首页
外语
计算机
考研
公务员
职业资格
财经
工程
司法
医学
专升本
自考
实用职业技能
登录
外语
Laughter is a fundamental part of everyday life. It is so common that we forget how strange— and important—it is. Indeed, laught
Laughter is a fundamental part of everyday life. It is so common that we forget how strange— and important—it is. Indeed, laught
admin
2019-07-19
89
问题
Laughter is a fundamental part of everyday life. It is so common that we forget how strange— and important—it is. Indeed, laughter is a "speaking in tongues" in which we’re moved by an unconscious response to social and linguistic cues. Stripped of its variation and nuance, laughter is a regular series of short vowel-like syllables usually transcribed as "ha-ha" , "ho-ho" or "hee-hee". These syllables are part of the universal human vocabulary, produced and recognized by people of all cultures.
Given the universality of the sound, our ignorance about the purpose and meaning of laughter is remarkable. We somehow laugh at just the right times, without consciously knowing why we do it. Most people think of laughter as a simple response to comedy, or a cathartic mood-lifter. Instead , after ten years of research on this little-studied topic, I concluded that laughter is primarily a social vocalization that binds people together.
Students in my classes confirmed the social nature of laughter by recording the circumstances of their laughter in diaries. After excluding the effects of media, the fact was striking: Laughter was thirty times more frequent in social than solitary situation and it’s a signal we send to others and it virtually disappears when we lack an audience.
As anyone who has ever laughed at the sight of someone doubled over can attest, laughter is contagious. Because our laughter is under minimal conscious control, it is spontaneous and relatively uncensored. Contagious laughter is a compelling display of Homo sapiens, a social mammal. It strips away our outer layer of culture and challenges the hypothesis that we are in full control of our behavior. From these synchronized vocal outbursts come insights into the neurological roots of human social behavior and speech.
The irresistibility of others’ laughter has its roots in the neurological mechanism of laugh detection. The fact that laughter is contagious raises the intriguing possibility that humans have an auditory laugh detector—a neural circuit in the brain that responds exclusively to laughter. Once triggered , the laugh detector activates a laugh generator, a neural circuit that causes us in turn to produce laughter. Furthermore, laughter is not randomly speech. There is evidence of " the punctuation effect" , the tendency to laugh almost exclusively at phrase breaks in speech. The pattern requires that speech has priority over laughter.
Pain reduction is one of laughter’s promising applications. Rosemary Cogan, Ph. D. , a professor of psychology at Texas Tech University, found that subjects who laughed at a funny video or underwent a relaxation procedure tolerated more discomfort than other subjects. Humor may help soften intense pain and it may also help us cope with stress. In a study by Michelle Newman, Ph. D. , an assistant professor of psychology at Pennsylvania State University, subjects viewed a film a-bout three grisly accidents and had to narrate it either in a humorous or serious style. Those who used the humorous tone had the lowest negative effect and tension. However, a problem with these studies is that none of them separate the effects of laughter from those of humor. None allow for the possibility that presumed effects of laughter or humor may come from the playful setting associated with these behaviors. And none evaluate the uniqueness of laughter by contrasting it with other vocalizations such as shouting.
Rigorous proof that we can reduce stress and pain through laughter remains an unrealized but reasonable prospect. While we wait for definitive evidence, it can’t hurt—and it’s certainly enjoyable—to laugh.
Questions 66 to 70
Answer the following questions with the information given in the passage.
What fact does the passage reveal about laughter and speech?
选项
答案
Laughter occurs almost exclusively at phrase breaks in speech.And speech has priority overlaughter.
解析
(倒数第三段后部分指出“笑”并非randomly speech,有证据表明“the punctuation effect”的存在,即“the tendency to laugh almost exclusively at phrase breaks in speech.The patternrequires that speech has priority over laughter”。)
转载请注明原文地址:https://www.kaotiyun.com/show/whfK777K
本试题收录于:
A类竞赛(研究生)题库大学生英语竞赛(NECCS)分类
0
A类竞赛(研究生)
大学生英语竞赛(NECCS)
相关试题推荐
LINDA:Lindawantsthecollegetoofferbetteradviceon【D1】______.Studentsneedmoreinformationaboutjobs【D2】______.Shethi
"Englishistheworstofallthealphabeticallanguages,"saidliteracyresearcherMashaBell."Itisuniqueinthatthereare
Inthissection,youwillhearashortpassage.Thereare10missingwordsorphrases.Fillintheblankswiththeexactwordso
Changethepositionofthreewordsonlyinthesentencebelowinorderforittomakecompletesense.Becausehousingisnecessa
ThesixteenthinternationalAIDSconferenceopenedonSundayinToronto,Canada.Morethantwenty-fourthousanddelegatesfromo
Themajorpartofmychildhoodwasspentinfightingoffterrorofthingswhichdidn’texist,andIdon’tthinkmyfatherever
TheSupremeCourt’sdecisionsonphysician-assistedsuicidecarryimportantimplicationsforhowmedicineseekstorelievedyin
PeopleintheUnitedStatesinthenineteenthcenturywerehauntedbytheprospectthatunprecedentedchangeinthenation’sec
Accordingtothetheoryofsemantictriangle,awordisnotdirectlyrelatedtothethingitrefersto.Theyareconnectedby___
随机试题
社会主义初级阶段发展战略的第三步是指,到21世纪中叶,人均国民生产总值要
下列不属于常见高级程序设计语言的是_______。
以下有关免疫印迹法错误的说法是
海因里希因果连锁理论认为,伤亡事故的发生不是一个孤立的事件,尽管伤害可能在某瞬间突然发生,却是一系列事件相继发生的结果。其借助于多米诺骨牌形象地描述了事故的因果连锁关系,即遗传及社会环境→人的缺点→不安全行为或不安全状态→事故→伤害。企业安全工作的重心是控
根据《特种作业人员安全技术培训考核管理规定》,施工企业每个类别的特种作业人员一般不超过全体从业人员的()。
根据行业的流动比率参考指标,下列()行业的流动比率应该大于2。
确定教育目的的客观依据是()。
最近,英国的人类学家发现,生活习惯会改变我们的下颌形状。她从11种生存文化迥异的族群成员头骨中选取了近300个个体,测量了他们头骨和下颌骨详细的数据,进行精细的比较分析。结果发现,来自狩猎采集社会的人通常下颌骨都狭长、较大,而靠农业为生的人下颌都短宽、较小
异步通信,一帧信息只传送【 】位。
Whathesaidsuggestedthatthey(be)______nolongerfriends.
最新回复
(
0
)