Terms can arise as a way of increasing efficiency. A paper
published last year, by Ronald Burt of Bocconi University and Ray
Reagans of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, looked for how 【M1】__________
jargon emerges naturally among groups. It describes an experiment
which volunteers are assigned to teams. Each team member is separately 【M2】__________
assigned a set of symbols, and one symbol is common to all of them.
Team members must quickly identify this shared symbol by sending
messages to each other that describe what they have given. 【M3】__________
To start with, the teams use quasi-sentences and general words to 【M4】__________
get across what they are seeing (one symbol “looks like its leg is out in a
kicking motion”). Soon enough everyone in the team is calling them 【M5】__________
” kicking man” or “ kicker”. As rounds progress a tacitly agreed
vocabulary allows teams to identify the common symbol more and more
quickly. Different teams alight on different forms of jargon for each
symbol, and the effect is the same: everyone knows what is meant and 【M6】__________
things get done faster.
Jargon can also be desperately unhelpful. The criminal-justice
system is made more intimidated, to victims and suspects alike, by 【M7】__________
confusing terminology. Conversations between doctors and patients go
much better when everyone understands each other. One reason why
management jargon arises so much irritation is that it usually substitutes 【M8】__________
for something that was doing the job perfectly well.
There is an awfully lot of non-useful blather out there, in other 【M9】__________
words. But the fact that jargon emerges spontaneously and repeatedly
suggests it has its merits. In the right circumstances it can help build the 【M10】_________
culture and act as useful shorthand. If you think jargon is worthless, it
may be time to circle back.
【M4】
general—generic
- 支付寶捐助
- 微信捐助
