【推荐2】It's clear that hiking-and any other physical activity-can reduce stress and anxiety. But there's something about being in nature that may expand those effects. Scientists are beginning to find evidence that being in nature greatly influences our brains and our behavior, helping us to reduce anxiety and stress, and increasing our creativity and our ability to connect with other people.

In one recent experiment conducted in Japan, participants were asked to walk either in a forest or in an urban center(taking walks of equal length and difficulty) while having their heart rate variability(可变性), heart rate, and blood pressure measured. The participants also filled out questionnaires about their moods, stress levels, and other psychological measures.

Results showed that those who walked in forests had apparently lower heart rates and higher heart rate variability, indicating more relaxation and less stress, and reported better moods and less anxiety, than those who walked in urban settings. The researchers concluded, that there's something about being in nature that has a beneficial effect on stress reduction, above and beyond what exercise alone might have produced.

In another study, researchers in Finland found that urban people who walked for as little as 20 minutes through an urban park or woodland reported more stress relief than those who walked in a city center.

The reasons for this effect are unclear, but scientists believe that we evolve to be more relaxed in natural spaces. In a now-classic laboratory experiment by Roger Ulrich of Texas A&M University, participants who first viewed a stress-causing movie, and were then exposed to color/sound videotapes describing natural scenes, showed much quicker and more complete recovery from stress than those who’d been exposed to videos of urban settings.

These studies and others provide evidence that being in natural spaces-or even just looking out of a window onto a natural scene-somehow helps us become calm and relieves stress.

【推荐3】It is easy to be doubtful about announcements of drugs that claim to slow the progress of Alzheimers, the most common form of dementia (痴呆). A new drug called Lecanemab, however, may be the real deal. Results of a clinical trial, conducted by its makers, Eisai, of Tokyo, and Biogen, of Cambridge Massachusetts, have just been announced in the New England Journal of Medicine(November; 2022). After18 months, it had slowed the progress of symptoms by a quarter.

The trial involved 1795 participants who were in the early stages of the illness. Half received the drug. The others, a placebo(安慰剂). It showed two things. One was the modest but measurable slowing of progression. The other was that an explanation of Alzheimers called the Amyloid Hypothesis(淀粉样蛋白假说) seems correct.

Amyloid is a protein which accumulates in parts of the brains of those with Alzheimers, which is an established sign of the illness. Lecanemab, containing a special antibody, is found to be able to attach itself to amyloid and then attracts immune-system cells to clear the protein away (and measurably did so in those receiving the drug).That suggests amyloid does indeed directly create problems associated with dementia and that Lecanemab can slow down the development of the disease.

This is a small first step. Some experts question whether the test used to show an improvement in symptoms is clinically meaningful because amyloid can be detected only with the help of a piece of expensive equipment, which is not something that can easily be turned into a routine program. Moreover, Lecanemab also caused swelling and bleeding of the brain in a number of participants. Now that the new drug has been shown to work, it can be followed up with further tests. Hope for more good news soon.

【推荐2】Text message acronyms (缩略词) caused plenty of confusion for the older generations when mobile phones became commonplace — now emojis are making the embarrassment become more serious.

Slack, a workplace messaging service, surveyed 9,400 office workers worldwide including 1,000 in the UK. It found the biggest emoji socially embarrassing action or mistake at work was pictures of lips. Most older workers did not realize the double meaning of the peach emoji, which for younger users means hips. Olivia Grace, a director at Slack, said, “The findings of our research are very clear — be careful when communicating with emojis across generations. Emojis offer a great way to communicate emotion, whether it’s a joke, support or something else, but it’s good to be aware that different meanings may exist to avoid any awkward interpretations.”

The simple smiling face was also a source of misunderstanding — 60 percent of over-40s used it to show happiness or pleasure but a significant number of younger workers used it to convey “deep anger”. An image of someone painting their nails was the most confusing — it meant nothing to the older generation, while the under-25s said they used it to say “there is gossip”, and the 25 to 40-year-olds used it to communicate making themselves more beautiful. However, all ages agreed on the meaning of some emojis, such as a face with tears of laughter and a crying emoji.

Speaking about its reasons for conducting the survey, Slack said, “Are there certain emojis that should restrict your boss from using them? Have your international colleagues ever misunderstood an emoji? And do you usually wait to build a relationship before sending emojis at work?” It added that with thousands of emojis at users’ treatment, “there’s a lot of potential” to communicate by mistake.

Emojis are not technically a form of language, as they lack grammar. The original user of a particular emoji has no copyright on how it is to be understood. The significance of emojis belongs to those who use them, and they have a truly valuable role in written communication.