Being more attractive with masks 口罩戴一戴，魅力加三分

范叶萍

一項新的研究表明，人们对口罩的心理疏远正在逐渐发生变化。戴上口罩可能会使人更富有魅力，其美颜效果对男性更为明显。

主题语境：热点话题篇幅：366词建议用时：7分钟

A study published recently found that men wearing masks appear to be more attractive. The researchers found that not only do masks alter people's perceived attractiveness but also the type of masks plays a role as well， with blue medical masks ranking the highest in facial attractiveness.

Dr Michael Lewis， a professor at Cardiff University's School of Psychology who is an expert in the psychology of faces， said， “Research carried out before the pandemic found medical masks reduce attractiveness—so we wanted to test whether this had changed. Since more people tended to wear masks， masks became ubiquitous and we hoped to understand whether the type of masks had any effect.”

“Our study suggests faces are considered most attractive when covered by medical masks. This may be because we're used to healthcare workers wearing blue masks and now we associate these with people in caring or medical professions，”Lewis explained. “At a time when we feel vulnerable（脆弱的），we may find the wearing of medical masks reassuring， thus feeling more positive towards the wearers.”

The study also indicated that people's faces were perceived as dramatically more attractive when covered by cloth masks. “Some of this effect may be a result of being able to hide undesirable features in the lower part of the face—but this effect was present for both less attractive and more attractive people，”Lewis said.

The team conducted the study by asking 43 female participants to rank the attractiveness of images of men's faces uncovered， wearing a cloth mask， a blue medical mask， and one where a black book hid the portion（部分）of the face where a mask would be.

Lewis explained how this phenomenon almost certainly relates to the context of the pandemic， specifically an association between masklessness and disease. “This relates to evolutionary psychology and why we select the partners we do. Disease and evidence of disease can play a big role in mate selection-previously any cues（暗示）to disease would be a big turn-off. Now we can observe a shift in our psychology that masks are no longer acting as a contamination cue.”

Reading Check

1. What does the underlined word “ubiquitous”mean in Para. 2？

A. Illegal.B. Strange.C. Common.D. Outdated.

2. Why do blue masks make men most attractive？

A. Blue is considered a healthy color.

B. Blue is a color appealing to the eyes.

C. Blue masks make men look more powerful.

D. Blue masks are related to medical professions.

3. What does Lewis actually mean with his words in Para. 4？

A. Masks do affect the attractiveness of all people.

B. Less attractive men are more affected by masks.

C. Masks may make men less attractive as well.

D. Masks change the features of our faces permanently.

4. What a psychological role do face masks now play in mate selection？

A. Negative.B. Positive.

C. Unimportant.D. Ambiguous.

Language Study

I. Difficult sentence in the text

The researchers found that not only do masks alter people's perceived attractiveness but the type of masks plays a role as well， with blue medical masks ranking the highest in facial attractiveness.研究人員发现，口罩不但会改变人们对吸引力的感知，而且口罩的类型也有一定的影响，这种蓝色的医用口罩在面部吸引力方面排名最高。

【点石成金】本句是一个复合句。found后接了一个that引导的宾语从句，这一从句中使用了not only...but （also）句型;with结构在句中作伴随状语。

II. Text-centered chunks

associate...with把……与……联系起来

perceive...as将……理解为;将……视为

play a role in在……中扮演角色;在……中起作用

carry out执行;完成

at a time依次;每次;在某个时刻

a result of……的结果

relate to与……相关

act as充当