【設問】
Ⅰ
次の文章は，“meaningful life” について書かれた記事である。この文章を読んで，
問1～5に答えなさい。
When we think about lives filled with meaning, we often focus on people whose grand contributions benefited humanity. Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Nelson Mandela surely felt they had a worthwhile life. However, how about us ordinary people?
Many scholars agree that a subjectively meaningful existence often (a)boils down to three factors: the feeling that one’s life is coherent and “makes sense,” the possession of clear and satisfying long-term goals, and the belief that one’s life matters in the grand scheme of things. Psychologists call these three things (1)coherence, purpose, and existential mattering.
However, we believe that there is another element to consider. Think about the first butterfly you stop to admire after a long winter, or imagine the scenery on top of a hill after a fresh hike. Sometimes existence delivers us small moments of beauty. When people are open to appreciating such experiences, these moments may enhance how they view their life. We call this element experiential appreciation. The phenomenon reflects the feeling of a deep connection to events as they occur and the ability to extract value from that link. It represents the detection of and admiration for life’s (b)inherent beauty.
We recently set out to better understand this form of appreciation in a series of studies that involved more than 3,000 participants. Across these studies, we were interested in whether experiential appreciation was related to a person’s sense of meaning even when we (c)accounted for the effects of the classic trio of coherence, purpose, and existential mattering. If so, experiential appreciation could be a unique contributor to meaningfulness and not simply a product of these other variables.
As an initial test of our idea, during the early stages of the COVID pandemic, (2)we had participants rate to what extent they agrees with different coping strategies to relieve their stress. We found that people who managed stress by focusing on their appreciation for life’s beauty also reported experiencing life as highly meaningful. In the next study, we asked participants to rate how much they agreed with various statements, such as “I have a great appreciation for the beauty of life” and “I appreciate a wide variety of experiences,” as well as other statements that related to coherence, purpose, existential mattering, and a general sense of meaning in life. Our results showed that the more people indicated that they were “appreciating life” and its many experiences, the more they felt their existence was valuable. In fact, these two elements were strongly related to each other. In subsequent studies, we further explored the connection between these concepts. For example, we found that participants asked to ( A ) the most meaningful event of the past week generally reported ( B ) experiential appreciation in those moments.
Finally, we conducted a series of experiments in which we gave people specific tasks and, once more, asked them to report how strongly they identified with statements linked to coherence, purpose, and existential mattering. In one case, we found that participants who watched an awe-inspiring video, such as the opening sequence of the BBC documentary Planet Earth, reported having a greater sense of experiential appreciation and meaning of life, compared with participants who watched more neutral videos, such as an instructional woodworking video. Similarly, participants who wrote about a recent experience for which they were grateful had a greater sense of meaning and experiential appreciation afterward when compared with participants who simply wrote about a common place they had visited in the past week.
The results confirmed our original theory: [ C ]. However, applying that insight can be difficult. Our modern, fast-paced, project-oriented lifestyles fill the day with targets and goals. We are always (d)on the go, and we attempt to maximize output both at work and at leisure. This focus on future outcomes makes it all too easy to miss what is happening right now. Yet life happens in the present moment. We should slow down, let life surprise us, and (e)embrace the significance in the everyday. As former Indian prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru wrote in 1950, “We live in a wonderful world … There is no end to the adventures that we can have if only we seek them with our eyes open.”
問1 下線部(a)~(e)を，本文の内容に合致するように，別の表現で置き換えるとすれば，どのような表現が最も適切か。それぞれの選択肢から一つ選び，記号で答えなさい。
(a) boils down to
① collects ② complements ③ comprises ④ contradicts
(b) inherent
① fundamental ② long-term ③ multiple ④ satisfying
(c) accounted for
① figured out ② gave an explanation for
③ made up ④ took into consideration
(d) on the go
① busy and active ② living in a progressive society
③ relying on each other ④ self-indulgent and uncritical
(e) embrace
① eagerly generate ② constantly change
③ steadily accumulate ④ willingly accept
問2 下線部(1)について，(イ)coherence，(ロ)purpose，(ハ)existential matteringそれぞれの例としても適切なものを選択肢の中から選び，記号で答えなさい。ただし，同じ記号は一度しか使えない。
(あ) George, a young teacher, feels that his actions and life have value to others when students and parents express their appreciation to him.
(い) Julia, a junior public officer, applies what she learned in sociology courses at college to her service to the community.
(う) Naomi, who would like to be a novelist, commits herself to writing 100 words every morning to complete a 100,000-word novel.
問3 下線部(2)を日本語に訳しなさい。
問4 空所( A )と( B )に入る最も適切な単語の組み合わせはどれか。選択肢の中から一つ選び，記号で答えなさい。
① (A) attend (B) deep ② (A) memorize (B) vivid
③ (A) recall (B) high ④ (A) remind (B) stable
問5 空所[ C ]に入る最も適切な表現を，選択肢の中から一つ選び，記号で答えなさい。
(あ) appreciating small things can make life feel more meaningful
(い) a meaningful life has to do with enjoyment of work and leisure
(う) your life becomes meaningful when you are meaningful to other people
(え) coherence, purpose, and existential mattering can constitute a meaningful life
【解答例】
Ⅰ
問1 (a) う (b) あ (c) え (d) あ (e) え
問2 (イ) い (ロ) う (ハ) あ
問3 我々は，ストレスを和らげるための様々な対応策にどの程度賛成しているのか被験者たちに評価をつけてもらった。
(和訳文：we had participants rate to what extent they agreed with different coping strategies to relieve their stress.)
問4 う
問5 あ
Ⅱ
問1 食糧や土地と同様に，清潔な飲用水や農業用水を利用できる機会には不平等なバラつきがある。
(和訳文：As is the case for food and land, access to clean drinking water and water for agricultural usage is unequally distributed.)
問2 あ
問3 もし我々が局地的あるいは地域的な範囲で利用可能な水資源を濫用し，無駄遣いし，汚染し続ければ，世界のいくつかの地域ではすでに深刻な水不足に直面しているという現在の状況は今後数十年で劇的に悪化するだろう。
(和訳文：The situation will worsen dramatically in the decades to come if we continue to overuse, waste, and contaminate the resources available at local and regional levels.)
問4 (A) あ (B) え
問5 い・お (※選択肢(い)に関しては出題ミスとのこと。)
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