Unreasonable laughter is evidence of health. How to overcome an inappropriate and uncontrollable attack of laughter? Involuntary laughter can be a symptom of serious illness. What does laughter mean in psychiatry

“Laughter, like any other emotion, does not stop immediately and does not disappear without a trace. For complete emotional complacency, it takes from 10-15 minutes to several hours, ”explains the reason for your prolonged hysteria at a recent meeting of shareholders, Doctor of Psychology, Professor of the Faculty of Psychology of the VSGU Alexander Tikhonov. But it's not all bad: managing emotions is a skill that can be mastered.

Before the storm

If you feel that laughter is already rolling in and the abdominal muscles are starting to contract (and how to resist if the dead man fell out of the coffin again and fell straight into the cake with his face!), Try auto-training.

Close your eyes and repeat to yourself: “I hold back laughter”, “I control emotions”, etc. Most importantly, avoid phrases with a “not” particle (like “I’m not funny”). Convince yourself only with affirmative sentences.

“Since the process of inhibition during a surge of emotion is much weaker than the process of excitation, the brain will not perceive a negative particle,” Alexander assures.

If joyful adult laughter is already heard nearby, beware of looking at the faces of others. Laughter is as contagious as a yawn. It will be easier for you to refrain from him, not seeing those laughing. If possible, take a short walk, take a few deep breaths, and drink a glass of water in large sips.

The task of mindfulness

“A good distraction can be switching attention to some object or business,” Alexander promises. Laughter is not such an arbitrary reaction as it seems.

In fact, laughing at the chef's pants that have come apart (because of which his rudimentary third leg became visible), you are doing a certain conscious work. Change it - do something else. Although it may be a mental activity, muscular activity works best.

Scatter a stack of documents and start picking them up, drop your pen under the table and rush after it, release a bat and start catching it. All this will stop you from laughing, although it will make everyone else laugh.

Stranger

Step away from the situation that makes you laugh. You should not become a participant (albeit passive) of what is happening, but an outside observer. Change your perspective on what's going on, and the tourist hatchet in the back of the groom will not seem so funny to you.

If the cause of laughter is a certain person, find any difference between him and yourself. Is his position inferior to yours? Is he bigger than you? Any of these reasons will make you special, and you will be able to treat the person who made you laugh like an exhibit under glass that you can study without showing emotions.

It hurts

Nothing helps? You probably belong to people with high emotionality. However, in this case, there is a way out. “Pain is the strongest of human feelings, which outweighs any emotions,” our consultant hints, encouraging you to take concrete actions.

Twist your finger, bite your tongue, give a kick. The hurt nerve will not keep you waiting long: you will instantly shake yourself up and be able to do well, looking in the mirror

Have you noticed how a calm and balanced person suddenly becomes capricious, begins to find fault with others just like that, for no particular reason? And the other, always cheerful, suddenly turns into a tearful and boring subject ... Experts are convinced that sometimes these unusual mood swings are caused by a disease hiding for the time being.

According to the observations of doctors, the strongest changes in human behavior are caused by damage to the cardiovascular and endocrine systems, liver and gallbladder. Hepatitis or cholecystitis - and now he begins to pour out his irritability on others, becomes quick-tempered, sometimes aggressive. Moreover, as quickly it flares up, it cools down just as quickly: it is easy to offend such a patient, but he will easily forgive insults. A person who suffers from diseases of the joints is just as hot and quick-tempered.

In the core (with coronary disease, heart defects, hypertension, atherosclerosis), as a rule, causeless fear, a feeling of anxiety appear.

Failures in the endocrine system are also often accompanied by violent outbursts of emotions. Moreover, the mood in various diseases differs in well-perceptible shades. With thyrotoxicosis, for example, this is a light, cheerful impulsiveness. But if you develop a goiter and this process has already become chronic, sadness is added to the speed and ardor in making decisions.

In diseases of the respiratory system (pneumonia, bronchitis, tuberculosis), after a surge of irritation, a person withdraws into himself, becomes thoughtful. And diseases of the kidneys (pyelonephritis, glomerulonephritis, nephritis) and bladder (cystitis) are accompanied by a state of melancholy.

