每日英語 #079: Don’t Trust Your Gut 別信任你的直覺

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Don’t Trust Your Gut

“To trust your gut” means to believe and follow your instincts, that internal voice that speaks to you about whether something is right or wrong, good or bad. “Anatomically” (as related to the body), the word “gut” refers informally to the area below your lungs – your stomach and intestines – but we use it in expressions such as “gut instinct” to mean our deep feelings and emotions.

“信任你的直覺”（To trust your gut）意指相信並遵循你的本能，那個內心聲音會告訴你某事是對的還是錯的、好的還是壞的。從解剖學角度看，單詞“gut”非正式地指的是肺部以下的區域——你的胃和腸——但我們在表達“gut instinct”時使用它，意指我們的深層感受和情感。

The advice of trusting your gut is often used and recommended by people when it comes to making decisions about things both large and small. One area where you see this belief is at school. According to one recent book, 75% of college students believe that it is better “to stick with” (to keep; not to change) the first answer they write down for a question on a test instead of changing it later. “Surveys” (polls; questionnaires) of college professors show a similar attitude among teachers. Only 16% of college professors think that changing an answer will improve a student’s “score” (mark; grade) on a test. Even people in the test-preparation or “test-prep” (getting ready to take an exam) business believe this is true.

信任你的直覺這個建議在做大大小小的決策時經常被人們使用和推薦。在學校可以看到這種信念。根據一本最近的書籍，75%的大學生認為在考試中堅持自己寫下的第一個答案比後來更改要好。大學教授的調查顯示教師中有類似的態度。只有16%的大學教授認為更改答案會提高學生在考試中的分數。甚至在考試準備或“考試準備”（test-prep）行業的人也相信這一點。

But all of this may be wrong, at least when it is related to taking tests. More than 70 years of research on test-taking shows that most of the time a student changes his or her answer, the change is from a wrong answer to a right one. It doesn’t matter what kind of test you are taking – “multiple-choice” (where you are given three or four possible correct answers) or “true/false” (where you say whether a “statement” (sentence) is right or wrong), “timed” (where you are given only a certain number of minutes) or “untimed” (where you can take as long as you want to finish). One review of 33 studies on the issue found that in every study, students typically did better when they decided to change their answer for difficult questions, when they did not trust their guts.

但所有這些可能是錯誤的，至少在考試方面是這樣。超過70年的考試研究顯示，大多數情況下，學生更改答案時，是從錯誤答案改成正確答案。無論你參加的是哪種考試——選擇題（multiple-choice）或是非題（true/false），計時考試（timed）或非計時考試（untimed），都無關緊要。對33項相關研究的一次綜述發現，在每一項研究中，學生在面對難題時決定更改答案，通常會取得更好的成績，而不是相信他們的直覺。

重點單字

• To trust your gut 信任你的直覺 /tə trʌst jɔːr ɡʌt/
• Instincts 本能 /ˈɪnstɪŋkts/
• Anatomically 解剖學地 /ˌænəˈtɒmɪkli/
• Gut instinct 直覺 /ɡʌt ˈɪnstɪŋkt/
• Stick with 堅持 /stɪk wɪð/
• Surveys 調查 /ˈsɜːrveɪz/
• Score 分數 /skɔːr/
• Test-prep 考試準備 /tɛst prɛp/
• Multiple-choice 選擇題 /ˈmʌltɪpəl tʃɔɪs/
• True/false 是非題 /truː fɔːls/
• Statement 陳述 /ˈsteɪtmənt/
• Timed 計時的 /taɪmd/
• Untimed 非計時的 /ˌʌnˈtaɪmd/