Just watching another person shiver can cause our own temperature to drop, scientists have found.

科学家发现，看着别人发抖，我们自己的体温也会下降。

Volunteers who viewed videos of actors plunging¹ their hands into ice-cold water, experienced a simultaneous drop in the temperature of their own hands.

当视频中的演员将手放入冰冷的水中时，观看视频的志愿者们自己的手部温度也会同时下降。

Neuroscientist Neil Harrison, from the University of Sussex said: ‘We believe that this mimicry² of people’s bodily response helps us understand how they are feeling.

苏塞克斯大学（The University of Sussex）的神经系统科学家尼尔·哈里森（Neil Harrison）说，“我们认为这种人体反应的模拟行为可以帮助我们理解他人的感受。

Humans are profoundly social creatures and much of humans’ success results from our ability to work together in complex communities – this would be hard to do if we were not able to rapidly empathise with each other and predict one another’s thoughts, feelings and motivations.’

“人类是极度社会化的生物，我们所获得的很多成功都来源于在复杂社会中的相互合作，如果无法快速理解他人的感受或是预测他人的想法、感受和动机，我们将难以合作。”

It’s believed that ‘mirror neurons’ in the brain are behind the phenomenon.

科学家认为，这种现象的背后是大脑中的“镜像神经元”在起作用。

Dr Harrison explained: ‘Mirror neurons found in very specific parts of the brain are known to fire when we perform an action or observe a similar action in others – it has been proposed that more general mirror properties may also exist across many other brain areas.'

哈里森博士解释道，“仅在大脑特定部分存在的镜像神经元在我们完成一个动作或是观察到他人做出相似动作时会发挥作用，有人提出，大脑其他区域可能存在更多的镜像特质。”

And the more naturally empathetic the person, the more likely they are to mimic³ another person’s responses, he added.

他补充道，“一个人越容易与他人产生同感，就越有可能模仿他人的反应。”

For the study, which was published in the Plos One journal, researchers asked 36 participants to watch eight videos that showed actors with one of their hands in visibly warm or cold water.

这一研究刊登于公共科学图书馆期刊（The Plos One journal），研究者让36名参加者观看八段视频，视频中演员将一只手放入明显温暖或是冰冷的水中。

In the four 'warm' videos, the first 40 seconds showed the actor gradually adding hot water from a steaming kettle into the container, checking the temperature of the water every few seconds.

在其中四段关于热水的视频中，前40秒，演员将冒气的水壶里的热水逐渐加入容器中，并每隔几秒检查一下水温。

The actor was then shown with their hand immersed in the water for a further two minutes and 20 seconds.

之后，演员的手完全浸入水中，持续两分钟20秒。

The actor did the same in the 'cold' videos, but instead, filled the container with a bag of ice.

在另外四段关于冷水的视频中演员做同样的动作，但容器中加入了一袋冰。

Four control videos with the actors’ hand in front of a tank of room temperature water were also shown.

同时还有四段对照视频，演员的手放在装有与室温相同温度的水的容器前。

None of the actors’ faces could be seen and the temperature of the room was kept at a constant 21°C (70°F).

镜头里看不到演员的脸，室温保持在21摄氏度（70华氏度)。

The researchers monitored the participants’ hand temperature while the watched the videos.

研究人员监控了参与者观看视频时的手部温度。

They found that when they viewed the actors putting their hands in the iced water, their temperatures dropped by a small, but statistically⁴ significant, amount: 0.2°in their left hands, and 0.05°in their right.

他们发现，当参与者看到演员将手放入冰水时手部温度会有小幅度下降，幅度虽小，但在统计数据上很显著。左手温度下降了0.2摄氏度右手温度下降了0.05摄氏度。

There was no significant change in their hand temperature when they watched the control videos and the warm water videos.

观看对照视频和温水视频时，参与者的手部温度没有明显变化。

Dr Harrison said: ‘Though we didn’t see a significant change in participants’ own hand temperature when they viewed the warm videos, we think that this is probably because the warm videos were less potent⁵.

哈里森博士说：“尽管我们并未发现参与者在观看温水视频时自己的手部温度有明显变化，我们相信这可能是因为温水视频效果不够明显。

'The only cues that the water was warm was steam at the beginning of the videos and the pink colour of the actor’s hand, whereas blocks of ice were clearly visible throughout the duration of the cold video.

“判断水是温的仅有线索是视频开始时的蒸汽和演员手部红润的颜色，而在冷水视频中，我们始终能明显地看到冰块。

‘There is also some evidence to suggest that people may be more sensitive to others appearing cold than hot. Why this may be the case is currently unclear.’

“这在一定程度上也可以证明，比起别人觉得热这件事，人们对别人觉得冷更为敏感，关于这一点的原因，目前还太不清楚。”