拥有一群漂亮的朋友是什么样的体验？| 《经济学人》精读

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「谢谢你张的这么好看，还和我做朋友！」拥有一群漂亮的小伙伴是一种什么样的体验呢？是不是意味着更加容易找到漂亮的男票儿或者女票儿呢？还是意味着颜值平平的自己总是无时无刻地受到自信心的暴击？《经济学人》的这篇Friends, then Benefits就在讨论颜值和恋爱的关系，拥有一帮漂亮的朋友真的是近水楼台先得月吗？难道帅哥永远都是陪美女吗？ 

Friends, then benefits 

众所周知，《经济学人》的标题以善用双关而出名，这篇文章也不例外。有一部电影叫做Friends with benefits，中文译为《朋友也上床》。实际上，Friends with benefits本身也是一个俚语，意思是Two good friends who have a sexual relationship without being emotionally involved. 两个好朋友，维系着炮友的关系，但并没有感情纠葛。这篇文章将这个俚语稍作修改为Friends, then benefits，刚好和文章探讨的主题（颜值高的朋友和恋爱的可能性）互相呼应。从朋友开始（friends），再（then）发展为恋人（benefits）的可能有多大呢？其中颜值的相关性又有多大？ 

难度指数  ★ ★ ★ 

通读

先将一下精选内容进行通读。其中浅色斜体内容不做精析，通读的时候可以略读。 请特指注意一下粗体部分。

Beauty opens many doors. Study after study has concluded that the comely earn more, are better liked, are treated more indulgently and are even given more lenient sentences in court than their plainer counterparts. The door it opens widest, though, is the romantic one. As both common sense and evolutionary theory suggest should happen, beautiful people attract beautiful partners. But not always. Occasionally, handsome men choose plain women, and vice versa.

Why this should be vexes psychologists and biologists alike. A study by Lucy Hunt of the University of Texas at Austin, and her colleagues, soon to be published in Psychological Science, suggests an answer. It depends on whether the couples in questions were friends before they were lovers.

Ms Hunt asked 167 couples how they had come to know one another. Individuals were questioned alone, and their responses compared with those of their other halves. Those responses were mixed: 40% of couples said they were friends before they were lovers, while 41% said they were not. (The remaining 19% could not agree, with one member of the couple saying they had been friends beforehand and the other denying it.)

To measure participants’ attractiveness, Ms Hunt showed videos of them to a group of undergraduates who had not been told the experiment’s goal. The students were asked to rate the attractiveness of the people in the videos on a seven-point scale. Generally, the scores assigned to a participant by different students agreed with one another, which allowed Ms Hunt to calculate, with a fair degree of confidence, just how well-correlated in the beauty stakes a pair of lovers were.

She and her colleagues found that the attractiveness of couples who became romantic partners soon after their first meeting had an average correlation of 0.46 (out of a maximum possible of 1.0). In other words, if a man in such a couple was rated as “very attractive”, there was a fair chance that his female counterpart would be rated as “very attractive” too. In contrast, those who were friends first had an average correlation of just 0.18. Tellingly, the researchers found that the longer the members of a couple had known each other before becoming lovers, the lower was the strength of the correlation.

So a period of pre-romantic friendship can indeed erode beauty’s pulling power. But why? One explanation Ms Hunt proposes is that friendship gives potential mates time to assess subtler attributes, such as intelligence and dependability, as well as the more obvious signal of outward beauty. Given the huge commitment, by both sexes, involved in raising children, such a strategy of long-term assessment is likely to have evolution on its side.

That does, though, raise questions. One is, why does love at first sight persist? Another is, if beauty is, in an evolutionary sense, tradable for good parenting skills, what does that have to say about the parenting skills of beautiful couples? 

开始阅读

第一部分精读

Beauty opens many doors. Study after study has concluded that the comely earn more, are better liked, are treated more indulgently and are even given more lenient sentences in court than their plainer counterparts. The door it opens widest, though, is the romantic one. As both common sense and evolutionary theory suggest should happen, beautiful people attract beautiful partners. But not always. Occasionally, handsome men choose plain women, and vice versa. 