A tendency to meticulous judgment is a sure sign that not everything is in order with the pancreas (pancreatitis, diabetes mellitus) or the stomach (gastritis).

And a person who suddenly began to notice an uncontrollable desire to sting behind him should appear to a gastroenterologist. On closer examination, he may have a peptic ulcer.

The more serious the disease, the stronger the emotions

It turns out that even laughter is not always good. If it is causeless and unrestrained, this should alert you, make you listen to your well-being. Sometimes this can be expressed as a protective reaction of the body to a short-term failure in the work of any organ.

It has been noticed that in diseases of the heart and blood vessels, lungs, liver, kidneys, pancreas and spleen, emotions are deeper and longer. But problems associated with the stomach, gallbladder, large and small intestines, bladder, spine and endocrine system will manifest themselves brightly and superficially.

If a person with kidney disease falls into a deep blues (sometimes this is manifested in a dream by involuntary sighs and groans), then a patient whose bladder is not all right becomes tearful.

Imposes a shade on emotions and the cause of the disease. For example, a person suffering from pyelonephritis caused by a fungal infection will gradually turn into a sad sage. The same disease, but caused by a viral infection, is likely to make a person more active.

In general, the emotional picture in various diseases is very different. Symptoms of several diseases often overlap one another. So, various ulcers will give a combination of "signature" causticity and those emotions that are characteristic of the affected organ: for the stomach - rational causticity, for the walls of the bladder - with elements of sadness.

On this topic

The heads of the ministries of internal affairs of Russia and Finland at a meeting in Helsinki discussed important aspects of cooperation between the law enforcement agencies of the two countries. The topics of migration, the fight against drug trafficking and others were raised at the meeting.

Any dense formations in the body - both tumors and stones - make themselves felt with a feeling of fear and sadness. The denser the structure, the stronger these feelings. So, with urolithiasis, a person is prone to deep longing, up to depression, and with uterine myoma, a woman will experience a feeling of fear, self-doubt.

Changes in mood as a mirror of health

Changes in one's own mood, as a rule, a person is able to notice himself. And even more so to notice them in loved ones. If such changes suddenly appear, do not put off a visit to the doctor for a long time. The sooner the disease is detected, the easier it will be to treat.

Sometimes we take offense at people who, as it seems to us, take out their anger on us, practice wit, or even deliberately ignore. Isn't it the fact that they are not completely healthy, but they themselves do not realize this? In this case, they should sympathize and advise them to pay attention to their health.

And what can we say about the elderly! Can you imagine how many health problems they accumulate over the years? So they say: in old age, the character deteriorates. Here one must be patient, because far from always a person is able to curb his emotions, especially when he is unwell.

It is possible that the temperament of each of us depends on how we feel. Emotions are a mirror of health, experts say. It happens, and often, that a person is completely absorbed by a bad mood and he cannot do anything about it, thereby only aggravating the situation, creating favorable conditions for the disease.

At the same time, many examples are known when even apparently doomed patients extended their lives by changing their attitude towards the disease. Being close to such patients, one should stock up on patience, sympathy and always resort to the help of psychologists and psychotherapists. They are armed with special methods of psycho-training and drugs that improve mood.

"Laughter for no reason is a sign of foolishness." Here is such a playful saying can be heard among the people. But is there an unreasonable laughter? There are many factors that cause laughter, both psychological and physiological.

An ordinary tickle or a witty joke is not a complete list of the reasons that can cause laughter. And even the memory of something good or a great mood causes a smile. This is just what may seem to others causeless laughter.

Science cannot yet give an exact and completely exhaustive explanation of what laughter is. But we know exactly what happens when a person laughs.

The ability to laugh and the positive emotions associated with it increase immunity, increase the amount of antibodies that can fight the harmful effects of pathogenic bacteria.

In such a person, at moments of laughter or after it, lymphocytes are activated, endorphins are produced - hormones under the influence of which a person feels happy. Laughter can also act on a person as a mild pain reliever.

