雙語閱讀：你還在辦公桌前吃午餐嗎

摘要：越來越多的美國人都在辦公桌前吃午餐，或更有甚者乾脆就不吃了。放棄適當的午間休息對一個人的健康有害嗎?田納西大學查特努加分校(University of Tennessee at Chattanooga)工業組織心理學與職業健康心理學教授克里斯·康寧漢(Chris Cunningham)就此表達了自己的一番看法。

More Americans are eating lunch at their desks or even forgoing it altogether. Is passing up a proper midday break bad for one's health? Chris Cunningham, professor of Industrial-Organizational and Occupational Health Psychology at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, offers one view.

如今，越來越多的美國人都在辦公桌前吃午餐，或更有甚者乾脆就不吃了。放棄適當的午間休息對一個人的健康有害嗎?田納西大學查特努加分校(University of Tennessee at Chattanooga)工業組織心理學與職業健康心理學教授克里斯·康寧漢(Chris Cunningham)就此表達了自己的一番看法。

　　Brain Drain

腦力枯竭

The attention it takes people to focus at work drains them of psychological, social and material reserves, says Dr. Cunningham, leading to stress and lower productivity. 'Taking a lunch break away from the desk lets people separate themselves from the source of that drain,' he says. 'And that offers the opportunity to build back some of those resources in the middle of the day -- rather than just at the end when work is over.'

康寧漢說，工作要求人們集中注意力，這使得其心理、社交及物質層面的能量精力消耗枯竭，而這一切又會導致壓力的產生並降低勞動者的生產力。他說：“從辦公桌邊抽身離去進行午間休息能讓人們遠離腦力枯竭的根源。這還會爲你提供在晌午時分——而不是等到一天工作結束之際——恢復大腦活力、重整精氣神的機會。”

There is no hard data on how much of a break the body needs to fully recover its resources, says Dr. Cunningham. He believes it's person-specific; some might need 10 minutes, while others might need an hour.

康寧漢說，對於人體到底需要休息多久才能完全恢復腦力，目前尚無確鑿的數據。他認爲，這完全是因人而異。有些人可能只需歇上10分鐘，而另一些人則可能需要調整一個小時。

你還在辦公桌前吃午餐嗎

　　Gravitate to Green

投入大自然的懷抱

With so much research showing that parking in a chair all day puts a drag on productivity, mood and physical health, Dr. Cunningham suggests ditching the desk at least once at midday to do something energizing: 'At least go for a walk down the hall.' If possible, he says, use the full break to switch focus to something uplifting -- instead of, say, online shopping, reading email or running to the bank. 'I wouldn't call that a resource-replenishing moment,' he says.

諸多研究表明，整天黏坐在椅子上會對生產效率、勞動者的情緒以及身體健康形成拖累。康寧漢建議，午間時分至少離開辦公桌一次去做點兒提神醒腦的事情：“起碼要走到大廳盡頭散散步。”如果可能的話，他說，利用整個休息時段將注意力轉移到一些振奮人心的事情上——而不是，比如說，到網上購物，收讀電子郵件或奔到銀行辦事。“我不會將它們稱爲養精蓄銳、給大腦充電的時刻”，他補充說。

Dr. Cunningham cites psychologist William James's 19th-century concept of passive attention, which suggests that people can restock their inner resources by focusing on something that fascinates them and draws them in, seemingly without effort.

康漢寧還引用了心理學家威廉·詹姆斯(William James)在19世紀提出的被動注意的概念。被動注意是指人們能夠通過關注讓他們着迷、吸引他們的事物來給自身內在能量充電，這一舉動看起來毫不費力。

The easiest way to replenish, research shows: Interact with nature. 'Just changing your environment relieves you of the need to decide what you want to attend to, and that in itself poses a sort of relief,' says Dr. Cunningham.

研究表明，充注精力最簡便的方法就是：與大自然互動。康漢寧說：“只要換一換你的環境就能緩解你的這一需求——即決定你想要關注的事物的需求，而這種調整本身就是一種放鬆。”

　　A Buddy Boost

聯絡同事感情，提高人緣

Studies have also shown that connecting to colleagues socially throughout the day can be very energizing.

諸多研究也已表明，在一天中與同事們聯絡聯絡感情也特別能提神醒腦。

'If you're a service rep or a call-center employee, I could understand why you wouldn't want to take a social lunch,' says Dr. Cunningham, 'but for some of us, it's different enough from what we've been spending our day doing, and we get a lot out of it.'

康漢寧說：“如果你是一位客服代表或是呼叫中心的一名僱員，我能理解你爲什麼不願參加社交午餐。但對於我們當中的另一些人，與同事一起吃頓飯，這與大家日間從事的工作內容完全不同，況且我們還能從中受益良多。”

He is a fan of going out with co-workers for lunch frequently -- and not talking about work. 'That is a resource-replenishing activity,' he says.

康漢寧自己就經常和同事一起出去吃午餐——而且飯桌上不談公事，他對此頗爲熱衷。他說：“這就是一種重整精氣神、恢復腦力的活動。”

The only downside: 'You can't write that lunch off your taxes.'

唯一的弊端是：“這頓午餐，公司不會給你報銷，你得自己掏錢。”

　　Enjoy Eating

享用美食

In a recent exploratory study, Dr. Cunningham asked medical residents to rate the degree to which they found each of their daily activities to be stressful, resource-straining and resource-replenishing. 'Eating during work hours was the one activity that was rated only as replenishing, and tremendously valuable to them,' he says.

在最近的一次調研中，康漢寧讓住院醫師給他們自己的每一項日常活動從三個層面打分，看看哪些活動會讓他們覺得壓力重重，哪些活動使人耗神費力，又有哪些活動能讓人恢復能量、精神倍增。他稱：“在工作時段進食是僅有的一項被評爲能給人充注能量且沒有被貼上其他標籤的活動，而且這一活動對他們而言意義重大。”

Nutritionists have long asserted that eating small amounts throughout the day helps maintain a level metabolism. And most people have experienced the sluggishness that follows a heavy midday meal.

營養學家長期以來都稱，一整天少吃點有助於維持新陳代謝的水平。而大多數人都經歷過在午間飽餐一頓後的慵懶懈怠感。

'It's certainly not advised to have a Thanksgiving feast for lunch,' says Dr. Cunningham. 'Then again, you should give yourself a chance to be fascinated with the world around you -- and enjoying your food can do that.'

康漢寧說：“當然了，並不建議大家像享用感恩節饕餮大餐那樣敞開肚皮吃午飯。但容我再說一遍，你應該給自己一個欣賞周邊世界的機會——而享用美食能爲你提供這樣一個機會。”