开篇第一句话开门见山，指出美丽的外表确实能为我们的人生开启很多扇门。同时，在第一段最后一句也引出了全文的中心议题，即「handsome men choose plain women, and vice versa.」帅气的男人有时候也选择相貌平平的女人，反之亦然，后文所有的内容就围绕着这个现象而展开。 

精选词
open many doors

open many doors是一个隐喻，字面是开门，实际意义为美的外表为人生开了很多扇门，就是说长得好看的人更加吃香。「吃香」具体表现在哪里呢？他们挣的更多（earn more），更加受人喜欢（better liked），更加被溺爱（are treated more indulgently），甚至在法庭上接受的惩罚也更加轻微些（are even given more lenient sentences in court）。在所有这些「好处」之外，最大的好处就是：

The door it opens widest, though, is the romantic one. 

The door it opens widest字面是「开的最大的一扇门」，内涵是「好看所带来的最大的好处」是romantic one，即爱情。也就是说，长得好看对恋爱关系的好处才是最大的。（长得丑的人好想哭T_T）

第一自然段看似简单，但体现的是英语写作典型的General-Specific-Brorder Statement的结构，这种写作结构广泛应用于学术写作中，包括四六级，雅思托福GRE/GMAT中。段落通常以一个论点开头，即段落中心句（topic sentence），这个段落总论点比较重点和宽泛（general）。然后，为了论证中心句，文章提出细节（specific），具体可能运用对比，举例等等手法，比如本文中就列举了几个「好看」所带来的具体好处。最后，段落再次回到一个宽泛的中心上，提出新的问题，即Occasionally, handsome men choose plain women, and vice versa.

注意，这种General-Specific-Broader Statement的写作结构和我们中文的「欲扬先抑，起承转合」的手法相比是完全不同的思维方式。在精读的时候，不妨常常用这个结构来分析段落的铺陈方式，有助于养成更加地道的英语思维。 

Why this should be vexes psychologists and biologists alike. A study by Lucy Hunt of the University of Texas at Austin, and her colleagues, soon to be published in Psychological Science, suggests an answer. It depends on whether the couples in questions were friends before they were lovers. 

精选词

vex; in question

vex是困扰，动词的意思是 make someone feel annoyed, frustrated, or worried, especially with trivial matters.

在继续阅读前，你不妨先来自己分析一下这个句子结构，看看能不能找出第一句话的主语，谓语和宾语呢？试试看！

Why this should be vexes psychologists and biologists alike.

分析出来了吗？

why this should be 是本句的主语，this指代的是上一段的最后一句话，即「有时候帅气的男人选择了长相一般的女人，反之亦然」。vexes是句子的谓语动词，剩下的部分是宾语。

soon to be published in Psychological Science 是 A study的同位语，不定式 to be publish说明还未发表，但即将发表的状态。

in questions 是一个介词短语，非常常用。就是当前语境下的当事话题或者人物，例如你和朋友在正在讨论某一张照片，那么这张照片就是The picture in question。另外，in question也表示怀疑，疑问的意思，例如你质疑某人实验的真实性，就可以说I am saying that the validity of the test is in question. 

参考译文

Beauty opens many doors. Study after study has concluded that the comely earn more, are better liked, are treated more indulgently and are even given more lenient sentences in court than their plainer counterparts. The door it opens widest, though, is the romantic one. As both common sense and evolutionary theory suggest should happen, beautiful people attract beautiful partners. But not always. Occasionally, handsome men choose plain women, and vice versa.

Why this should be vexes psychologists and biologists alike. A study by Lucy Hunt of the University of Texas at Austin, and her colleagues, soon to be published in Psychological Science, suggests an answer. It depends on whether the couples in questions were friends before they were lovers. 

美丽的外表可以为人生开启很多扇门。一次又一次的研究证明长得好看的人挣钱更多，更受人喜欢，也更受人溺爱，和外貌一般的人相比，他们甚至在法庭上收到的惩罚也更加轻微一些。然而，外貌对于恋爱的益处才是最大的。常识和进化论都表明，美丽的人常常互相吸引。但也不是经常如此，有时候，相貌帅气的男人也选择长相一般的女人，反之亦然。

至于为什么会出现这种现象，这让很多心理学家和生物学家深感困惑。一项来自奥斯汀德克萨斯州立大学的露丝·亨特与其同事对此进行的研究尝试给出答案，这项研究结果将很快在《心理科学》杂志上发表。这种现象的存在，和这对恋人在确立关系前是否是朋友关系有着非常大的相关性。 

第二部分泛读翻译

参考译文

Ms Hunt asked 167 couples how they had come to know one another. Individuals were questioned alone, and their responses compared with those of their other halves. Those responses were mixed: 40% of couples said they were friends before they were lovers, while 41% said they were not. (The remaining 19% could not agree, with one member of the couple saying they had been friends beforehand and the other denying it.)

