Why do we laugh? The causes that make laughter innate

These are the causes that make us evolved to laugh.

For a long time the focus has been on why we are sad or why we suffer from a disorder, with the clear intention of "correcting" the problem.

However, what many psychologists and psychiatrists have forgotten is to understand why we laugh, to encourage laughter and to promote laughter.The aim is to encourage laughter and promote long-term psychological wellbeing.

Although research has been expanding this question a little more in recent years, the truth is that this question still raises many unknowns. Let's take a closer look at this question.

Why do we human beings laugh?

Throughout the history of psychology, much attention has been paid to the negative and pathological aspects rather than the positive when trying to understand how they originate. Whether anxiety, stress, depression or anger, these emotions have been extensively studied, with the intention of finding out how to correct them. Positive emotions, on the other hand, have been viewed solely as the desired outcome, without understanding why they occur.

Fortunately, this view has been changing. Nowadays, the aim is to understand the origin of the person's discomfort, to make him/her relate in a healthier way and achieve wellbeing, but understanding how to produce that positive situation and maintain it. This idea has been strongly defended in currents such as positive psychology, by the hand of Martin Seligman, promoting the acceptance and understanding of positive emotions.without pathologizing negative emotions or treating them as terribly undesirable.

Laughing is undoubtedly good, having multiple benefits at an organic level. It has been related not only to our greater physical and emotional well-being, but also to the fact that it plays a very important role at an evolutionary level. it also acquires a very important role at an evolutionary level, demonstrated in our social relationships.It has been demonstrated in our social relationships. In spite of all this, it has not been until recently that laughter has been approached in a scientific way, with the intention of answering the question of why we laugh. This question is so simple and, at the same time, so complex, that its answer still remains, roughly speaking, a mystery.

The importance of laughing

Happiness, joy, humor and laughter are positive phenomena necessary for our organism. In most cases, and provided they occur in the right contexts, these emotions have a clear adaptive function, both personally and socially. Normally, when we laugh with other people we are acting in a clearly prosocial way, giving them signals that we enjoy being with them, something that enhances relational bonds.We are giving them signals that we enjoy being with them, something that enhances relational bonds.

Laughter is a very important nonverbal component when communicating. It is the non-explicit way of indicating that what we are saying is either a joke or something to be interpreted with humor. For example, if we say something that appears to be serious but, at the same time, we laugh, it is as if we are taking the heat off the matter. It softens the blow and avoids having an awkward moment with other people, preserving relationships.

And this is where it acquires its evolutionary importance. Laughter is a phenomenon that has been observed in other species, many of them close to humans (bonobos, chimpanzees, gorillas and orangutans) and has also been seen in foxes. Laughter in the animal world is used to indicate that, when a certain action is being performed, it is not serious, for example in "fights" or bites between foxes. It is their way of saying that "they are just playing, there is nothing to worry about"..

Another important aspect of laughter is its function as a regulator of group behavior, attributed to the fact that it can be contagious. As with yawning and posturing, laughter is contagious, causing members of a group to synchronize by laughing all at once, even if they have no clear reason to do so.

The reason why laughter is contagious has to do with some very important neurons for human beings: mirror neurons. These neurons have great importance in our behavior, since it is what allows us to replicate the gestures of others. The same thing would happen with laughter: seeing another person laugh would activate these neurons and we would replicate their behavior.

What are the benefits of laughter?

Laughter has a very positive influence on an organic level. It stimulates the immune system, which translates into greater resistance to pathogens.. It has also been observed that thanks to it our pain threshold increases, that is, it makes us less sensitive to pain. It is for this reason that therapies such as laughter therapy have been shown to be useful in the context of hospital and various medical treatments. Although it does not cure the disease, it makes the person who suffers from chronic pain not feel it so much.

It has been observed that laughing contributes to a reduction in cholesterol levels and an improvement in Blood oxygenation. It should not be thought that laughing is synonymous with running a marathon, but it is a good aerobic exercise. Thanks to its effects, being a laughing person has been related to having up to 40% less vascular problems, making you live an average of four and a half years longer. In other words, it could be said that the popular saying "laughing lengthens life".

But, in addition to the physical aspect, it is obvious that laughter influences our mental health. The act of laughing helps to placate anger, which, in addition to reducing the risk of heart problems, prevents relational problems. In addition, it helps to boost mood, increasing the levels of dopamine and endorphins, hormones involved in psychological well-being.

What happens in our brain when we laugh?

Thanks to modern neuroimaging techniques, it has been possible to see how the brain behaves when we laugh..

First, for laughter to occur, it is necessary for our brain to interpret a received stimulus as something incongruent. That is, when we relate to the world, our brain expects things to happen according to its rational forecasts. If something deviates from that reasoning, the brain interprets it as an incongruity, which surprises it.

This is easy to understand when we are told a joke.. It is funny because the punchline has surprised us. This perception of the surprising incongruity would occur in the dorsolateral prefrontal region and temporoparietal junction of the dominant hemisphere.

Subsequently, in response to this incongruity, the brain activates the reward circuit. This is done by releasing dopamine, which is the neurotransmitter that produces the pleasurable sensation associated with laughter and happiness. For this reason, it can be said that laughter is very closely related to other pleasurable phenomena, in which the reward circuit is also activated, such as drug consumption, sex, being in a social relationship or eating.

The phenomenon of humor

In our species, laughter is innate, beginning to manifest itself after the first five weeks of life.. The fact that laughter is something universal can be verified with deaf, blind or deaf-blind people. In these three groups, as long as there is no comorbid disorder associated with relational problems, laughter is a phenomenon that occurs naturally, even if they have never seen and/or heard it.

Anything, however simple and banal, can make us laugh. However, laughter should not be confused with humor, a component that, although closely related, is not universal. Humor depends on cultural, personality and developmental factors, making each person have a very different sense of what makes them laugh.

It is for this reason that some people are more serious than others, since their idea of what is funny may be much stricter than ours. Factors such as age and gender also play a role. Women laugh more, enjoying humor more, since it has been seen that two specific areas of the brain related to the brain are activated in them: language and short-term memory.

It has also been shown that we do not all laugh in the same way.. The psychologist Paul Ekman, a pioneer in the study of emotions, was able to differentiate up to 16 different types of smiles and laughter, each with a different emotional meaning and interpretation. In addition, research has been done on how true or false laughter is, having as a pioneer in these studies Guillaume Duchenne, who observed that the way in which the eyes narrow in false laughter is very different from how it is done in true laughter.

The pathological laughter syndrome

In the same way that laughter can be synonymous with happiness and imply multiple benefits at an organic level, it can also be an indication that one is suffering from a serious problem. There is laughter that is provoked by stress, anxiety, tension or as a consequence of a neurological injury..

Laughter that is dysfunctional, manifesting itself in an uncontrolled manner and with an excessive intensity is known as pathological laughter syndrome, which can also turn into crying and alternate rapidly between euphoria and sadness.

This syndrome can be observed in multiple medical and psychiatric conditions, such as schizophrenia, various types of dementia, Angelman syndrome, epilepsy, stroke, multiple sclerosis, ALS, Parkinson's disease or tumors.various types of dementias, Angelman syndrome, epilepsy, stroke, multiple sclerosis, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), Parkinson's disease or brain tumors. In these cases laughter is an indicator that one is suffering from a health problem and medical, surgical, psychiatric and psychological intervention is required.

Bibliographic references:

• Gervais, M. & Wilson, D. S.. (2006). The evolution and functions of laughter and humor: A synthetic approach. The Quarterly review of biology. 80. 395-430. 10.1086/498281.