Increase Your IQ and Your Memory:Learn Synaesthesia 利用“聯(lián)覺”提升智商及記憶力

Activity 1

Before you read, match the word to a definition.

1. a study 2. be responsible for something 3. benefit 4. technique 5. test 6. train

a. a good thing

b. a piece of research

c. a way of doing something

d. check an idea to find out if it is true

e. learn something; teach someone something

f. make something happen

Some creative people see colours when they hear different sounds. Others see colours when they see words and numbers printed in black and white. These interesting people are called synaesthetes[聯(lián)覺者], and what they experience is called synaesthesia.

A

A study at the University of Sussex is finding out how learning to see sounds as colours or think of letters in colour could improve your IQ and memory.

Study leaders Dr. Daniel Bor and Dr. Nicolas Rothen have been working on memory for a number of years. They want to see which parts of the brain do different jobs.Dr. Bor says that carrying out these tests has given them the opportunity to find out more about how we use different kinds of memory.

B

He explains that Professor Simon Baron Cohen, of the University of Cambridge, was largely responsible for beginning the modern science of synaesthesia in the 1980s. “He created a test to try and find out whether the experiences that synaesthetes have are the same over time. The tests showed that synaesthesia was real, and this made lots of scientists in different places want to do similar research. They wanted to know what synaesthesia is, what different kinds there are, and what creates it in the first place.”

C

Dr. Bor based his latest research around something scientists already know a lot about:chunking[組塊化]. He explains that this is a way of breaking large pieces of information into smaller units, to make it easier to remember.“When I give you my phone number,01274737215, you probably remember it as 012 74 73 72 15, or something similar. If you can remember 012 and the first 74, you can remember the rest. You can get some amazing benefits from chunking.”

This is really important for understanding synaesthesia. Dr. Bor says that synaesthesia adds extra information to things that are difficult to remember, such as letters and numbers, or extra colours. This helps us remember things better.

When Dr. Bor first started talking about this topic 12 years ago, other experts were interested, but at the time there was no supporting research. Now that has changed.There have been other studies showing the memory advantages of synaesthetes. And Dr. Bor’s own study of one amazing person,who has both synaesthesia and a very strong memory advantage, supports this idea as well.

D

“All these signs are pointing towards synaesthesia being connected to greater abilities to do certain things, certain jobs,”says Dr. Bor. “So, the study began as a way to test that.” They wanted see if they could create a way to learn synaesthesia, and develop those benefits for everyone.

They developed the study from an idea by Dr. Nicolas Rothen who had trained people for ten minutes a day for a week.The results were not huge, but they were interesting. “My idea was to train them for a lot longer, and make the experience really interesting and enjoyable, so they would want to learn more and more,” says Dr.Bor. “I knew exactly how I wanted to teach them, to get the biggest benefits. We used those ideas in the study and we did see strong benefits.”

E

They discovered that, after training,people were able to pass the normal synaesthesia tests, and their IQ jumped up about 12 points! Although Dr. Bor says they need to test the increase in IQ with different groups of people, the result is very interesting. “It’s very rare to read about a study which increases people’s IQs.Especially when the group are already quite clever, like the students who took part in this study.”

As Dr. Bor says, “Synaesthetes, on the whole, are really pleased and proud that they are synaesthetes. They get a memory advantage and they see the world in this extra special way.”

Activity 2

The text has five parts labelled A–E. Match the headings below to the paragraphs.

1. Information Chunking

2. Training in Synaesthesia

3. Amazing Results

4. The Beginning of a Science

5. Studying Memory

Activity 3

A. Which sentence is about…?

1. something happening now

2. something that is generally true

i. A study at the University of Sussex is finding out how to improve your IQ and memory.

ii. Synaesthesia adds extra information to things.

B. Choose the correct verb form in bold.

1. I’m doing an interesting project. I am finding out/find out how people remember phone numbers.

2. They are carrying out/carry out a lot of memory tests at the moment.

3. I am basing/base my research on an idea I had when I forgot my own phone number.4. Our results are supporting/support their ideas.

5. We are developing/develop a number of tests each year.

Activity 4

Discussion: Do you know

anyone with synaesthesia? If you could have any kind of synaesthesia, what kind would you choose?

無論是中文寫作還是英文寫作，無論是學(xué)生練筆還是專業(yè)論文，“煩瑣”是人們很容易犯下的通病。我們經(jīng)常接觸到各種多余累贅的文字、拐彎抹角的句子、華而不實(shí)的修飾和毫無意義的套話。這些語(yǔ)言上的毛病雖然在日常生活中不會(huì)對(duì)溝通交流造成太大障礙，但是一旦出現(xiàn)在考試作文、期末論文或者其他重要文稿當(dāng)中，它們就會(huì)成為影響文章質(zhì)量的頭號(hào)敵人。

以英文寫作為例，為什么那么多作者在明明可以只用一個(gè)介詞的情況下非要用個(gè)復(fù)雜的詞組呢？其中原因有很多，有時(shí)是因?yàn)樽髡咦罱鼘W(xué)到的新內(nèi)容，有時(shí)是在故意“抖機(jī)靈”，有時(shí)是因?yàn)闊o話可說只好這樣湊字?jǐn)?shù)，有時(shí)是為了“顯擺”自己的語(yǔ)言水平，還有些時(shí)候則是為了討老師或讀者的歡心。

事實(shí)上，對(duì)大部分讀者而言，用思路清晰的文字把自己的意思準(zhǔn)確無誤地表達(dá)出來，遠(yuǎn)比不知所云的繁雜瑣碎更有吸引力——而對(duì)閱卷時(shí)間有限的老師來說，一語(yǔ)中的、不拐彎抹角的作文顯然更易讓人產(chǎn)生好感。

那么我們應(yīng)該如何去繁從簡(jiǎn)呢？拿起一篇自己的習(xí)作，檢查每個(gè)句子——每個(gè)詞都是必要的嗎？有沒有多余的介詞、意思重復(fù)的副詞和形容詞、沒有意義的插入語(yǔ)？這句話是不是和上文的意思有所重復(fù)？這句話是不是和文章內(nèi)容無關(guān)？這句話能用更簡(jiǎn)單的語(yǔ)言表達(dá)嗎？全文還有什么華而不實(shí)、做作時(shí)髦的地方嗎？

從小處開始，從最基礎(chǔ)的課堂作業(yè)開始，通過這樣的檢查一點(diǎn)點(diǎn)糾正自己的寫作習(xí)慣。只要堅(jiān)持不斷地練筆、檢查和修改，你的文章就會(huì)在不知不覺中產(chǎn)生可喜的質(zhì)變。

一句話：簡(jiǎn)潔，再簡(jiǎn)潔。

（石蘊(yùn) 供稿）