(单词翻译:单击)
听力文本
This is Scientific American's 60-second Science, I'm Christopher Intagliata.
One of the ugliest sights in Great Britain is a small power station outside Plymouth, England, its electrical lines and towers surrounded by a drab-colored fence. I know this not because I've been there—but because a photo of it has scored a measly 1 out of 10 on an online game called Scenic or Not. The game has viewers rate photos from all over the U.K. on their scenic beauty.
After a million and a half ratings of more than 200,000 photos, the site has classified more than 93 percent of Great Britain as scenic, or not, or somewhere in between. And now, a study in the journal Scientific Reportshas used that data to show that our happiness increases in line with the scenic beauty around us. Which might sound kind of obvious.
"But what was I think surprising is we find that connection when they're in more built-up areas as well. So it's not just a natural area that might have an impact on happiness, but we might also feel happier in more beautiful areas in our cities."
Chanuki Seresinhe is a data scientist at the Warwick Business School and the Alan Turing Institute. Seresinhe and her team used data from the "Mappiness" iPhone app—which polled some 15,000 participants about their wellbeing a few times a day, over a three-year period. The app also pulled GPS data, which allowed Seresinhe and her team to correlate happiness ratings with the Scenic-or-Not rating of where a participant happened to be. The team found that as scenic beauty goes up, so does self-reported wellbeing. And that held true for areas featuring picturesque human-built structures, such as bridges and interesting architecture.
And though it's just a correlation for now, "I think what's interesting about this research is it shows that just a small injection of beauty into an area of a city can actually create happiness for possibly thousands of people that are being exposed to that."
Which could come in handy. Because the global population is forecast to grow to 11 billion by the end of the century—living mostly in cities. Which should be built to be as appealing as possible.
Thanks for listening for Scientific American — 60-Second Science. I'm Christopher Intagliata.
参考译文
这里是科学美国人——60秒科学系列，我是克里斯托弗·因塔格里塔。
英国最丑的地方之一是英格兰普利茅斯郊外的一个小发电站，那里的电线和电塔被土褐色的栅栏围了起来。我知道这件事并不是因为我去过那里，而是因为在一款名为“算不算风景”的在线游戏中，发电站的照片在满分10分中只得到了1分。这款游戏让观看者浏览英国各地的照片，并对照片的风景美进行评分。
在对20多万张照片进行了150万次评分后，该网站将英国93%以上的地区划分为风景区、非风景区或介于二者之间的区域。现在，发表在《科学报告》上的一篇研究利用这些数据表明，我们的幸福感会随着周围景色美丽程度的上升而增加。这听起来似乎是显而易见的事情。
“但我认为令人惊讶的是，我们在更完善的建成区也发现了这种联系。因此，不仅自然区可能会影响幸福感，住在风景更优美的城市也会让我们感觉更幸福。”
华威商学院和阿兰图灵研究所的数据科学家查努基·塞莱辛和说到。她和她的团队使用了来自苹果应用程序“Mappiness”的数据，该应用在三年中，每天分几次对15000名参与者进行有关幸福感的调查。这款应用还提取了GPS数据，这使塞莱辛和及其团队得以将幸福感评分与参与者恰巧所在之地的“算不算风景”评分联系起来。该团队发现，风景优美程度越高，参与者自我报告的幸福感就越高。在以桥梁和有趣建筑等风景如画的人类建筑为特色的地区，情况也是如此。
尽管这只是暂时的关联，但“我认为这项研究的有趣之处在于，它表明将少许美丽注入城市某一区域，或许就能为置身其中的成千上万人创造幸福。”
这可能会派上用场。因为到本世纪末，预计全球人口将增长到110亿，而且大部分人会居住在城市。因此城市建造应该尽可能地吸引人。
谢谢大家收听科学美国人——60秒科学。我是克里斯托弗·因塔利亚塔。
译文为可可英语翻译，未经授权请勿转载！
重点讲解
重点讲解：
1. in between 介于…之间；
The house was near a park but there was a road in between.
房子在一处公园附近，但两者之间隔着一条马路。
2. in line with （与…）一致；（与…）相符；
I can assure you that our price is in line with the market.
我可以保证我的价格与市价是一致的。
3. hold true 同样适用；在…情况下亦然；
This law is known to hold true for galaxies at a distance of at least several billion light years.
据知，这条定律同样适用于距离至少几十亿光年之远的星系。
4. come in handy 派上用场；
That key will come in handy if you lock yourself out.
要是你把自己锁在了屋外，那把钥匙就派上用场了。
