Are you feeling stressed right now? As 2012 gets under way, plenty of people would probably say “yes.” But when the American Psychological Association recently posed this question, the results were distinctly surprising.

现在你压力大吗？在2012年拉开帷幕之际，很多人的回答可能是“大”。但当美国心理学会(APA)最近以此问题进行调查时，得出的结果却非常令人意外。

Although 22 per cent of Americans described themselves as “very stressed”, this figure was slightly down on the previous year, when it was 24 per cent – and well below 2007, when it was 32 per cent. Indeed, the measured levels of stress have been dropping steadily over the past five years since the APA started its survey. In 2007, for example, the mean stress level was 6.2 per cent, whereas this year it was “only” 5.2 per cent.

有22%的美国人称自己“压力非常大”，但这个比例却略低于上一年的24%，更远低于2007年的32%。实际上，自美国心理学会开始进行此项调查的5年来，调查得出的心理压力水平一直在稳步下降。例如，2007年的平均压力水平为6.2（10分制），而2011年“仅为”5.2。

At first glance, this looks odd. America has hardly seen a story of economic growth in the past five years. On the contrary, when the APA first conducted this survey (in summer 2007) the economy was in the midst of a boom. Even in the summer of 2008 a full-blown slump seemed unlikely, and the Lehman Brothers shock still lay ahead. And while there are signs that the US economy has now improved slightly compared with the severe downturn in 2009, this improvement has mostly occurred after the 2011 survey. Last autumn, US unemployment was well above 9 per cent – twice the level in the (most stressed) summer of 2007.

乍一看，这个结果有些不可思议，因为5年来美国经济几乎未见显著增长，而当美国心理学会在2007年夏首次进行此项调查时，美国经济正处于繁荣时期。即便到了2008年夏，美国经济似乎也没多大可能步入全面衰退，而令人震惊的雷曼兄弟(Lehman Brothers)倒闭事件当时还未发生。尽管眼下有迹象表明，与2009年的严重滑坡相比，美国经济现已略有回暖，但2011年的调查是在经济回暖之前进行的。去年秋天，美国失业率远高于9%，相当于2007年夏（即压力水平最高之时）的两倍。

What is going on? One cynical explanation might be that the survey itself is flawed: the data run is short and the questions somewhat vague. But there is another, more intriguing, theory, voiced by some psychologists. After five long years of financial turmoil, Americans might – just possibly – be getting used to shocks. The type of instability and economic pain that used to spark stress, in other words, is losing its ability to unsettle people.

到底发生了什么？有个玩世不恭的解释是，此项调查本身存在缺陷：数据采集得少，而且问题问得有些模糊。但也有一些心理学家提出了一个更有趣的理论。在经历了长达5年的金融动荡之后，美国人可能——只是可能——变得对冲击习以为常了。换言之，过去能够造成心理压力的那类不稳定局面和经济困境，已渐渐不再能够扰乱人们的心绪。

This theory might sound Pollyana-ish. But, there again, it might not be entirely crazy. Fifteen years ago I lived in Tokyo where many Japanese were initially thrown into a state of profound shock – and stress – when their once-solid banks started to collapse. It was even more devastating when the “job for life” culture crumbled: back then, unemployment was almost taboo.

这种理论听起来可能太过乐观了。但话说回来，它可能并非毫无道理。15年前我在东京居住时，日本一度稳如磐石的银行开始倒闭，许多日本人一开始深感震惊、压力很大。“终身雇佣制”文化的崩塌则更具冲击性，因为在当时，失业几乎是一种禁忌。

But while that made the late 1990s a time of profound angst, what struck me when I returned to Tokyo after 2000 was how many of my Japanese friends seemed to be moving on. Whereas some had once wept into their noodles at the thought of losing their job, they were starting to accept the idea, and recognise that it was possible to survive. When banks collapsed and work vanished, they no longer assumed that the world would come to an end.

