研究：听伤感音乐可以减轻疼痛

新研究发现，听喜爱的音乐能够降低人们的疼痛感，尤其是那些苦涩又甜美的动人歌曲。

There is no doubt that music can soothe the soul for some, and it turns out that it could also be a temporary soother for physical pain.

毫无疑问，音乐可以安抚某些人的灵魂，但事实证明，音乐也可以暂时缓解身体的疼痛。

Listening to favorite songs could reduce people’s perception of pain, according to a new study published in the journal Frontiers in Pain Research. And the most effective pain relievers were found to be sad songs detailing bittersweet and emotional experiences.

发表在《疼痛研究前沿》期刊上的一项新研究称，听喜爱的音乐能够降低人们的疼痛感。研究发现，缓解疼痛最有效的是讲述苦乐参半的感性经历的悲伤歌曲。

The small study invited 63 young adults to bring two of their favorite songs, and the only requirement was that they needed to be at least 3 minutes and 20 seconds long. One selection represented their favorite music of all time, and the other was the song they would bring with them on a desert island. The researchers also had the young adults pick one of seven songs that the team considered relaxing and were unfamiliar to the study participants.

这项小型研究邀请了63名年轻成人各选两首自己最喜爱的歌曲，唯一的要求是歌曲必须至少长达3分钟20秒。其中一首歌是他们一直以来最爱听的歌曲，另一首歌是他们会带到荒岛上听的歌曲。研究人员还让这些年轻人从7首歌中挑出一首歌曲，这7首歌是研究团队认为能让人放松而且参与者不熟悉的歌曲。

Each person underwent 7-minute blocks where they were instructed to stare at a monitor screen while listening to their favorite music, one of the seven relaxing instrumental songs (each of which lasted for 6 minutes and 40 seconds), or a scrambled version of both songs and the relaxing song chosen. The scrambled music was a noisy jumble of all three songs, cut into fragments and randomly shuffled so that they lacked their original structure. One 7-minute block had people sitting in silence. All the while, the researchers stuck a hot object — similar to the pain of a boiling hot teacup on your skin — to the participants’ left inner forearms.

研究人员让每个人在7分钟时间内一边盯着监控屏幕，一边听自己最喜爱的歌曲，或7首舒缓的器乐曲中的一首（每首曲子长6分钟40秒），或他们喜爱的两首歌曲和研究人员选的舒缓乐曲剪切成小段后打乱顺序随机混合成的版本。混合版本已经完全听不出原歌的曲调。还有一个对照组是安静地坐着度过7分钟的。与此同时，研究人员将一个灼热的物体放在参与者的左前臂内侧，痛感相当于用一个滚烫的茶杯接触皮肤。

When rating their experiences, people were more likely to report feeling less pain when listening to their favorite songs compared with hearing the unfamiliar relaxing song or silence. The scrambled songs did not reduce pain either, which the authors suggested was evidence of music being more than a distraction from an unpleasant experience.

在给自己的体验评级时，相比那些听自己不熟悉的舒缓歌曲或没有听歌的人，听自己喜爱的歌曲的人报告的痛感更低。听混合歌曲也不能降低痛感，研究作者指出，这一证据说明音乐起到的作用不仅仅是分散人们对不愉快体验的注意力。

After interviewing the participants about the song they brought and their rating of pain, the researchers found people who listened to bittersweet and moving songs felt less pain than when they listened to songs with calming or cheerful themes.

研究人员通过访谈了解参与者带来的歌曲以及他们的痛感评级后发现，听苦乐参半、打动人心的歌曲的参与者比那些听舒缓或欢快歌曲的人感受到的疼痛更少。

People who listened to bittersweet songs also reported more chills — the thrill and shivers you get on your skin from listening to pleasurable music. This sensation was associated with lower ratings of unpleasantness elicited by the burning pain they felt in the experiment.

听苦乐参半歌曲的人也报告称自己会有一种凉丝丝的颤栗感，那种听到悦耳歌曲时皮肤上会起疙瘩的感觉。这种感受和他们在实验中对灼痛感的评级更低有关。

"When people are listening to music they enjoy, by our measurements it can reduce the pain that we’re feeling by 10%,” said Patrick Stroman, a professor of biomedical and molecular sciences at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario.

加拿大安大略省金斯顿市皇后大学生物医学和分子科学系教授帕特里克·斯特罗曼指出：“根据我们的测量，人们听喜欢的音乐可以将痛感降低10%。”