If you feel a pang of guilty pleasure when you read celebrity tittle-tattle, don’t be too hard on yourself。

如果你每次看到明星小道消息都會感到一陣自責(zé)，不必如此為難自己。

Hearing juicy gossip about famous people apparently fires up the brain’s pleasure centre in the same way as eating the finest food or even winning the lottery。

聽到關(guān)于明星的勁爆八卦消息會明顯刺激人大[微博]腦中的愉快中樞，其效果就想吃到最美味的食物或者中了彩票一樣。

And it’s not good news that gives us the biggest buzz. Tales about stars’ troubles are what we crave, with affairs, drink-driving and other misdemeanours stirring up feel-good chemicals in the brain。

最讓我們感到興奮的不是好消息，我們渴求的是關(guān)于明星的各種囧事，緋聞、醉駕等各種不斷行為都會刺激我們大腦中產(chǎn)生愉悅感的化學(xué)成分。

Most of us would never admit that we enjoy such tales but brain scans carried out during a study show that deep down, we find them highly amusing。

大多數(shù)人絕不會主動承認我們喜歡那些負面故事，可是通過掃描大腦進行相關(guān)研究，結(jié)果證實，我們對負面故事有著很濃厚的興趣。

Researchers scanned the brains of a group of students while a person read out snippets of gossip about them, their best friends and a host of movie stars. Some of the gossip was designed to put the person in a bad light, such as having an affair or walking out on their family。

研究者們對一組學(xué)生進行了腦部掃描，同時讓人把一些八卦新聞念給他們聽，其中有關(guān)于他們密友的，也有關(guān)于若干電影明星的。部分消息是可以從負面角度設(shè)計的，例如報道當(dāng)事人的婚外戀請或者拋棄家庭等等。

They may have been the victim of bad luck, such as being in a hit and run accident. Other gossip included heartwarming tales of caring for the sick and helping parents track down missing children。

還有一些新聞是關(guān)于當(dāng)事人罹受不幸的，例如深陷肇事逃逸的案件之中;另一類新聞則是溫暖人心的故事，例如當(dāng)事人看護病人或者幫助失蹤兒童的父母尋找孩子等等。

The volunteers were also asked how amusing they found each piece of information。

然后研究者向參與實驗的學(xué)生提問，問他們覺得每條新聞是否有趣。

The most interesting results related to the negative stories about the celebrities. These stirred up dopamine and other feel-good chemicals in the brain’s ‘reward region’。

結(jié)果顯示，最有趣的新聞是關(guān)于名人的負面報道，這些報道會刺激大腦中“獎勵區(qū)域”釋放多巴胺等產(chǎn)生愉悅感的化學(xué)物質(zhì)。

The scans, carried out at Shenzhen University in China, revealed that the students were particularly tickled by tales of stars’ misfortune, with a celebrity scandal exciting the brain more than news of a friend in trouble。

這項深圳大學(xué)主持的研究項目表明，參與研究的學(xué)生們對明星的不幸事件尤為感興趣，大腦對名人八卦的興奮程度要高于比朋友患難消息的興奮程度。

Adam Perkins, neurobiologist from King’s College, London, was fascinated by the findings. ‘Celebrities are particularly likely to be envied, and when they fall from grace we therefore are likely to feel particularly happy,’ he said。

倫敦大學(xué)國王學(xué)院的神經(jīng)生物學(xué)家亞當(dāng)·帕金斯對這項研究成果非常感興趣。他說：“人們很容易對名人產(chǎn)生嫉妒心理，因此，當(dāng)我們聽說他們遇到囧事時很可能產(chǎn)生一種特殊的與快感。”