What does a scientist do when he or she "explains" something? Scientific explanation comes in two forms; generalization and redu

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问题     What does a scientist do when he or she "explains" something? Scientific explanation comes in two forms; generalization and reduction. Most psychologists deal with generalization. They explain particular instances of behavior as examples of general laws. For instance, most psychologists would explain a pathologically strong fear of dogs as an example of classical conditioning. Presumably, the person was frightened earlier in life by a dog. An unpleasant stimulus was paired with the sight of the animal [perhaps the person was knocked down by an exuberant (充满 活力的) dog] and the subsequent sight of dogs evokes the earlier response—fear.
    Most physiologists deal with reduction. Phenomena are explained in terms of simpler phenomena. For example, the movement of a muscle is explained in terms of changes in the membrane (薄膜,隔膜) of muscle cells, entry of particular chemicals, and interactions between protein molecules within these cells. A molecular biologist would "explain" these events in terms of forces that bind various molecules together and cause various parts of these molecules to be attracted to one another.
    The task of physiological psychology is to "explain" behavior in physiological terms. Like other scientists, physiological psychologists believe that all natural phenomena—including human behavior—are subject to the laws of physics. Thus, the laws of behavior can be reduced to descriptions of physiological processes.
    How does one study the physiology of behavior? Physiological psychologists cannot simply be reductionists. It is not enough to observe behaviors and correlate them with physiological events that occur at the same time. Identical behaviors, under different conditions, may occur for different reasons, and thus be initiated by different physiological mechanisms- this means that we must understand "psychologically" why a particular behavior occurs before we can understand what physiological events made it occur.
According to the passage, which of the following is important in explaining a muscle movement?

选项 A、The flow of blood to the muscles.
B、Classical conditioning.
C、Protein interaction.
D、The entry of unpleasant stimuli through the cell membrane.

答案C

解析 文中第二段第三句说:“例如,一块肌肉的运动可以用肌肉细胞膜的变化来解释,特殊的化学物质的进入和这些细胞内蛋白质分子之间的相互作用而引起肌肉的运动。”由此可知,选项C正确。
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