是什么让意大利人活得更健康、更长寿?

是什么让意大利人活得更健康、更长寿?

If you think longevity solely comes down to genes and diet, think again.

如果你认为长寿仅仅取决于基因和饮食，那你就大错特错了。

Our social life -- the family ties and the bonds you have with friends and community -- might also play a vital role.

我们的社会生活——家庭关系以及你与朋友和社区之间的纽带——也可能发挥着至关重要的作用。

Adolfo Melis, who lives on the island of Sardinia, in Italy, is testament to this way of thinking.

生活在意大利撒丁岛的阿道夫·梅利斯(Adolfo Melis)就是这种思维方式的明证。

He might be 94, but he says he feels like 50. Melis is still active -- he's one impressive pool player -- he doesn't need glasses to read the newspaper, and he gets up early enough to serve coffee from 6 a.m. onwards at his coffee shop. Importantly, "all my customers are my friends, and everyone knows each other," Melis said.

他可能已经94岁了，但他说自己感觉像50岁。梅利斯仍然很活跃——他是一个令人印象深刻的台球选手——他不需要戴眼镜就能看报纸，而且他起床很早，从早上6点起就在他的咖啡店里供应咖啡。重要的是，“我所有的客户都是我的朋友，每个人都认识对方”，梅利斯说。

So what exactly is behind Melis' fitness at his impressive age?

那么，究竟是什么让梅利斯在这个令人印象深刻的年龄还能保持健康呢?

Dr. Gianni Pes studied the population of this area -- one of the world's "Blue Zones," an area with an extraordinarily long-living population -- and thinks people live longer and more healthily here because they do more physical activity outdoors and feel strong connections to each other.

Gianni Pes博士研究了这个地区的人口——世界上的“蓝色地带”之一，一个有着非常长寿的人口的地区——并认为人们在这里活得更久、更健康，因为他们在户外做更多的体育活动，并感到彼此之间有很强的联系。

"The community is strong and gives support to old people," he said. For example, there are no nursing homes in the village of Arzana in Sardinia. "Elderly people stay within the family until the end of their existence," Pes said.

他说:“这个社区很强大，支持老年人。例如，在撒丁岛的Arzana村就没有养老院。Pes说:“老年人一直呆在家里直到他们的生命结束。”

People who lack social connections have 50% higher odds of dying than others who are more connected, according to a review of 148 studies. Being isolated was also shown to have a greater effect on high blood pressure than having diabetes in old age, according to another recent study.

一项对148项研究的综述显示，缺乏社会关系的人的死亡率比那些有更多关系的人高出50%。最近的另一项研究表明，与老年糖尿病相比，隔离对高血压的影响更大。

One common social activity in particular is shown to help us stay healthy: enjoying a meal together. Melis himself regularly enjoys eating dinner with friends and family.

一项共同的社会活动尤其能帮助我们保持健康:一起吃饭。梅利斯自己也经常喜欢和朋友和家人一起吃饭。

People who are socially connected tend to eat together, said Berkman, who is also the director of the Harvard Center for Population and Development Studies. She believes that by doing so, they tend to avoid eating the kind of foods that people under a lot of stress turn to, such as comfort food.

伯克曼说，有社会关系的人倾向于在一起吃饭，他也是哈佛人口与发展研究中心的主任。她认为，通过这样做，他们倾向于避免吃人们在很大压力下会转向的食物，比如安慰食物。

"What we know is that people who have strong social connections tend not to be so obese," she added.

“我们知道的是，拥有强大社会关系的人往往不会那么肥胖，”她补充说。

The most obvious reason for socializing doing us good is that social people have better health behaviors, she said. People with strong ties tend to eat better, smoke less and be slightly more physically active. In turn, people with stressful relationships tend to have some unhealthy behaviors, such as eating less healthily and smoking more. "In a number of studies, these behaviors have turned out to be important."

她说，社交对我们有好处的最明显的原因是，喜欢社交的人有更好的健康行为。有牢固关系的人往往吃得更好，吸烟更少，身体稍微更活跃。反过来，有压力的人往往会有一些不健康的行为，如吃得不健康和吸烟更多。“在许多研究中，这些行为被证明是很重要的。”

The evidence on socializing being good for our health doesn't stop there. People are also less susceptible to the common cold if they have good social relationships, according to a randomized trial.

社交对健康有益的证据还不止于此。根据一项随机试验，如果人们有良好的社会关系，他们也更不容易感冒。

The stress and strain of a lack of connections can generally make "you more susceptible to whatever's out there," as it can weaken people's immune systems, Berkman said.

伯克曼说，缺乏联系带来的压力和紧张通常会使“你更容易受到外界环境的影响”，因为它会削弱人们的免疫系统。