Non-auditory effects of noise

噪音的非聽(tīng)覺(jué)效應(yīng)

Many people in industry and the Services, who have practical experience of noise, regard any investigation of this question as a waste of time; they are not prepared even to admit the possibility that noise affects people. On the other hand, those who dislike noise will sometimes use most inadequate evidence to support their pleas for a quieter society. This is a pity, because noise abatement really is a good cause. and it is likely to be discredited if it gets to be associated with bad science. One allegation often made is that noise produces mental illness. A recent article in a weekly newspaper, for instance, was headed with a striking illustration of a lady in a state of considerable distress, with the caption 'She was yet another victim, reduced to a screaming wreck '. On turning eagerly to the text, one learns that the lady was a typist who found the sound of office typewriters worried her more and more until eventually she had to go into a mental hospital. Now the snag in this sort of anecdote is of course that one cannot distinguish cause and effect. Was the noise a cause of the illness, or were the complaints about noise merely a symptom? Another patient might equally well complain that her neighbours were combining to slander her and persecute her, and yet one might be cautious about believing this statement.

What is needed in the case of noise is a study of large numbers of people living under noisy conditions, to discover whether they are mentally ill more often than other people are. Some time ago the United States Navy, for instance, examined a very large number of men working on aircraft carriers: the study was known as Project Anehin. It can be unpleasant to live even several miles from an aerodrome; if you think what it must be like to share the deck of a ship with several squadrons of jet aircraft, you will realize that a modern navy is a good place to study noise. But neither psychiatric interviews nor objective tests were able to show any effects upon these American sailors. This result merely confirms earlier American and British studies: if there is any effect of noise upon mental health it must be so small that present methods of psychiatric diagnosis cannot find it. That does not prove that it does not exist; but it does mean that noise is less dangerous than, say, being brought up in an orphanage -- which really is a mental health hazard.

本文參考譯文

在工業(yè)部門工作和在軍隊(duì)中服役的許多人對(duì)噪聲音有切身的體會(huì)，他們認(rèn)為對(duì)這個(gè)問(wèn)題進(jìn)行調(diào)查中浪費(fèi)時(shí)間，甚至不愿承認(rèn)噪音可能對(duì)人有影響。另一方面，那些討厭噪音的人有時(shí)會(huì)用不充分的證據(jù)來(lái)支持他們希望有一個(gè)較為安靜的社會(huì)環(huán)境的要求。要求減少噪音是件好事，但是如果與拙劣的科學(xué)摻雜在一起的話，就不會(huì)被人們所信任，這是很遺憾的。

常見(jiàn)的一種指責(zé)是，噪音能引起精神病。例如，最近一家周報(bào)刊登了一篇文章，文章上方有一幅引人注目的插圖，是一位表情沮喪的女子。圖的文字說(shuō)明：“她是又一個(gè)受害者，成了只會(huì)尖叫的可憐蟲(chóng)。”當(dāng)人們急切地看完正文后，便知道這女子是個(gè)打字員，辦公室打字機(jī)的聲音使她越來(lái)越煩，最終住進(jìn)了精神病醫(yī)院。這類奇聞的疑難之處是無(wú)法區(qū)別因果關(guān)系。是噪音引起了(精神)病呢，還是(精神)病的癥狀之一是對(duì)噪音的抱怨?另有一位病人可能同樣有理由抱怨說(shuō)，她的鄰居們正在聯(lián)合起來(lái)對(duì)她進(jìn)行誹謗和迫害，不過(guò)，人們不會(huì)輕信她的抱怨。

對(duì)于噪音問(wèn)題，需要對(duì)大量生活在噪音中的人進(jìn)行研究，看一看他們是否比其他人更易患精神病。例如，美國(guó)海軍前些時(shí)候調(diào)查了許多在航空母航上工作的人，這次調(diào)查被稱之為：“安內(nèi)英工程”。即使住在離機(jī)場(chǎng)幾英里以外的地方，機(jī)場(chǎng)的噪音也會(huì)使人難受。因此，如果你能想像出和幾個(gè)中隊(duì)的噴氣機(jī)同在一個(gè)甲板上是什么滋味兒的話，你就會(huì)認(rèn)識(shí)到現(xiàn)代海軍是研究噪音的好地方。但是，不管進(jìn)行精神病學(xué)的調(diào)查訪問(wèn)，還是進(jìn)行客觀的測(cè)試，都不能顯示噪音對(duì)這些美國(guó)水兵有任何影響。這個(gè)結(jié)果只不過(guò)證實(shí)了美國(guó)和英國(guó)早些時(shí)候的研究結(jié)論：如果噪音對(duì)精神健康有影響的話，那也一定是微乎其微，以致現(xiàn)代的精神病診斷方法還發(fā)現(xiàn)不了。這并不是證實(shí)不存在噪音對(duì)健康的影響。但它確實(shí)說(shuō)明，噪音的危險(xiǎn)性 -- 比如說(shuō) -- 比在孤兒院長(zhǎng)大所受的危害要小一些，孤兒院才是真正危害精神健康的地方。

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