英语听力文摘 English Digest 80、手势的作用

　　Communicating by voice alone has its drawbacks, though.For example, I can’t use hand gestures to clarify what I mean. And, as it turns out, that makes a big difference. Researchers at the University of Otago in New Zealand wanted to know how much a relevant hand gesture helps to communicate an idea. They had volunteers watch video clips of a woman saying different phrases, such as “the square box,” or “peel the banana.”
In some, she simply said the phrase without moving her hands. Peel the banana. In others, she made the kind of hand gesture most of us would make when saying that–a sort of banana-peeling mime¹ that matches the content of the phrase. In a third group, she made gestures with her hands that were unrelated to what she was saying.
The results? People who got the matching content hand gestures remembered those phrases more effectively than folks who got just the words alone. And folks who got just the words alone did better than folks who got irrelevant² hand gestures!
What does this show us? We already knew that all the hand-waving we do when we speak isn’t just nervous energy; it serves various functions. Apparently³, one of them is to help the listener remember what you’ve said.
drawback:缺点
peel:剥，削
matching:对应的
irrelevant:不相关的

1 mime   

n.指手画脚，做手势，哑剧演员，哑剧；vi./vt.指手画脚的表演，用哑剧的形式表演

参考例句：

• Several French mime artists will give some lectures this afternoon.几位法国哑剧表演艺术家将在今天下午做几场讲座。
• I couldn't speak Chinese,but I showed in mime that I wanted a drink.我不会讲汉语，但我作摹拟动作表示要一杯饮料。

2 irrelevant   

adj.不恰当的，无关系的，不相干的

参考例句：

• That is completely irrelevant to the subject under discussion.这跟讨论的主题完全不相关。
• A question about arithmetic is irrelevant in a music lesson.在音乐课上，一个数学的问题是风马牛不相及的。

3 apparently   

adv.显然地；表面上，似乎

参考例句：

• An apparently blind alley leads suddenly into an open space.山穷水尽，豁然开朗。
• He was apparently much surprised at the news.他对那个消息显然感到十分惊异。