 亨特女士询问了167对恋人的相识过程。对每个人单独提问，再对比他们的回答。受访者的答案各不相同：40%的恋人在确定关系之前是朋友，41%则不是（剩下的19%恋人彼此之间无法达成共识，一人说他们是朋友，而另一人否认）。

To measure participants’ attractiveness, Ms Hunt showed videos of them to a group of undergraduates who had not been told the experiment’s goal. The students were asked to rate the attractiveness of the people in the videos on a seven-point scale. Generally, the scores assigned to a participant by different students agreed with one another, which allowed Ms Hunt to calculate, with a fair degree of confidence, just how well-correlated in the beauty stakes a pair of lovers were.

为了测量参与者的吸引力，亨特女士将实验者的录像展示给一组大学生，并未事先告知这些大学生这个测试的目的。她让学生们就录像中的人魅力打分，总分是7分。总体上，不同的学生打的分值是大致相似的，这给了亨特一定的自信，让她可以估算外貌在恋爱关系中有多么重要。

She and her colleagues found that the attractiveness of couples who became romantic partners soon after their first meeting had an average correlation of 0.46 (out of a maximum possible of 1.0). In other words, if a man in such a couple was rated as “very attractive”, there was a fair chance that his female counterpart would be rated as “very attractive” too. In contrast, those who were friends first had an average correlation of just 0.18. Tellingly, the researchers found that the longer the members of a couple had known each other before becoming lovers, the lower was the strength of the correlation.

她和同事们发现在初次江面就发展为恋人关系的情况下，这对恋人的魅力值呈现0.46的相关性（相关性的最大值为1）。也就是说，如果一对恋人中男性「很有魅力」，那么女子也非常有可能「很有魅力」。相反，如果一对恋人之前是朋友，那么他们的魅力值只有0.18的相关性。明显地，研究人员发现在成为恋人之前彼此认识的时间越长，彼此的魅力值相关性就越低。 

第三部分精析

So a period of pre-romantic friendship can indeed erode beauty’s pulling power. But why? One explanation Ms Hunt proposes is that friendship gives potential mates time to assess subtler attributes, such as intelligence and dependability, as well as the more obvious signal of outward beauty. Given the huge commitment, by both sexes, involved in raising children, such a strategy of long-term assessment is likely to have evolution on its side.

That does, though, raise questions. One is, why does love at first sight persist? Another is, if beauty is, in an evolutionary sense, tradable for good parenting skills, what does that have to say about the parenting skills of beautiful couples? 

我们的精析省略了实验部分，实验研究了相貌高低对恋爱关系的影响。具体来说，长得好看的两个人，如果之前是朋友，那么他们成为恋人的可能性就会降低。第二部分实际是对这个实验结果的解析。 

So a period of pre-romantic friendship can indeed erode beauty’s pulling power. But why? One explanation Ms Hunt proposes is that friendship gives potential mates time to assess subtler attributes, such as intelligence and dependability, as well as the more obvious signal of outward beauty. Given the huge commitment, by both sexes, involved in raising children, such a strategy of long-term assessment is likely to have evolution on its side. 

精选词

pre-romantic; erode; pulling power; mates time

pre-是一个前缀（prefix），意思是「……之前的」，比如preschool学龄前的，prehistory史前的…… 于此相反的前缀是post-，例如postwar战后的，postgraduate大学毕业后的……这里pre-romantic就是指「恋爱前的」，那么pre-romantic friendship就是指「恋爱前的朋友状态」。

我们不妨注意一个非常有意思的地方，这同时也是很多人觉得的英语难点。这就是汉语善用动词，英语善用名词的思维差异。pre-romantic friendship一个简单的名词短语，如果将其翻译为中文，就变成了「确立恋爱关系前，两人是朋友」，其中有两个动词「确立」和「是」。试想一下，如果我们是从中文向英语描述，大部分同学一定会将这个意思用一个条件状语来表达，但名词化以后，中文里的动词借由英语的名词就表达了，这些地方都是精读时需要细细品味的地方。 

erode，pulling power这两个词用的都很形象。erode是腐蚀的意思，pulling power中的pull是「拉」，当你面对一个男神/女神的时候，是不是常常不能控制，似乎被某种力量（power）拉（pull）过去了呢？erode beauty’s pulling power意思是，在恋爱关系中，外表本来起着非常重要的作用，但之前友谊的存在使得外表的因素大打折扣。  

mates time

mate做动词时是交配的意思，当然一般指动物之间的交配，是不及物动词，后面一般跟with。例如It is quite common for male birds to mate with several females. 雄鸟和多只雌鸟交配很正常。

mates time中的mate是「同伴」的意思，即somebody you do an activities with，其实就是朋友的意思。

在口语里，这个词也做男人之间的称呼，比如以前我在国外上班的时候，男性同事之间就用mate来招呼，例如下班的时候同事会说 Goodbye,mate! 

