Although the personality dimension ofintroversion/extraversion is certainly influenced by biological factors(including being partly inherited from our parents), we now know that thearousal theory itself is only half true. There is ample evidence, includingfrom brain imaging studies, to show that introverts tend to respond morestrongly to loud noises and other sensory stimulation. But contrary toEysenck’s theory, there is precious little evidence that introverts have higherbaseline levels of arousal in general.

尽管内外向型人格的程度在某种程度上受到生理原因的影响（包括部分继承了我们的父母的性格），我们现在知道，皮质兴奋理论并不是完全真实。有包括脑成像研究等充分的证据表明，内向的人往往对噪音或者其他感官刺激反应强烈。但与艾森克理论相悖的是，基本上没有任何证据可以说明内向的人总体来说有更高大脑皮质兴奋的水准。

So while it’s still debatable whether thelemon test can accurately reveal your introversion, it certainly does tell yousomething interesting about your physical sensitivity – and you could alwaystry repeating it a few times to get a more reliable result.

虽然柠檬测试是否准确仍有争议，但这个测试确切的揭示了一些有趣现象，那就是你身体的敏感度，况且你可以经常重复这个测试，这样结果会更加准确。

In any case, extraversion and introversionaren’t the only aspects of personality that can be measured with a lemon-basedtest. A paper published in 2014 suggested that we can also use a lemon to testa different aspect of personality – how much empathy people have. Again, thisis something that psychologists often measure using questionnaires, with theusual issues of subjectivity and honesty coming into play.

此外，柠檬测试并不仅仅能够测试内外向型人格。2014年发表的一篇文章说，我们可以用柠檬来测试其他人格特质——人有多少同情心。同样的，这也是心理学家经常使用问卷来衡量的特质，存在主观和诚实性的问题。

To provide a more objective test, FlorenceHagenmuller and her colleagues asked volunteers to put three rolls of cotton intheir mouths (used to measure saliva) and watch two one-minute videos – onefeatured a man cutting up and eating a lemon, the other (the control condition)involved the same man taking coloured balls out of a container and putting themon a table.

为提供一个客观的测试结果，佛罗伦斯·哈根穆勒（Florence Hagenmuller）和她的同事们要求志愿者在观看2个一分钟的视频时，口含三卷棉棒（用于测量唾液量）一视频一描述了一个人切柠檬和吃柠檬，另一个（在可控条件下）视频中一个人将彩球从容器中拿出放在桌子上。

Afterwards, the researchers weighed thecotton rolls and found that, overall, the participants salivated more whenwatching the man eat lemon than the control video. This is an example of whatpsychologists call “autonomic resonance” – the way that we automatically mimiceach other’s physiological states, such as when we yawn when we see someoneelse yawn, or wince at their pain. But we all differ in how sensitive we are inthis respect and, intriguingly, the researchers found that the higher theparticipants had scored on a questionnaire measure of empathy (they agreed withstatements like “I often have tender, concerned feelings for people lessfortunate than me” and “I am often quite touched by things that I see happen)”,the more they tended to salivate while watching the man eat lemon.

研究人员之后将棉棒称重，并发现总体上参与者在观看吃柠檬的视频比另一个视频时分泌了更多的唾液。这是心理学家所说的“自主——共鸣”，我们会自动模仿对方的生理状态，比如当我们看到别人打哈欠自己也会打哈欠，或着看到对方疼痛也会感同身受。但是我们机体对此的敏感程度是不同的，有趣的是，研究人员发现，在移情问卷中获得高分的参与者（他们同意这样的陈述“我经常对于不幸的人心存善念与关爱”和“我经常被我看到的事情所感动）”，他们在看柠檬视频时分泌了更多的口水。

This is a trickier test to try at home,unless you want to start weighing cotton rolls filled with saliva! Also, to getany meaning from the results, you’d have to compare how much you salivated tothe lemon video compared with one or more other people. I could imagine itwould make for a fun science experiment to try out at school or college.

除非你打算测试沾了口水的棉棒，不然这项测试在家做有点难度。同时，要想得到有意义的测试结果，你还要比较自己和一两个其他人看到柠檬视频的唾液量。可以想象，在中学或大学做这样的科学实验会是一件很有意思的事情。

Hagenmuller and her team said that thelemon-based empathy test could have some serious uses – for example, to assessempathy in people who can sometimes find it difficult to follow questionnaireinstructions, such as people with schizophrenia or autism. The advantage of thelemon video test is that it doesn’t require any comprehension on the part ofthe test-taker. All they have to do is sit back and watch the video, and theresults provide a read-out of how much empathy they experience at an automaticvisceral level.

哈根穆勒和她的团队说，柠檬的移情测试可以使用在一些严肃的问题上——例如，患有精神分裂症或自闭症的人有时很难按照问卷说明进行测试。柠檬的视频测试的优点是，它不需要参与者有任何理解。他们要做的就是坐下来观看视频，结果就显示他们内心能够有怎样一个同理心的水平。

So next time you find yourself in apossession of a bag of lemons, you’ve got a choice. Youcould make lemonade or you could start doing some psychology experiments. Iwonder what your decision says about your personality?

那么下次你发现自己有一袋子柠檬的时候你就可以进行选择了。你可以做柠檬汁或者进行一些心理学测试。那做这个决定本身是不是也能说明你的性格呢？