴子幼崽更多擅长辨认猴脸？

Y: 完全正确。