If you feel a pang of guilty pleasure when you read celebrity tittle-tattle, don't be too hard on yourself.
要是你在看明星八卦時會感到一陣罪惡的快感，無需過分自責。

Hearing juicy gossip about famous people apparently fires up the brain's pleasure centre in the same way as eating the finest food or even winning the lottery.
聽一段勁爆的名人八卦會刺激大腦的愉快中樞，就像吃到最美味的食物，甚至中彩票時的感受一樣。

And it's not good news that gives us the biggest buzz. Tales about stars' troubles are what we crave, with affairs, drink-driving and other misdemeanours stirring up feel-good chemicals in the brain.
而正面八卦并不能給我們最大的刺激。我們更垂涎于明星們所遭遇的麻煩事。外遇、酒駕等越軌行為才會讓我們的大腦產生興奮的化學反應。

Most of us would never admit that we enjoy such tales but brain scans carried out during a study show that deep down, we find them highly amusing.
大多數人絕不會承認自己享受這些八卦，但在一項研究中，腦部掃描表明，在內心深處我們對這些八卦非常感興趣。

Researchers scanned the brains of a group of students while a person read out snippets of gossip about them, their best friends and a host of movie stars. Some of the gossip was designed to put the person in a bad light, such as having an affair or walking out on their family.
研究者們對一組學生進行了腦部掃描，同時讓人把一些八卦消息念給他們聽，其中有關于他們自己的，關于他們密友的，也有一些電影明星的。其中一部分八卦是為了丑化當事人而設計的，比如有外遇或拋棄家庭等。

They may have been the victim of bad luck, such as being in a hit-and-run accident. Other gossip included heartwarming tales of caring for the sick and helping parents track down missing children.
還有一些八卦是關于當事人遭遇厄運的，比如被車撞了而肇事者逃逸等。另一些八卦則是溫暖人心的故事，比如當事人照顧病人或幫助失蹤兒童的父母尋找孩子等等。

The volunteers were also asked how amusing they found each piece of information.
志愿者們還被要求評價每條八卦的有趣程度。

The most interesting results related to the negative stories about the celebrities. These stirred up dopamine and other feel-good chemicals in the brain's "reward region".
結果顯示，最吸引人的八卦是關于名人的負面報道，這些報道會刺激大腦中的“獎勵區域”釋放多巴胺等讓人產生愉悅感的化學物質。

The scans, carried out at Shenzhen University in China, revealed that the students were particularly tickled by tales of stars' misfortune, with a celebrity scandal exciting the brain more than news of a friend in trouble.
這組在深圳大學開展的掃描表明，學生們對明星的不幸遭遇尤為感興趣，名人的丑聞比身邊朋友有難的消息更能讓他們的大腦興奮起來。

However, they would not admit to finding the celebrity gossip amusing – perhaps because they didn't want be seen to be gloating over the misfortunes of others.
但是，學生們并不會承認自己對名人八卦感興趣，這可能是因為他們不想被看做幸災樂禍的人。

Adam Perkins, neurobiologist from King's College, London, was fascinated by the findings which were published in the journal Social Neuroscience. "Celebrities are particularly likely to be envied, and when they fall from grace we therefore are likely to feel particularly happy," he said.
這項研究結果刊登在《社會神經科學》雜志（Social Neuroscience）上。倫敦國王學院神經生物學家亞當·帕金斯（Adam Perkins）對研究成果非常感興趣。他說：“人們尤其容易對名人產生嫉妒心理，他們身陷丑聞時，可能會讓我們產生一種強烈的快感。”

"An interesting follow-up study would be to investigate whether personality characteristics affect responses to negative gossip about celebrities.
“一項有趣的后續研究將探討個性特點是否會影響人們對名人負面八卦的反應。

"For example, and this is speculative, people who are prone to feeling miserable might gain pleasure from hearing about celebrities having a bad time because it makes them feel that famous people can also feel bad."
“比如，這只是推斷，當容易悲傷的人聽說明星處境艱難時，可能會產生快感，因為他們會覺得名人也不好過。”

He suggested our love of celebrity scandal has ancient roots, adding: "Since we are essentially running round the modern world with a cave person's brain, it may perhaps be that our familiarity with the lives of celebrities tricks our brains into seeing them as within our peer group and therefore direct competition for us, even though we have never met them.
帕金斯表示，人們對名人丑聞的熱愛有著古老的淵源。“本質上說，盡管生活在現代世界，但我們的大腦還是洞穴人的大腦。或許，我們與名人生活的相似程度，會讓我們的大腦覺得他們也屬于我們中的一員，因此也是我們的直接競爭對手，盡管我們從未見過他們。”他說。

"When a celebrity falls from grace, our brain’s reward centres activate as if we had witnessed the downfall of a more successful rival within our own tribe."
“當一位名人身陷丑聞時，我們大腦中的“獎勵區域”便會啟動，就像親眼目睹部落中比自己更成功的競爭對手垮臺一般。”

Vocabulary

tittle-tattle：八卦，閑聊
snippet：（消息、新聞等的）片段
gloat：得意洋洋，幸災樂禍
fascinate：使（某人）著迷，極感興趣
speculative：猜測的

（譯者：quella0 編輯：侯瑋萍）