如何讓你的另一半也動起來

Spouses influence each other’s exercise habits, for better and worse, more than is often recognized, according to an interesting new study of the workout habits of middle-aged couples. The study found that changes in one spouse’s routine tend to be echoed in the other’s, highlighting the extent to which our exercise behavior is shaped not just by our personal intentions but by the people around us as well.
一項有趣的新研究在考察了中年夫婦的鍛鍊習慣後提出，配偶可以影響彼此的運動習慣，這種影響有好有壞，且其程度往往超出了人們的預計。該研究發現，夫妻中任何一方生活日程的改變往往是與對方相呼應的，這表明，我們的鍛鍊行爲不僅僅出自個人的意願，我們周圍的人對此也功不可沒。

In studying why people opt to exercise or not, scientists often and understandably focus on individual psychology and situations. But increasingly, exercise scientists are also looking into broader factors that can have a bearing, including our social relationships and whether being single, married, childless or employed is likely to affect exercise behavior.
在探討是什麼原因促使人們選擇進行鍛鍊（或不鍛鍊）時，科學家們經常理所當然地側重於研究個人的心理和身體狀況。現在，有越來越多的運動科學家將更廣泛的因素納入考慮，例如，他們開始調查社會關係以及單身、已婚、無子女或就業等狀態是否可能影響到人們的鍛鍊行爲。

The results of past studies on this subject have been alternately predictable and startling. Single men and women, for instance, generally exercise far more than do married people, although divorce can change that. Men typically exercise more after a marriage ends; women in that situation frequently exercise less. Meanwhile, employed men, even those with desk jobs, usually exercise more than men who are unemployed.
關於這一問題，以前也進行過一些研究，其結果有的在意料之中，也有的令人震驚。例如，單身男女的運動量通常會遠多於已婚男女，但離婚後這種狀況會有所改變。在結束一段婚姻之後，男性一般會加大運動量，女性則往往相反。另一方面，在職的男性，即使他們從事的是文書工作，一般也會比失業的男性更多地從事體育運動。

Parenthood, though, has the greatest downward pull on planned exercise time. In a number of studies in recent years, scientists have found that mothers of even one child exercise considerably less than do the childless, although, perhaps not surprisingly, they often complete more light activity, which would include cooking, cleaning and scrambling after streaking toddlers, than do the childless. Meanwhile, fathers of a single child often exercise as much as they did before becoming a parent, but fathers of more than one child experience a large and rapid decline in their formal exercise time.
爲人父母是讓計劃好的運動時間大大縮水的最強力因素。在近年來的一些研究中，科學家們發現，與無子女的女性相比，哪怕成爲一個孩子的母親也會讓她們的運動時間大爲減少，但是她們完成的輕度活動，如烹飪、打掃衛生以及追在蹣跚學步的孩子後面跑等等行爲要比沒有孩子的女性多——這倒也不足爲奇。而獨生孩子的父親的運動量與成爲父親前沒什麼兩樣，不過一旦孩子的數量超過兩個，他們正正經經地做運動的時間就會迅速地大幅下降。

There has been surprisingly little examination, however, of how marriage affects exercise in the years after a couple’s children have grown, and especially whether and how changes in one spouse’s exercise routine at that point affect the other spouse.
然而，關於子女長大多年以後婚姻會如何影響夫妻兩人的運動情況，尤其是此時其中一方的運動習慣的改變能否以及將如何影響配偶，研究卻少得驚人。

So, for the new study, which was presented this month at a scientific meeting of the American Heart Association in Baltimore, researchers from Johns Hopkins University and other institutions turned to data from the large-scale Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities Study, which includes answers to health-related questionnaires from thousands of middle-aged American adults. Most of the participants answered the questionnaires multiple times, beginning in the late 1980s.
本月初在巴爾的摩舉行的美國心臟協會(American Heart Association)科學會議上發表的一項新研究中，約翰斯·霍普金斯大學(Johns Hopkins University)和其他機構的研究人員參考了大規模的“社區動脈粥樣硬化風險研究(Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities Study)”中的數據，包括數以千計的美國中年人填寫的健康相關問卷。大多數參與者從20世紀80年代末起，多次回答過這些調查問卷。

