A great way to get to know someone better is to say something that makes them laugh.
想要更好地了解別人，一個好辦法就是說些能讓他們發笑的事。

Sharing a few good giggles and chuckles makes people more willing to tell others something personal about themselves, without even necessarily being aware that they are doing so, suggests new research.
新研究顯示，分享一些好笑的事會讓人更樂意告訴別人自己的私事，甚至當他們這樣做的時候，也根本不會意識到這一點。

Alan Gray of University College London discovered the tidbit in a new study recently published in the journal Human Nature.
英國倫敦大學學院（University College London）的艾倫?格雷（Alan Gray）在研究中發現了這一有趣的現象。最近，他的這項研究成果發表在了《人類天性》（Human Nature）雜志上。

According to Gray, the act of verbally opening up to someone is a crucial building block that helps to form new relationships and intensify social bonds.
格雷認為，用言語向他人敞開心扉的行為是幫助人們建立新關系，增強人與人之間社會聯系的重要基本要素。

Such self-disclosure can be of a highly sensitive nature — like sharing one’s religious convictions or personal fears — or a superficial tidbit such as one’s favorite type of food.
自我表露的過程具有高度敏感性——好比分享宗教信仰或者害怕之物——或者只是一個流于表面的趣聞，比如最愛的食物類型。

To investigate the role and influence of laughter in this disclosure process, Gray and his colleagues gathered 112 students from Oxford University in England, into groups of four.
為了調查笑聲在自我表露過程中扮演的角色和產生的影響，格雷和他的同事從英國牛津大學（Oxford University）召集了112個學生，并把他們分為四組。

The students did not know one another. The groups watched a 10-minute video together, without chatting to one another.
學生們彼此都不認識。每組會坐在一起看一個10分鐘的視頻，期間并無交談。

The videos differed in the amount of laughter they invoked, and the amount of positive feelings or emotions they elicited.
視頻的區別在于，引人發笑的頻率和傳達積極情緒或情感的效力各有不同。

One featured a stand-up comedy routine by Michael McIntyre, another a straightforward golf instruction video, and the third a pleasant nature excerpt from the “Jungles” episode of the BBC’s Planet Earth series.
一個視頻是邁克爾?麥金太爾（Michael McIntyre）的單人喜劇秀，一個是簡短的高爾夫教學片，第三個是從《BBC行星地球系列》（BBC’s Planet Earth series）“叢林”（Jungles）一集里節選的一個令人愉悅的自然片段。

The levels of laughter and the participants’ emotional state after watching the video was then measured. Each group member also had to write a message to another participant to help them get to know each other better.
在看完視頻之后，研究人員會測算參與者的情緒狀態和笑聲等級。每個小組成員還需給另一名參與者寫下一條消息，以便更好地相互了解。

The participants who had a good laugh together shared significantly more intimate information than the groups who did not watch the comedy routine.
比起那些沒有觀看喜劇的組別，一起歡笑過的參與者們向彼此分享了更多的親密信息。

Gray suggests this is not merely because it is a positive experience, but because of the physiology behind a good laugh. It actually triggers the release of the so-called “happy hormone” endorphin.
格雷認為，究其原因，不僅在于歡笑是一種積極的體驗，還因為歡笑的背后隱藏著的心理學。實際上，正是這種心理學的作用引發了所謂的“快樂荷爾蒙”——內啡肽（endorphin）的釋放。

The findings support the idea that laughter encourages people to make more intimate disclosures to strangers. Furthermore, researchers discovered the sharing of the information occurred so spontaneously, the person who disclosed information was seldom aware that he or she had done so.
這項研究證實，笑聲能促使人們對陌生人透露更多隱私。此外，研究人員還發現，信息的分享就這樣自然而然地發生了。那些透露信息的人很少會意識到自己正在這么做。

It was only the listener who realized that it had happened.
只有傾聽者才會發現這一行為。

Vocabulary

tidbit：趣聞
stand-up comedy：單人脫口秀，單口相聲

（翻譯：孫明哲BISTU 編輯：江巍）