好英语网科学家找到治疗失恋痛苦好办法
A Montreal researcher says he has found a way to take the emotional sting out a bad breakup by "editing" memories using therapy and a beta blocker.
加拿大蒙特利尔一名研究人员称，他找到了一种方法，通过心理治疗和beta受体阻断剂药物来“编辑”人的记忆，消除分手失恋的情感创伤。
Dr Alain Brunet has spent over 15 years studying post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), working with combat veterans, people who have experienced terror attacks and crime victims.
阿兰·布鲁内博士（Dr Alain Brunet）花了15年时间研究创伤后压力症候群（PTSD），对参加过战争或者经历过恐怖袭击的人，以及罪案受害者等进行研究。
Much of his research has centred on the development of what he calls "reconsolidation therapy", an innovative approach that can help remove emotional pain from a traumatic memory.
他的研究很大部分集中在他所说的“再固化疗法”的发展上。这是一种革新性的治疗方法，能够帮助消除创伤记忆当中的情感伤痛。
At the heart of his work is a humble pharmaceutical - propranolol - a beta blocker long used to treat common physical ailments like hypertension and migraines, but which research now suggests has a wider application.
他工作当中的一个重心是一种不起眼的药物“普萘洛尔（Propranolol）”——这是一种乙型交感神经阻断剂，多年以来一直被用于高血压和偏头痛等一般疾病的治疗，但是目前的研究显示，它还有更广泛的用途。
The reconsolidation method involves taking propranolol about an hour before a therapy session where the patient is asked to write a detailed account of their trauma and then read it aloud.
这种记忆再固化治疗方法，是要在心理治疗前一小时左右服用普萘洛尔，然后病人在治疗中会被要求将自己的创伤经历详细地写下来，再大声读出来。
"Often when you recall memory, if there's something new to learn, this memory will unlock and you can update it, and it will be saved again," the Canadian clinical psychologist tells the BBC.
“很多时候当你回想一段记忆，如果有新的东西可以学，那这段记忆就会解锁，然后你就可以去更新它，然后它会重新储存，”这名加拿大临床心理医生向BBC表示。
That process of reconsolidation creates a window of opportunity to target the highly emotional portion of that memory.
这个记忆再固化的过程会打开一扇窗户，让你有机会找到那段记忆当中情绪高度强烈的部分，并以它为目标。
"We're using this enhanced understanding on how memories are formed and how they are unlocked and updated and saved again - we're essentially using this recent knowledge coming out of neuroscience to treat patients," says Dr Brunet.
“我们正在利用记忆如何形成，以及它是如何被解锁、更新然后重新储存等这些来自神经科学的最新知识治疗病人，”布鲁内医生说。
His work has often been compared to the science fiction film Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind, where an estranged couple have their memories of each other erased, though Dr Brunet notes memories aren't gone after reconsolidation therapy, they just stop hurting.
他的工作经常令人联想起那部科幻电影《无痛失恋》（Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind，另译《暖暖内含光》/《王牌冤家》），故事里的一对情侣各自将对彼此的回忆清洗掉。不过布鲁内医生指出，再固化治疗之后的记忆并不会消失，只是不再令人伤心。
Memories, their neutral, factual elements, are saved in the brain's hippocampus. But the emotional tone of the memory is saved in its amygdala.
在人的记忆当中，那些核心事实部分是储存在大脑的海马体中，而记忆当中有感情色彩的部分则是储存在杏仁核体当中。
"Imagine that you are shooting a movie in the old-fashioned way so you have the image and and the sound and they are on two separate channels," he says.
“想象一下，你在用老式方法拍摄一部电影，你的影像和声音分别是在两条不同的轨道上，”他说。
When a person relives their traumatic memory they experience both channels. Propranolol helps target one channel - the emotional aspect of memory - inhibiting its reconsolidation and suppressing its pain.
当一个人回忆自己的创伤经历时，是会再次重历两条轨道的。普萘洛尔帮助锁定其中一条——就是记忆当中的情感部分——抑制它的再固化，压制它的痛楚。
A memory recalled under the influence of the medication will then be "saved" by the brain in its new, less emotional version.
在这种药物作用下，记忆将会以一种感情色彩相对不强烈的新版本重新“储存”在大脑里。
His research suggests about 70% of patients found relief within a few sessions of reconsolidation therapy.
他的研究显示，大约70%的病人在几次再固化治疗之后会找到解脱。
Dr Brunet has collaborated with other PTSD researchers, including Harvard University's PTSD expert Dr Roger Pitman, in studying the method.
