词汇与短语

1 birth certificates

出生证明

2 World Cup tournament 世界杯    

3 feed the professional ranks

4 conceive

conceive children 怀孕

5 stamina 耐力  

increase soccer stamina

6 the first subject

第一个实验者

7 coupled with 伴随着

8 cognitive 认知的

 the act of memorizing is more of a cognitive exercise than an intuitive one.

9 entail 需要

Deliberate practice entails more than simply repeating a task.

Some foreign travel is entailed in the job.

10 technique 技巧

 Rather, it involves setting specific goals, obtaining immediate feedback and concentrating as much on technique as on outcome.

11 startling 令人吃惊的

Their work makes a rather startling assertion: the trait we commonly call talent is highly overrated.

12 Expert performers—whether in memory or surgery, ballet or computer programming—are nearly always made, not born.

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逐句翻译

【一】

1 If you were to examine the birth certificates of every soccer player in 2006’s World Cup tournament, you would most likely find a noteworthy quirk: elite soccer players are more likely to have been born in the earlier months of the year than in the late months.

如果你去检查一下06世界杯上每个足球运动员的生日的话，你可能会找到一个值得关注的规律：精英足球运动员们在年头出生的好像要比在年底出生的要多。

如果查看一下2006世界杯参赛足球运动员的出生证，你很可能会发现一个值得注意的奇怪现象：精英的足球运动员更可能在一年的头几个月出生，而非后几个月。

2 If you then examined the European national youth teams that feed the World Cup and professional ranks, you would find this strange phenomenon to be ever more pronounced.

如果你再去查看一下为世界杯和职业联赛输送队员的欧洲青年国家队，你会发现这个奇怪的现象变得更加明显了。

【二】

1 What might account for this strange phenomenon?

什么因素导致了这一奇怪的现象呢？

2 Here are a few guesses: a) certain astrological signs confer superior soccer skills; b) winter-born babies tend to have higher oxygen capacity, which increases soccer stamina; c) soccer-mad parents are more likely to conceive children in springtime, at the annual peak of soccer mania; d) none of the above.

这里有一些猜想： a) 某些星象有更高超的足球技巧；b) 冬天出生的孩子有更大的肺活量，使他们踢足球时体力过人；c)春天是足球的年度狂欢之巅，喜欢足球的父母更可能在春天孕育子女；d)以上都不是

【三】

1 Anders Ericsson, a 58-year-old psychology professor at Florida State University, says he believes strongly in“none of the above.”

58岁的佛罗里达州立大学的心理学专家安德斯埃里克森说他强烈地相信答案是“以上都不是”。

2 Ericsson grew up in Sweden, and studied nuclear engineering until he realized he would have more opportunity to conduct his own research if he switched to psychology.

埃里克森在瑞典长大，他的专业是核工程，知道他意识到如果转专业学习心理学，他会有更多机会去进行自己的研究。

3 His first experiment, nearly 30 years ago, involved memory: training a person to hear and then repeat a random series of numbers.

30年前，他的第一个实验就与记忆相关：训练一个人在听完一串随机数字后进行复述。

4 “With the first subject, after about 20 hours of training, his digit span had risen from 7 to 20,” Ericsson recalls.

在第一个课程，大概进行了20个小时的训练之后，他复述的数字个数从7个上升到了20个，埃里克森回忆说。

对于第一个受试者，大概进行了20个小时的训练之后，他复述的数字广度从7个上升到了20个，埃里克森回忆说。

5 “He kept improving, and after about 200 hours of training he had risen to over 80 numbers.”

他持续不断地在进步，200个小时的训练结束后，他能复述的数字广度已经提升到80多个了。

【四】

1 This success, coupled with later research showing that memory itself is not genetically determined, led Ericsson to conclude that the act of memorizing is more of a cognitive exercise than an intuitive one.

这个实验的成功，再加上后续的研究显示，记忆力本身并不是由基因决定的，驱动着埃里克森总结出记忆力这一行为不是先天的，而更是训练出来的。

这个实验的成功，再加上后续的研究显示，记忆力本身并不是由基因决定的，让埃里克森得出了这样的结论，与其说记忆力是直觉活动，不如说是一个认知活动。

2 In other words, whatever inborn differences two people may exhibit in their abilities to memorize, those differences are swamped by how well each person “encodes” the information.

换句话说，不管两个人天生存在着的记忆能力方面表现出多大的差距，这些差距都会被个人对信息的“编码”的能力所掩盖。

3 And the best way to learn how to encode information meaningfully, Ericsson determined, was a process known as deliberate practice.

埃里克森说，最好的学习如何有意义地编码信息的方法，就是一个被人熟知的刻意学习的过程。

4 Deliberate practice entails more than simply repeating a task.

刻意学习比仅仅重复一个东西内涵更加丰富。

刻意练习所需要的不仅仅是简单地重复。

5 Rather, it involves setting specific goals, obtaining immediate feedback and concentrating as much on technique as on outcome.

相反，它包含了制定明确的目标，包含了直接的反馈并且像关注对技术一样去关注结果。

相反，它包含了制定明确的目标，得到及时的反馈以及注重结果和技巧方法。

【五】

1 Ericsson and his colleagues have thus taken to studying expert performers in a wide range of pursuits, including soccer.

埃里克森和他的同事因此在一个很多领域内去研究优秀人士，包括足球运动。

2 They gather all the data they can, not just performance statistics and biographical details but also the results of their own laboratory experiments with high achievers.

他们收集了所有能搜集的数据，不仅仅是表现统计和生物细节，还有他们实验室里做实验时成绩突出的人的结果。

他们收集了所有能收集的数据，不仅包括工作情况的数据统计生平资料，还包括他们对卓越成就者的实验研究结果。

3 Their work makes a rather startling assertion: the trait we commonly call talent is highly overrated.

他们的工作得出了一个令人吃惊的结论：我们称为天才的特质所发挥的作用被我们严重高估了。

4 Or,  put another way, expert performers—whether in memory or surgery, ballet or computer programming—are nearly always made, not born.

或者，从另一个角度说来，不管是在记忆力或者外科手术，芭蕾舞或者电脑编程，优秀的人几乎都是后天培养的，而不是天生的。