The researchers looked for data related to exercise from 3,261 healthy, middle-aged, married couples with an average age of about 55, each of whom had filled out the questionnaires at least twice, with about six years between their answers.
研究人員分析了3261名健康的中年已婚夫婦的運動相關數據，他們的平均年齡爲55歲，每人都至少填過兩次問卷，且填寫問卷的時間間隔約爲六年。

As a benchmark, the researchers focused on whether, according to their first questionnaire, each husband or wife had met the standard recommendation for exercise to improve health, which amounts to 30 minutes of moderate exercise at least five times a week. (These married couples consisted of a man and a woman.)
研究人員們考察了每一位丈夫或妻子在填寫第一份問卷時是否達到了促進健康的建議標準運動量（即每週進行至少五次中等強度的鍛鍊），並以此作爲研究基準。（上述的已婚夫婦均由一名男性和一名女性構成。）

Then the scientists determined whether either of the middle-aged spouses had altered his or her exercise habits between questionnaires, and whether the couple’s exercise routines had converged or grown more different during those years.
然後，科學家們探討了這些中年夫婦在後來填寫問卷時，他或她的運動習慣是否發生了改變，以及在此期間，夫妻雙方的運動習慣是更加接近了還是差異更大了。

What they found was that the older couples’ exercise routines tended to become strikingly similar at this point in their lives.
他們發現，到了人生的這個階段，中年夫婦的運動習慣往往變得驚人地相似。

If a woman met the standard recommendation for exercise during her first questionnaire and her husband did not, he was 70 percent more likely to be meeting those recommendations six years later than were men whose spouses did not exercise much, so long as the woman was still exercising regularly.
如果妻子在第一次問卷調查時達到了建議的標準運動量，而她的丈夫反之，那麼，只要妻子還在定期鍛鍊，其丈夫在六年後達到上述建議運動量的可能性比妻子運動不足的那些丈夫們要高出70%。

Similarly, if a husband met the recommendations during his first questionnaire and his wife did not, she was about 40 percent more likely to be meeting those recommendations a few years later than were women whose husbands were and remained sedentary.
同樣，如果丈夫在第一次問卷調查時達到了建議的標準運動量而妻子反之，那麼妻子在幾年後達到建議運動量的可能性要比丈夫習慣久坐的妻子們高出40%。

Less encouraging, if one spouse eased off or eschewed exercise during the years between questionnaires, his or her spouse usually followed suit.
令人遺憾的是，如果在這些年期間，配偶中一方運動熱情減退或者開始逃避鍛鍊，另一方通常也會效尤。

The implication, says Laura Cobb, a graduate student at Johns Hopkins who led the study, is that “spouses can play an outsized role” in exercise behavior during middle age.
該研究的負責人，約翰斯·霍普金斯大學的研究生勞拉·科布(Laura Cobb)說：這意味着中年“夫婦可對對方的鍛鍊行爲造成巨大的影響”。

Of course, the study relies on self-reported, prospective information, she says, and so “can’t prove” that one spouse’s exercise habits directly affect the other’s. “It’s equally possible,” she says, “that other shared lifestyle factors,” such as retirement or a move to a new neighborhood, could be influential. (The scientists controlled for health problems by not including couples if one spouse had or developed a major disease.)
當然，由於這項研究依賴於參與者自我報告的前瞻性信息，因此它“不能證明”配偶中一方的運動習慣可以直接影響到另一方，她說。“夫妻雙方共享的其他生活方式因素，”如退休或遷居到新的社區，同樣可能有一定作用。（科學家排除了一方曾罹患或現存在重大疾病的夫婦，從而對參與者的健康問題進行了校正。）

But the neat alignment between one middle-aged spouse’s workouts and, after a few years, the other’s does suggest, Ms. Cobb says, that to inspire your spouse to work out more, you should probably begin by ramping up your own routine. And if you hope to maintain that regimen into the future, nudge a sedentary spouse to join you. Otherwise it can be sorely tempting to settle onto the couch yourself.
但科布女士認爲，幾年之內中年夫婦的運動習慣就齊刷刷地趨於一致，這一發現表明，如果你想要激勵你的另一半多多鍛鍊，那麼很可能需要從增加你自己的日常運動量開始。而且，如果你希望以後也能將這樣的運動習慣保持下去，就鼓動你那個喜歡久坐的配偶來陪你吧。不然的話，搞不好你會拒絕不了像他一樣窩在沙發上的誘惑呢。