Under its influence, the signals entering the brain from the diseased area of the body are partly blocked.
A laughing person performs a kind of gymnastics that trains his organs and respiratory system.

Laughter is accompanied by movements of the chest, shoulders, diaphragm with small amplitude, but high speed and rapid changes in direction.

At the same time, relaxation occurs in places of "psychological clamps": on the face, neck and in the lumbar region. This makes it possible to get rid of the burden of heavy thoughts that put pressure on a person and negatively affect his health. Laughter is known to raise blood pressure.

Therefore, strong manifestations of emotions can even harm people with very high blood pressure. And they laugh useful, but only in moderation. The laughing person's pulse rate quickens, and his organs are more supplied with blood, the cholesterol content of which begins to decrease.

Under the influence of laughter, even the intestines try to normalize their work and make their contractions more rhythmically.
Energetic laughter acts as a good exercise. Some researchers believe that five minutes of violent laughter can replace.

And if so, then laughter may be one of the means of combating excess weight.
It is known that children are more funny than adults and sometimes like to laugh at such an occasion, which to an adult will seem like an insignificant trifle.

As people age, they lose the ability to laugh. Some more, some less

But if, despite the burden of the past years, pressing on the shoulders, a person still smiles, trying to look into the future with optimism, then surely nature will allow him to live as long as possible.
An unreasonably laughing child or teenager can be found much more often than an elderly person.

Suddenly, for no reason, an adult laughing, in public transport or on the street, may seem strange.

Surrounding people can immediately characterize this as a "sign of a fool." It would be nice to change the attitude of society towards laughter. Even official medicine recognizes the benefits of laughter, including artificial. Although such laughter is less effective than natural laughter, however, exercising every day for twenty minutes a day, you can cope well with your stress, negative emotions and pessimistic thoughts.

I'll give you an example. Watch teenagers in the process of courting a member of the opposite sex. Remember when you yourself were a giggling teenager? Nervous laughter performs almost the same function as whistling or talking to yourself while walking through a cemetery or a dark alley. Whistling calms a frightened person. Nervous laughter performs the same function in relation to those who find themselves in an uncomfortable position.

As evidenced by nervous laughter. At the same time, nervous laughter is disarming when the situation becomes tense. A person can use well-timed laughter to defuse accumulated tension. In addition, laughter is a human reaction that is easy to imitate. Therefore, it can be used to hide stress from the casual observer. Nervous laughter may indicate that the topic under discussion is very important or painful for the speaker, and may indicate evasiveness or even deceit.

Nervous laughter helps buy time before you say something.

The verbal symptom of sighing has two main interpretations. Firstly, constant sighs during the conversation indicate that your interlocutor in this situation feels sorry for himself and may be depressed. I do not mean to say that he suffers from clinical depression and needs the services of a psychiatrist. Perhaps now he would like to distance himself from the situation or just end it and move on to another issue. A single deep breath after prolonged resistance or overtly aggressive behavior says that the internal emotional or cognitive battle is over. The person is ready to give up and accept the point of view of the interlocutor. Investigators often become witnesses of such sighs. After them, the suspects are ready to confess. This behavior is called "acceptance". The person no longer resists the truth or reality of the current situation.

Nervous laughter, what is it from?

Nervous laughter is one of the speech signals of the human body to a state of stress. It is a means of a kind of psychological protection that relieves stress and at the same time conceals the degree of anxiety experienced. In addition, nervous laughter helps buy time and figure out exactly how to act in this situation. The ability to use nervous laughter in a timely manner disarms the opponent, defuses the situation when the situation becomes extremely dangerous (for example, when they are going to teach a lesson to a presumptuous newcomer at school, a young soldier, or in the event of a meeting with robbers in a dark alley).

The photo captured natural nervous laughter before the first parachute jump.

Nervous laughter, usually from hopelessness. When a person realizes that he does not understand anything. When he cannot explain why he did this or that. In general, he does not understand what is happening. It seems scary, but he laughs. So to speak, a defensive reaction.

