雅思口语中的中西方思维方式差异

朗阁海外考试研究中心  杨超

    在英语口语考试中，是一个需要处处小心的考项。因为由于中西方思维方式的差异，很可能会出现中式英语的现象。尤其是在雅思这种比较重要的考试中，随口一句Chinglish就有可能让你过去几个月的备考成效化为虚无。下面是朗阁雅思培训中心几个中西方的思维差异点，希望对考生有所帮助。
一、伦理型思维与认知型思维
    我国传统思维方式的另一个特点，可以称为伦理型。而西方人更偏向于认知型思维。让我们来看一道2014年雅思口语Part 2新话题Describe a subject that you want to give information to others，描述一个你想告诉别人信息的科目。

Describe a subject that you want to give information to others.
   You should say:
      what the subject is
      when people ask you information about the subject
      what you would say
   and explain how you feel after people ask you information about the subject.

    在众多科目中，有一个科目很明显地体现了我国伦理型思维与西方认知型思维的差异，那就是天文学。这个科目在我国并不十分流行，但在西方却是一个很热门的科目，不少*把它设为必修，也有不少大学生把它作为专业在大学里研究，这充分体现了西方人注重科学的态度。

    Ronen Plesser是杜克大学物理和数学系的副教授。他于1991年在哈佛大学获得物理学博士学位，曾在在耶鲁大学、高等研究中心以及以色列魏兹曼科中心任职，直到1997年他加入杜克大学。他的研究领域主要在于弦理论和粒子物理学背景下几何学与物理学的相互作用。2002年至今，他都在杜克大学教授天文学的入门课程。让我们来看看他是如何向大学给自己所教授的这门学科的信息吧：

“Hi, my name’s Roen Plesser, I’m from Duke University. And I want to talk to you about an astronomy course that I’ll be teaching online soon. I’ve been teaching a class similar to this at Duke for 10 years, and I’m excited about the opportunity to offer it to many more students through this online video. I like teaching astronomy despite the fact that I’m not professionally an astronomer, because astronomy give us an opportunity at the same time to discuss aspects of the university that we see every day—what stars are visible in the evening sky, why there are rainbows when it rains and why the moon changes shape in the sky. At the same time, it gives an opportunity to talk about aspects of physics that are not immediately obvious to us every day. Quantum mechanics, Einstein’s theory of relativity will all make an appearance and will be applied to understand the things that we have to talk about. So in teaching this class, we get to take a romp through physics, starting with things we see around us every day and culminating in things that we don’t understand yet. The beautiful thing, the glorious thing about astronomy is that the laws of physics that governs what happens in stars that might be a billion galaxies far away and long time ago are exactly the same laws that apply to our life here on earth. So understanding one, we understand the other. These laws are mathematical and they’re precise. And the understanding to which I refer is a very technical term. I say I understand something when I can make a calculation based on some principles. I can make a measurement and the two numbers the one I computed and the one I measured actually agree. This is the kind of understanding that we are going to try to achieve for as much of the universe as we can. Achieving this kind understanding is not an easy task. It’ll take some work, but it’s, I find, one of the most gratifying things that we can do. So if you have some time and some energy and you want to invest in having a completely mind-blowing new way to look at the universe around you, you’re invited to join us for this adventure. And I hope to see you in a few months.”

    这道口语话题并没有硬性规定考生描述的科目，但仍建议考生可以从西方人认知型的思维角度出发，投其所好，多描述一些与科学有关的学科，以拉近与*的距离，同时也更易于*理解考生表述的内容。

二、归纳型思维与演绎型思维
    厦门大学连淑能教授曾经说过：“我国人善于将一本书归纳成一句话，西方人善于将一句话演绎成一本书”。这话可谓一语中的。我国人较擅长“圣言式”、“语录式”、“格言体”的归纳，较典型的例子便是中医将其庞大的理论归纳为“望闻问切”。同样的归纳还体现在北魏贾思勰的农业名著《齐民要术》、北宋沈括的科技名著《梦溪笔谈》、明朝李时珍的药学名著《本草纲目》以及明朝宋应星的农业、手工业技术名著《天工开物》等等。而西方的思维方式倾向于演绎。古希腊哲学家亚里士多德便十分强调演绎法，其后的笛卡儿、莱布尼兹为代表的理性主义派也非常重视演绎法。

    让我们通过一道2014年雅思口语Part 2话题，来进一步分析一下我国归纳型思维和西方演绎型思维的差异。

Describe an event that changed your life in a good/positive way.
   You should say:
      when it happened
      where it happened
      what the change was
   and explain how you have benefited from this change.

    一说到改变自己的事情，我国考生大多想到一些非常重大的事件，如出国留学、进入了理想的大学、克服困难取得了成功等等。从这些大方面入手，进而谈到这些事对自己各方面的改变，这就是归纳型的思维方式。而西方人在谈论改变自己的事件时，则很可能会谈论很小的一件事，即生命中很渺小的一个点，进而扩大到对自己整体的改变，这就是演绎型思维。一个很好的例子，便是史蒂夫•乔布斯2005年在斯坦福大学毕业典礼上的演讲，其中他谈到了改变自己的一件事，那就是学习书法。

“Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and didn''t have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can''t capture, and I found it fascinating.

None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, it’s likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.

Again, you can''t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something - your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.”

    通过这段演讲我们可以看到，乔布斯把学习书法这件事看成生命中重要的一个点，并在日后把这个点和不同的点结合在一起，形成一个面，一个属于他自己的科技网络。这种由点及面的叙事方式，值得各位考生学习并模仿。

    以上分别从伦理型思维与认知型思维、归纳型思维与演绎型思维的差异入手，着重分析了2014年雅思口语Part 2话题，希望能帮助各位考生用合适的思维方式思考雅思口语话题，并灵活运用到其它话题当中，取得口语