Passage 26
学霸导读 午餐时间选择独自用餐还是跟同事一起吃饭，这居然与工作效率有关？
Should you grab a bite （ 简单的一餐 ） at your desk or eat with your colleagues？ That d 1 on what’s on your agenda （ 日程安排 ） for the rest of the day.
Lunch hours are getting shorter and shorter and even disappearing in some parts of today’s working world. Many Americans treat lunch not as a break but as just another task to squeeze into an already over-booked （ 超额预定 ） day.
But do quick meals at the desk actually i 2 productivity （ 生产力 ） over more leisurely meals？
The researchers only studied 32 employees， so the f indings are debatable （ 可争辩的 ）. But when they assigned one group to eat at their desks and another to dine with a colleague at a restaurant， they found those who ate lunch together showed a decline （ 衰退 ） in their performance on tests that measured （ 测量 ） concentration， m 3 and the ability to catch errors and read emotions in facial expressions following lunch than before lunch. Both groups ate the same meals， but those who ate a 4 were only given 20 minutes to eat their food， while the paired （ 配对的 ） participants were allowed one hour in the restaurant. Those who ate alone did not have as large a drop in their cognitive processing （ 认知处理 ） as those who ate in the restaurant.
What was r 5 for the change? There were too many variables at play to determine which inf luenced cognitive control most—was it the companionship, or was it the restaurant environment, the music played and the meal served, or was it the longer time to enjoy the meal?
Whichever factors are at play, the group that took a restaurant lunch break came back more relaxed, said the authors. S 6 a meal outside the off ice with a friend seems to have a calming effect, and while it reduces intellectual skills, it may develop social harmony and teamwork, which can be an important feature of some work tasks.
But don’t feel sorry for the lone lunchers. It t 7 out that since they were able to maintain their cognitive skills following the meal, they might be in a better position to think creatively for projects that require more innovative solutions or approaches.
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高频词汇
assign /ə'saɪn/ v. 分配；布置（工作、任务等）
relaxed /rɪ'lækst/ adj. 放松的；轻松自在的；从容的
innovative /'ɪnəveɪtɪv/ adj. 创新的，革新的；新颖的