One explanation Ms Hunt proposes is that friendship gives potential mates time to assess subtler attributes, such as intelligence and dependability, as well as the more obvious signal of outward beauty.

这里为such as 正一下名，在句中，such as的意思是「例如」，并不是「就是……」。也就是说，后面的内容常常不是全部，在本句中，intelligence和dependdability是subtler attributes的两个例子，但不是全部。

这个句子如何理解呢？as well as并不是「and」的意思，而是「not only……but also……」的意思。pre-romantic friendship不但给双方更多的时间了解外貌（outward beauty）这个更显而易见的特性（more obvious signal），还让他们了解诸如智力和依赖性这些细微的品性（subtler attributes）。

Given the huge commitment, by both sexes, involved in raising children, such a strategy of long-term assessment is likely to have evolution on its side.

由于婚姻和抚养孩子需要极大的投入，这种以友谊的方式对双方的观察了解从进化论（evolution）的角度来看也是有积极的意义的。从种族发展的角度而言，这种机制有助于双方增进了解，使得更加聪明，独立，值得信任的人成为夫妻，进入婚姻，而不仅仅是因为长相。这样有助于婚姻的长久，保证种族的延续，这是从进化论的角度来分析实验结果。 

That does, though, raise questions. One is, why does love at first sight persist? Another is, if beauty is, in an evolutionary sense, tradable for good parenting skills, what does that have to say about the parenting skills of beautiful couples?

That does, though, raise questions.

上面的结论虽然站得住脚，但是也带来了问题。第一个就是为什么还存在「一见钟情」love at first sight。因为，既然充分的了解对方在进化论上很重要的话，就不应该有love at first sight存在的呀？当前的实验结论无法解释这一点。注意，love at first sight是一个固定用法，请记住。

Another is, if beauty is, in an evolutionary sense, tradable for good parenting skills, what does that have to say about the parenting skills of beautiful couples?

如何理解这句话呢？

tradable是可交换的，可以买卖的，如果外表和抚养孩子的能力可以「买卖」，那么怎么解释那些长得美同时又擅长养孩子的人的存在呢？这句话是不是很绕，翻译过来了是不是也很难理解？实际上，tradable的意思是，进化论会让「长得好的人」和「善于抚养孩子的人」结合。这里隐含的意思是，长得好的人不擅长抚养孩子，擅长抚养孩子的人长相一般。那么，这就无法解释为什么有些人又漂亮，又擅长抚养孩子？同样地，这也无法解释为什么有些人相貌平平但是也不擅长养孩子（作者心善，没有写出来伤害读者的心）？ 

参考译文

So a period of pre-romantic friendship can indeed erode beauty’s pulling power. But why? One explanation Ms Hunt proposes is that friendship gives potential mates time to assess subtler attributes, such as intelligence and dependability, as well as the more obvious signal of outward beauty. Given the huge commitment, by both sexes, involved in raising children, such a strategy of long-term assessment is likely to have evolution on its side.

所以，在确立恋爱前是朋友，外表所产生的魅力就会大打折扣。为什么呢？亨特给出的一种解释是朋友关系不但给双方更多的时间了解外貌这个更显而易见的特性外，还让他们了解诸如智力和依赖性这些细微的品性。考虑到抚养孩子所需的极大投入，从进化论角度来着这种长时间的观察了解也是很有必要的。

That does, though, raise questions. One is, why does love at first sight persist? Another is, if beauty is, in an evolutionary sense, tradable for good parenting skills, what does that have to say about the parenting skills of beautiful couples?

然而，这也带来了一些别的疑问。第一是为什么还会有「一见钟情」存在？另外一个是从进化论角度上来看，如果外貌可以和抚养孩子的能力交换，那么如何解释长得好看同时又擅长抚养孩子的人的存在呢？ 

完

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