There are two distinct types of personality that tend to suffer from ennui, and neither are particularly dull themselves.

有两种迥然不同的人最容易陷入无聊，而这两种人都不能算无趣。

Boredom often goes with a naturally impulsive mindset among people who are constantly looking for new experiences. For these people, the steady path of life just isn’t enough of a rollercoaster to hold their attention. 

第一种人是不断寻求新事物新经历的人，对他们来说，平稳的生活状态根本不够持续的吸引他们的注意，他们的生活需要无时无刻不处于新刺激中，当刺激消失时，无聊常伴随而来。

The second kind of bored people have almost exactly the opposite problem; the world is a fearful place, and so they shut themselves away and try not to step outside their comfort zone. While this retreat might offer some comfort, they are not always satisfied with the safety it offers – and chronic boredom results.

第二种人几乎有着相反的问题，对他们来说世界是可怕的，于是他们选择躲在自己的巢穴里不出来。在他们高度敏感的痛觉范围之外的任何刺激都会使他们退缩。然而退缩虽然提供安全，却令人空虚，于是便会陷入无聊。

Almost from the very beginning, it became clear that either of these states could push people to harm themselves; a proneness to boredom was linked to a tendency to smoke, drink too much, and take drugs. Indeed, in one study boredom was the single biggest predictor of alcohol, cigarette and cannabis use among a group of South African teenagers.

几乎可以断言，这两种状态都会促使人们伤害自己。对无聊的倾向直接指向使用烟草、酒精以及毒品的倾向。事实上，一项针对南非青少年的调查就显示，无聊程度压倒其他因素的影响，与酗酒、抽烟以及抽大麻正相关。

The people who are most likely to get bored were 30% more likely to have died over the next three years.

有无聊倾向的人在三年内死亡率比其他人群高30%。

Reviewing the evidence so far, Lench suspects that it lies behind one of our most important traits – curiosity.Boredom stops us ploughing the same old furrow, and pushes us to try to seek new goals or explore new territories or ideas. That search for an escape could sometimes push us to take risks that eventually hurt us. But the upside is that it can also increase innovation.

通过分析，它与我们一个重要的特征相关，那就是好奇。无聊迫使我们从一成不变的旧路径中抬起头来，尝试新的目标和新的想法。这种从常规中的逃离有时会置我们自己于危险中，甚至导致伤害。然而它也有积极的一面，即提高人们的创新能力。

The tedium encouraged their minds to wander, which leads to more associative and creative ways of thinking. “If we don’t find stimulation externally, we look internally – going to different places in our minds,” she says. “It allows us to make leaps of imagination. We can get out of the box and think in different ways.” Without the capacity for boredom, then, we humans may have never achieved our artistic and technological heights.

她认为可能枯燥的过程中，大脑会更活跃的无目的的漫游，激发联想和创造性的思维。“当我们无法在外界找到刺激，注意力就转向内部，思维游弋于大脑的不同角落。我们会因此形成想像的飞跃，跳出常规想出不同的点子。”如果没有无聊时分，人类在艺术和科技上的成就可能永远达不到现有的高度。

Eastwood is less enthusiastic about boredom’s benefits, but admits we should be cautious about looking for an immediate escape. “The feeling is so aversive that people rush to eliminate it,” he says. “I’m not going to join that war on boredom and come up with a cure, because we need to listen to the emotion and ask what it is trying to tell us to do.”

伊斯特伍德并没有对无聊的好处这么热衷，但是他也承认我们不要太轻易的寻找逃离无聊的出口。“无聊感觉很差所以人们恨不得它立即消失。我不会提供消灭无聊的良方，我们需要倾听自己的情绪，弄清楚它背后的原因。”

His work, for instance, has shown that priming people to feel their lives have a greater purpose and meaning tends to make them less bored during subsequent tests. 

他的研究表明对于自己生活的目标和意义更明确的人在测试中更少的感到无聊。

原文链接：http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20141218-why-boredom-is-good-for-you