本文选自《北外网院》的博客，点击查看博客原文

　　Shooting an innocent person is a police officer's nightmare. So far research has blamed such errors on environmental and racial stereotypes, but new research published in Applied Cognitive Psychology adds another variable。

　　射杀无辜是一名警察的梦魇。到目前为止的研究均把这类失误归咎于环境和种族这些老套原因，不过发表在《应用认知心理学》杂志上的新研究提出了另外的原因。

　　Apparently, successfully multitasking and staying calm help cops make good decisions。

　　很显然，能同时处理多项任务以及保持镇静可以帮助警察做出好的决策。

　　First, scientists measured the working memory of 24 police officers. Working memory refers to the amount of information we hold in our heads while we perform other tasks。

　　首先，科学家们测量了24名警察的工作记忆。工作记忆指当我们处理其他任务的时候，我们在大脑中记住的信息量。

　　The cops then watched a video of a threatening situation in which a cop was killed, and their levels of arousal were measured via heart rate and facial movement。

　　这些警察然后观看一段情况危险的录像，录像中一名警察被杀死。研究者们随后通过心率和面部运动情况测量了这些警察的情绪水平。

　　After viewing the video, officers were asked to make decisions, by immediately clicking a "shoot" or "don't shoot" key, when shown computer-generated slides of armed and unarmed targets。

　　观看录像后，研究者给警察显示一些计算机生成的幻灯片，其中有携带武器和不携带武器的目标在幻灯片中出现，这时候，警察们被要求立即按“射击”或者“不射击”键来做出决策。

　　Cops with limited working memory, and high emotional arousal, made more errors than cops with large working memory。

　　工作记忆有限以及情绪水平高的警察比那些工作记忆好的警察犯的错误要多。

　　According to the authors high stress puts a strenuous load on working memory, and if one has limited working memory, their ability to accurately assess a situation is impaired。

　　根据这项研究的作者们的观点，压力大给工作记忆带来繁重的负担，而且如果一个人的工作记忆有限，那么他准确分析某项情况的能力就会受到削弱。

　　So for those faced with multitasking and high stress, remember working extra hard to keep cool under pressure has useful benefits--perhaps even lifesaving ones。

　　所以对于那些任务繁多、压力重大的人来说，请记住在压力下加倍努力保持镇静会有很好的益处——或许甚至能挽救某些人的性命。