時差N小時:追隨別人的目光

Don:Time to go again to the A Moment of Sciencemailbag. A listener writers: Dear Yael and Don: Whyis it that whenever I see someone looking atsomething, like someone gazing up at the sky, I lookthere too? Is it just me, or do we all do this?

唐：又到了科學(xué)一刻讀信時間了。 一位聽眾寫道：親愛的雅艾爾和唐，每當(dāng)我看見別人在看某件事物時，比如說望向天空，我也會朝那個方向看，這是為什么呢?只有我是這樣，還是大家都這樣做?

Yael:Great question! And the answer is that whatscientists call gaze-following is pretty much auniversal human trait. We're all prone to follow another person's gaze even if we're not surewhat they're looking at, or why.

雅艾爾：這個問題問得好!科學(xué)家稱這種現(xiàn)象為視線追隨，幾乎全人類所共有的特征。我們都傾向于跟隨別人的目光，即使不知道他們在看什么，或者為什么看。

Don:Right. But why do we gaze-follow? British researchers think it dates back to our primitiveprimate ancestors, who may have evolved the behavior as a way to locate food. When theBritish scientists studied gaze-following in lemurs, which are very primitive primates, theyfound that lemurs do in fact use gaze-following as a strategy to locate areas likely to containfood. When a lemur sees one or more of its fellows looking in a particular direction, it will turnits attention that way, too. And at some point the lemur is likely to search that area for hiddenfood.

唐：對。但是我們?yōu)槭裁磿冯S別人的目光?英國研究人員認(rèn)為，這種行為可以追朔到我們的靈長類祖先，這是進(jìn)化的結(jié)果，靈長類動物把這當(dāng)做尋找食物的一種方式。當(dāng)英國科學(xué)家用狐猴做實驗時，發(fā)現(xiàn)狐猴實際上是利用目光追隨來定位有食物的區(qū)域。當(dāng)一個狐猴看見一只或者一群同胞正看向特定的方向時，也會將注意力集中到那個方向。而且在大多情況下，狐猴很有可能在那片區(qū)域找到潛在的食物。

Yael:Of course, gaze-following could also be a way of sensing danger and staying away from acertain place. In any case, the point is that our human tendency to gaze-follow could haveancient origins. We no longer follow gazes for foraging purposes. But it's still useful as a way ofbeing alerted to something interesting, or menacing, in the vicinity.

雅艾爾：當(dāng)然，目光追隨也是一種感知危險，遠(yuǎn)離某個場所的方式。在任何情況下，人類這種追隨別人目光的傾向很可能源自古時，這點值得一提。雖然我們不再以覓食的目的，但目光追隨仍然可以用來發(fā)現(xiàn)身邊的趣事或者危險。