在研究这种疗法时，布鲁内医生与其他PTSD研究人士合作，其中包括哈佛大学的PTSD专家罗杰·皮特曼博士（Dr Roger Pitman）。
More recently, he launched a programme in France in the wake of deadly terror attacks in Paris and Nice, training some 200 doctors in the therapy to help treat victims, witnesses and first responders.
在巴黎和尼斯发生致命恐怖袭击之后，他在法国开展了一个项目，培训大约200名医生运用这种疗法，帮助受害者、证人以及前线工作人员心理康复。
So far, over 400 people have undergone the therapy in that country as part of the programme.
至目前为止，法国有超过400人在这个项目中接受过这种治疗。
After showing success with post-traumatic stress, the doctor says he wanted to broaden the application for the treatment.
在治疗创伤后压力症取得一些成功之后，布鲁内医生说，他想要扩展这种治疗运用的范围。
In 2015, along with one of his former graduate students, Michelle Lonergan, at McGill University in Montreal, he turned his attention to the broken hearted and their "romantic betrayals".
2015年，他与自己之前在蒙特利尔麦吉尔大学的一个学生米歇尔·洛纳甘（Michelle Lonergan）一起，将目标转向那些在爱情中受伤和被背叛的人。
"If you look at Greek tragedies what are they of? Essentially betrayals," he says. "It's really at the heart of the human experience."
“你去看看古希腊的悲剧，它们是讲什么的？主要就是背叛，”他说，“它真的是位于人类体验的核心部分。”
A bad breakup can also be tremendously painful, he notes, and people can feel emotional reactions similar to those seen in trauma survivors.
他指出，一次恶劣的分手也可能令人非常痛苦，而人们感受到的情感冲击可能与经历过其他重大创伤的人类似。
The patients they recruited for the study weren't suffering just a mild case of heartbreak. There were cases of infidelity. Some had been suddenly abandoned by someone they believed was a loving partner.
他们召集来参与研究的病人并不只是受到轻微情伤的人。当中有出轨的案例，有一些人则是忽然被自己以为很爱自己的伴侣抛弃。
They were struggling to cope and were people who "cannot turn the page, they cannot get over it", says Dr Brunet.
布鲁内医生说，他们很难应对，是那种怎么都“翻不过这一页，迈不过这一关”的人。
"That's what people were constantly telling them, which is not helpful. But [their friends] are pinpointing the problem."
“这些都是人们一直对他们讲的无济于事的话，但是朋友们知道问题所在。”
It was like the patients were "stuck in Groundhog Day" - the 1993 comedy where Bill Murray's character relives the same 2 February day over and over - but were instead stuck obsessively reliving their painful betrayals in their minds.
这些病人就像是《土拨鼠之日》（Groundhog Day，香港译为《偷天情缘》、台湾译《今天暂时停止》）电影中的经历——那是1993年的一部电影，比尔·莫瑞（Bill Murray 又译：标·梅利）饰演的角色一次又一次地重复度过2月2日那一天——这些病人也一样，只不过是终日沉迷在脑中回忆那些令他们痛苦的背叛。
What he and Dr Lonergan found was that, like with PTSD, many of the heartbreak sufferers felt relief, some after a single reconsolidation therapy session.
他和洛纳甘博士发现的一点是，很多这些受情伤的人和PTSD病人一样，在记忆再固化治疗之后就得到解脱，有些甚至在治疗一次之后就有好转。
After five sessions, when they read aloud the memory of their betrayal, they had the "impression that this could have been written by someone else - like reading a novel".
在5次治疗之后，他们再大声读出自己被背叛的回忆时，他们感觉，“就像在读一本小说一样，完全像是别人写的故事。”
"This treatment approximates the normal working of memory, how we gradually forget and turn the page," he says.
“这种治疗是模拟普通记忆的运作方式，我们会逐渐忘记然后翻过这一页，”他说。
His Montreal-based lab is currently recruiting about 60 people who have suffered infidelity or some other form of deception in a relationship for a new reconsolidation therapy study.
他位于蒙特利尔的实验室，目前正召集了大约60人进行一种新的记忆再固化治疗研究，他们都是在爱情关系中被背叛或者受到其他方式的欺骗。
Dr Brunet is also hopeful the scope of reconsolidation therapy can be expanded further, used to treat phobias, addiction, complicated grief.
布鲁内医生还希望，记忆再固化治疗的视野能够再一次扩大，用于研究恐惧症、成瘾症以及复杂的忧郁情绪问题等等。
"Any type of distress which emanates from an emotional event," he says.
他说，希望这种疗法可以用于“任何一种由一起情绪激烈的事件引发的苦恼”。