Nervous laughter

Nervous laughter is one of the most interesting speech signals used by a stressed person. Firstly, it both relieves stress and masks the degree of anxiety experienced. I'll give you an example. Watch teenagers go through a courtship ritual with a member of the opposite sex. Remember when you yourself were a giggling teenager? Nervous laughter performs almost the same function as whistling or talking to yourself while walking through a cemetery or a dark alley. Whistling calms a frightened person. Nervous laughter performs the same function in relation to those who find themselves in an uncomfortable position.

In addition, nervous laughter helps buy time before you say something. It gives the person a little extra time to think and prepare a safe response. It is not surprising that there are people who always start laughing or giggling before entering into a conversation. Laughter helps them determine their reaction to what is being said. I'll give you an example. A person may laugh before answering a question.

At the same time, nervous laughter is disarming when the situation becomes tense. A person can use well-timed laughter to defuse accumulated tension. In addition, laughter is a human reaction that is easy to imitate. Therefore, it can be used to hide stress from the casual observer. Nervous laughter may indicate that the topic under discussion is very important or painful for the speaker, and may indicate evasiveness or even deceit. Nervous laughter helps buy time before you say something.

You can learn more about the meaning of behavioral signals, the manifestation of gestures and emotions, as well as what manifestations are most characteristic in a given situation, depending on the experiences you are experiencing, from the materials in the Behavior Hunters section.

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Causes of development and symptoms of pathological affect

Pathological affect (synonyms: pseudobulbar affect (PBA), emotional lability, labile affect emotional incontinence) refers to neurological disorders characterized by involuntary egregious or uncontrolled bouts of crying, laughter or other emotional manifestations. PBA often occurs secondary to a neurological disease or brain injury.

Patients may show emotion unreasonably and uncontrollably, or their emotional response may be disproportionate to the importance of the cause capable of causing the disorder. The person is usually unable to stop himself for a few minutes. Episodes may appear inappropriately to the environment and not only in relation to negative emotions - the patient may laugh uncontrollably when angry or upset, for example.

Signs and symptoms of the disorder

The cardinal feature of the disorder is a pathologically reduced threshold for the behavioral response of laughing, crying, or both. The patient often exhibits episodes of laughing or crying without apparent motivation or in response to stimuli that would not have elicited such an emotional response prior to the onset of the underlying neurological disorder. In some patients, the emotional response is exaggerated in intensity, but the valence stimulus provoked matches the nature of the accompanying environmental circumstances. For example, the stimulus of sadness provokes a pathologically exaggerated state of unrestrained crying.

However, in some other patients, the nature of the emotional picture may be inconsistent and even contradict the emotional valence of the provoking stimulus. For example, the patient may laugh in response to sad news or cry in response to very mild stimuli. In addition, after provoking the situation, episodes may go from laughing to crying or vice versa.

Symptoms of pathological affect can be very severe and are characterized by constant and relentless episodes. The characteristics of the latter include:

The onset of an episode can be sudden and unpredictable, with many patients describing the condition as a complete seizure of thought and emotion.
Flashes have a typical duration from a few seconds to a few minutes, no more.
Episodes may occur several times a day.

Many patients with neurological impairment exhibit uncontrollable episodes of laughing, crying, or both, which are either exaggerated or contradictory to the context in which they occur. When patients have significant cognitive impairment, such as Alzheimer's disease, it may be unclear whether the symptom is a symptom of pathological affect or a gross form of emotional dysregulation. However, patients with intact cognition often report the symptom as an anxiety state leading to hysterics. Patients report that their episodes are, at best, only partially amenable to voluntary self-control, and, unless they experience major changes in mental status, are often aware of their problem and are quite aware of their condition as a disorder rather than a trait.

In some cases, the clinical impact of the pathological affect can be very severe, with relentless and persistent symptoms that can contribute to the unconsciousness of patients and significantly affect the quality of life for those around them.

Social Impact

PBA can have a significant impact on the social functioning of patients and their relationships with other people. Such sudden, frequent, extreme, uncontrolled emotional outbursts can lead to social isolation and interfere with daily activities, social and professional aspirations, and have a negative impact on the general health of the patient.

