If you find yourself unable to go more than 15 minutes without reaching into your pocket, pulling out your smartphone and checking your e-mail or micro blog, don’t freak out. You are hardly alone.
如果你发现自己无法自控，每隔不到十五分钟就想把手伸入口袋，拿出手机查看电邮或微博，别担心，这种状况并非只出现在你一人身上。
A recent survey in the scientific journal Personal and *UbiquitousComputing shows that smartphone users have developed what the researchers call “checking habit” – repetitive checks of e-mail and other applications.
科学期刊《个人或普适计算》最近最新调查结果表明，智能手机用户已染上反复用手机查看电邮和其他应用程序的习惯，研究人员称之为“查收习惯”。
The checks typically lasted less than 30 seconds and were often done within 10 minutes of each other.
这种检查举动通常持续不到三十秒，但常常每十分钟就会进行一次。
On average, the study subjects check their phones 34 times a day. And the freaky part is that they don’t even realize they are doing it.
在该研究中，被调查者平均每天检查手机34次。令人惊讶的是，他们经常没有意识到他们的行为。
“I hadn’t told my hand to reach out for the phone. It seemed to be doing it all on its own,” wrote Elizabeth Cohen, a medical correspondent for CNN who watched her right hand sneaking away from her side to grab her phone sitting on the table at dinner with friends.
美国有线电视新闻网医学记者伊丽莎白？？科恩在与朋友聚餐时看到自己的右手离开身边滑向了桌上的手机，她说，“我并没有要伸手去拿手机，似乎它自己就这么做了。”
Loren Frank, a neuroscientist at the University of California, San Francisco （UCSF）， explains that checking smartphones is rewarding in some way.
来自加利福尼亚大学旧金山分校的神经学者罗仁？？弗兰克解释道，在某种程度上，检查手机是有好处的。
“Each time you get an e-mail, it’s a small jolt, a positive feedback that you’re an important person,” Frank told CNN.
弗兰克在接受CNN记者采访时表示：“每次你收到一封邮件都会小兴奋一下，这个积极的反馈证明你是个受重视的人。”
Once the brain becomes accustomed to this positive feedback, reaching out for the phone becomes an automatic action you don’t even think about consciously, said Frank.
弗兰克认为，一旦大脑习惯了这种积极的反馈，伸手去拿手机就变成了一种下意识的自主运动。
Professor Clifford Nass of Stanford University added that constantly consulting your smartphone is also “an attempt to not have to think hard but feel like you are doing something”。
来自斯坦福大学的克利福德？？纳斯教授补充说，人们试图用不停查阅智能手机的方式来体会不必过度思考也能感觉正在做事的感觉。
However, this habit can cause problems. Studies show that whenever you take a break from what you are doing to check your smartphone, it is hard to go back to your original task, according to Adam Gazzaley, a neurologist at UCSF.
但加利福尼亚大学旧金山分校的神经学家亚当？？贾泽乐则表示，这种习惯能够引发一些麻烦。研究表明，每当你停下手头工作中，开小差检查一番自己的智能手机，之后你就很难再回到原来的工作状态中了。
That’s not the worst. A survey by South Korean marriage consulting agency Duo earlier this year shows that smartphones are killing intimate relationships, reports The Korea Herald.
而这还不是最糟的。《韩国先驱报》报道，韩国婚姻咨询公司Duo今年年初所做的一项调查结果显示，智能手机正在成为亲密恋情的杀手。
About half of the respondents said they had had fights with their boyfriend or girlfriend because of smartphones. And 32.8 percent of them fought about smartphone obsession.
近半数的被调查者表示，他们曾因为智能手机与另一半争吵。其中32.8%的人吵架原因是过度迷恋手机。
“It makes me bored and annoyed when my boyfriend keeps staring at his smartphone on a date,” 27-year-old office worker Han Hyung-young told the newspaper.
27岁的白领韩慧洋（音译）告诉记者：“每次和男友约会时，他都一直盯着手机看，这让我感到特别无聊，很让人生气。”
And bad habits die hard.
然而恶习难改。
“I’ve told him （my boyfriend） that I hate it when he reads it at dinner, and he’ll stop for a while, but then he keeps doing it,” complained an Internet user named Noelle on The Non-Consumer Advocate, a blog about frugality and environmentalism.
一位名叫诺艾尔的网友在关于节俭与环保的博客“非消费者倡议”上抱怨道：“我已经告诉我男朋友，我讨厌他吃饭时看手机，而他只是放下手机一小会儿，没过多久他便又拿起来看了。”
To get rid of the checking habit, Cohen suggests establishing phone-free times and zones.
为了改掉这种“查看习惯”，科恩建议可以设立无手机时段以及无手机区。
【相关词汇】
freaky奇怪的，令人害怕的 itchy不安的
jolt使人振奋的事 neurologist神经学者
neuroscientist神经学家 repetitive反复的
smartphone智能手机 sneak偷偷溜走
ubiquitous普遍存在的
