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Conversation goes far beyond talking. It also involves, as Swedish author Annika Thor has written, "eyes, smiles, the silences between the words. " When those elements are put together, conversational partners feel most deeply engaged and connected.
Dart-mouth College neuroscientists have taken that idea and carried it to new places. They report some surprising findings on the interaction between eye contact and how two people synchronize (使同步) neural (神经的) activity while talking. The researchers suggest that being in tune with a conversational partner is good — but that occasionally falling out of sync might be even better.
Maintaining eye contact has long been thought to act as the glue that connects two people in conversation. Similarly, the growing study of neural synchrony has largely focused on the way consistence in individuals' brain activity benefits the social connection between them.
Earlier research by the Dartmouth lab had showed that synchronized pupil dilation (瞳孔扩张) serves as a reliable indicator of shared attention, which in turn marks greater neural synchrony. In the new study, which measured pupil dilation during unstructured 10-minute conversations, the researchers found that the initial moment of eye contact — rather than a continuing period of locked stares — marks a peak in shared attention. Synchrony, in fact, drops sharply just after you look into your partner's eyes and begins to recover only when you and that person look away from each other. "Eye contact is not bringing synchrony; it's disturbing it, " says Thalia Wheatley, the paper's senior author.
Why would this happen? Wheatley claims that making and breaking eye contact ultimately drives the conversation forward. "Perhaps what this is doing is allowing us to break synchrony and move back into our own heads so that we can bring forth new and individual contributions to keep the conversation going, " Wohltjen says.
Connections between stare and synchrony might be relevant to research in mental disorders that involve untypical interaction. The findings also help explain frustrations over video-conferencing platforms, where real eye contact is nearly impossible to make or break because of the positioning of cameras and windows on screens.
(1)
What do the Dartmouth College neuroscientists find?
A . People tend to synchronize while talking.
B . Occasional absence of sync can be better.
C . Eye contact draws people to conversations.
D . The silences between the words work wonders.
(2)
When does shared attention reach the highest?
A . At the beginning of eye contact.
B . After 10 minutes' locked stares.
C . In the middle of the conversation.
D . Before looking away from each other.
(3)
What does Wohltjen think of breaking synchrony?
A . It disturbs rather than brings synchrony.
B . It often results in communication barriers.
C . It is a reliable indicator of shared attention.
D . It adds fresh thoughts to the conversation.
(4)
What does the last paragraph mainly tell us about the research?
A . Its significance.
B . Its shortcomings.
C . Its challenges.
D . Its complexity.
答案: B
A
D
A