喝酒其實只是人醉心不醉

Unless you are teetotal, we've all had a morning after when we are forced to wonder why on earth we did that hugely embarrassing thing while drunk the previous night.

據英國《每日郵報》9月2日報道，除非滴酒不沾，不然我們每個人都會碰到這樣的時候，即在酒醒後拼命想知道前一天晚上爲什麼要做那些令人尷尬的事情。

　　Whether it's as simple as an embarrassing text message sent, a drunken confession of love or something a little bit more bizarre, it's usually the sort of thing we wouldn't do while sober.

不管是酒醉後發出的一條尷尬短信，還是表白，抑或是更瘋狂的事，這些都是我們在清醒的時候不敢做的。

But a series of detailed brain scans has now revealed that alcohol doesn't cause us to behave badly, it just stops us from caring about embarrassing ourselves.

目前，一系列的腦部詳細掃描顯示，酒精並不會讓人舉止反常，它只是讓人忘記了尷尬。

　　Research from a team at the University of Missouri has shown that drunken people are still aware they're making a mistake, but the alcohol reduces brain signals telling us to worry.

密蘇里大學團隊的研究表明，喝醉的人依然知道他們在犯錯，但酒精使他們擔心這種（過失）的信號減少了。

　　Professor Bruce Bartholow, who led the study, said: "When we make mistakes, activity in a part of the brain responsible for monitoring behavior increases. This sends an alarm signal to other parts of the brain indicating that something went wrong. Our study shows that alcohol doesn't reduce your awareness of mistakes - it reduces how much you care about making those mistakes.

負責該研究的布魯斯 巴塞洛說：“當我們做錯事時，負責監控我們行爲的大腦區域的活動就會增加。而這種活動能向大腦的其他區域發出警報，提醒有錯誤出現。我們的研究表明，酒精並非減少了人對錯誤的覺察力，而是讓人不再關心錯誤造成的影響。”

　　During the study, Prof Bartholow's team of psychologists measured the brain activity of people aged between 21 and 35 as they completed a tricky computer task.

在研究過程中，巴塞洛教授領導的心理學家團隊對21到35歲之間的人在完成一項棘手計算機任務時的大腦活動進行了測評。

　　One third of them were given alcoholic drinks, while the rest were given no alcohol.

研究人員讓1/3的人喝酒，剩下的人則沒有喝酒。

In addition to monitoring their brain activity, the researchers also measured changes in participants' mood, their accuracy in the computer task and their perceived accuracy.

除了監控他們的大腦活動，研究者們還測評了被測者的情緒變化、執行計算機任務和感知的精確度。

The findings showed the brain's "alarm signal" in response to errors was much less pronounced in those who had drunk alcohol.

結果發現，攝入酒精的人的大腦對於錯誤的警報信號明顯減弱。

However, they were no less likely to realize when they had made a mistake - they just didn't care as much.

儘管如此，他們並不是不知道自己犯了錯，只是他們不在意。

"In certain circumstances reducing the brain's alarm signal could be seen as a good thing, because some people, like those with anxiety disorders, are hyper-sensitive to things going wrong. In some people, a small amount of alcohol can take the edge off those anxious feelings," added Prof Bartholow.

“在某些情況下，減少大腦的警報信號是件好事，比如那些患有焦慮症的人，他們對錯誤會異常敏感。對這些人來說，少量的酒精有助於其減少焦躁情緒，” 巴塞洛教授補充說。