然而，尽管这种局面让日本人在上世纪90年代末陷入了深深的焦虑，但当我在2000年后重返东京时，给我留下深刻印象的是，我的许多日本朋友似乎已不再忧心忡忡。虽然有些日本朋友曾经一想到失业就哀叹不已，但他们已开始接受新观念、认识到天无绝人之路。当银行倒闭、工作岗位消失之时，他们也不再认为世界末日即将来临。

Something comparable might now be happening in America and Europe. Before 2007, economists sometimes used to say that the west had moved into an era of “great moderation”, in the sense that inflation was ultra low, growth relatively healthy and capitalism seemed benign. That sense of stability extended into many non-economic areas, too: after the collapse of the USSR, it seemed that western capitalism had triumphed and trust in most western institutions was pretty high.

目前，美国和欧洲可能正在发生与此类似的事情。2007年之前，经济学家们有时会说，西方已进入一个“大缓和”(great moderation)时代，其特征是通胀率超低、增长相对健康、资本主义看起来蒸蒸日上。这种稳定感也蔓延到经济以外的许多领域：苏联垮台之后，西方资本主义似乎取得了胜利，国际社会对多数西方制度的信心非常大。

But this impression – or illusion – of “moderation” has now been shattered, in a way that has not only caused economic pain and market volatility, but undercut trust, too. A fascinating survey by Edelman, the public relations group, shows that while 65 per cent of Americans trusted their banks in 2007, just 35 per cent do so now, and their trust in government and business has also crumbled. Indeed, the only sector that still commands high trust post-2007 is technology: many respondents now prefer to get guidance from their peers via social media rather than place faith in “experts” such as politicians or business leaders.

但这种“缓和”的印象（或者说幻觉）现在已化为泡影，不但带来了经济困境和市场动荡，也削弱了人们的信心。公关集团爱德曼(Edelman)进行的一项有趣的调查显示，2007年有65%的美国人信任银行，而目前这个比例只有35%；美国人对ZF和企业的信任也大幅减弱。实际上，2007年后人们仍对之保持高度信任的唯一行业是科技行业：许多受访者眼下更愿意通过社交媒体从同行那里获得指引，而不相信政治家和商界领袖之类的“专家”。

But, while this new mood of cynicism has some debilitating consequences, it also has an advantage: when people have already lost their innocence – or faith – they are less prone to being shocked. Five years of watching “black swan” type events, bad government policies and bizarre economic twists might have made shocks less unsettling. People are slowly adapting to a more unstable world.

不过，这种新的玩世不恭情绪虽然有一定的不利影响，但它也具备一个优点：当人们不再天真（或丧失信任）之后，他们就不那么容易感受到冲击了。5年来，人们在目睹“黑天鹅”事件、糟糕的ZF政策和怪异的经济扭曲之后，可能已经觉得种种冲击不那么令人不安了。他们正在慢慢适应一个稳定性降低的世界。

For the generation now entering the working world for the first time, such instability and pain might almost be the new normal. Earlier this week, for example, I met students from America, Europe and Asia at a London School of Economics conference, who told me that they didn’t describe themselves as “Generation X, Y or Z”; instead, they prefer “Generation Flux”, or “Gen Flux”. “We are embracing change and flux, even to rejoice in it,” one of their leaders earnestly explained.

对眼下刚刚参加工作的这一代人来说，这种不稳定和痛苦几乎就是新的常态。比方说，上周早些时候，我在伦敦政治经济学院(LSE)的一次会议上遇到了来自美国、欧洲和亚洲的学生，他们告诉我，他们并不用“X一代、Y一代或Z一代”来描述自己；相反，他们喜欢自称为“变迁的一代”(Gen Flux)。他们中的一位领袖人物热心地解释道：“我们拥抱变化和变迁，甚至乐在其中。”

Of course, these pampered kids are hardly average: they have privileges that most young people lack. But embracing “Gen Flux” might yet be a good mantra for us all, even – or especially – for people (like me) who spent most of their careers living in a world that was supposed to be “moderate”, but may have actually been quite stressful.

当然，这些养尊处优的孩子很难算是普通人：他们享有大多数年轻人没有的特权。但是，拥抱“变迁的一代”对我们大家来说可能仍算得上一句正确的箴言，即便是（或者说尤其是）对像我这样的人来说也是如此——我们这类人在职业生涯的大部分时间里，都生活在一个本应“平和”、但实际上可能充满压力的世界里。

译者/邢嵬