The emergence of uncontrolled emotions is commonly associated with many additional neurological disorders, such as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, Parkinson's disease, cerebral palsy, autism, epilepsy, and migraine. This can lead to serious problems in social adaptation and avoidance of social interactions by the patient, which in turn affects their mechanism for overcoming domestic obstacles.

Pathological affect and depression

Clinically, PBA is very similar to depressive episodes, however, the specialist must skillfully distinguish between these two pathological conditions, I know the main differences between them.

In depression and emotional incontinence in the form of crying, as a rule, is a sign of deep sadness, while pathological affect causes this symptom regardless of the main mood or significantly exceeds its lysitor stimulus. In addition, the key to differentiating depression from PBA is duration: episodes of sudden PBA occur in a short, episodic manner, while an episode of depression is a longer event and is closely related to the underlying mood state. The level of self-control, in both cases, is minimal or completely absent, however, in depression, emotional expression can be controlled by the situation. Similarly, crying episodes in patients with PBA may be triggered by a non-specific, minimal, or inappropriate situation, but in depression, the stimulus is specific to the mood state.

In some cases, depressed mood and PBA can coexist. Indeed, depression is one of the most common emotional changes in patients with illness or neurodegenerative post-stroke complications. As a result, depression often accompanies PBA. The presence of comorbidities implies that the present patient is more likely to have a pathological effect than depression.

Causes of PBA

Specific pathophysiological involvement in the frequent manifestation of this debilitating condition is under study. The primary pathogenetic mechanisms of PBA remain controversial today. One hypothesis emphasizes the role of the corticobulbar tract in the modulation of emotional expression and suggests that a pathological affect mechanism develops if there is a bilateral lesion in the descending corticobulbar tract. This condition causes the failure of voluntary control of emotions, which leads to the disinhibition or release of the latter through direct reactions of the centers of laughter or crying in the brain stem. Other theories suspect the involvement of the prefrontal cortex in the development of pathological affect.

Pseudobulbar can be a condition that occurs as a symptom of a secondary neurological disease or brain injury and is the result of malfunctions in the neural networks that control the generation and regulation of emotion engine power. PBA is most commonly seen in people with neurological injuries such as traumatic brain injury and stroke. In addition, neurological diseases such as dementia, including Alzheimer's disease, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), multiple sclerosis, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, Lyme disease and Parkinson's disease can be included in this group. There have been several reports that Graves' disease, or hypothyroidism, in combination with depression, often causes pathological affect.

PBA has also been observed in association with various other brain disorders, including brain tumor, Wilson's disease, syphilitic pseudobulbar palsy, and unspecified encephalitis. Less commonly, conditions associated with PBA include gelastic epilepsy, central pontine myelinolysis, lipid accumulation, exposure to chemicals (eg, nitrous oxide and insecticides), and Angelman's syndrome.

It is hypothesized that these primary neurological diseases and injuries can affect the flow of chemical signals in the brain, which in turn leads to disruption of the neurological pathways that control emotional expression.

PBA is one of the symptoms of post-stroke behavioral syndromes, with reported prevalence rates ranging from 28% to 52%. This combination is often found in elderly patients who have had a stroke. The relationship between post-stroke depression and PAD is complex, as depressive syndrome also occurs at a high frequency in stroke survivors. It is worth noting that the pathological affect is more pronounced in patients after a stroke, and the presence of a depressive syndrome can exacerbate the “crying” side of PBA symptoms.

Recent studies show that approximately 10% of MS patients experience at least one episode of emotional lability. PBA here is usually associated with the later stages of the disease (chronic progressive phase). Pathological affect in patients with multiple sclerosis is associated with more severe intellectual wear, disability and neurological disability.

Studies show that PBA in TBI survivors shows a prevalence of 5% or more with more severe head trauma, which is consistent with other neurological features indicative of pseudobulbar palsy.

Treatment

Psychological preparation of patients, their families or carers is an important component of the appropriate treatment of PAD. Crying associated with the disorder can be misinterpreted as depression, and laughter can occur in a situation that does not in any way imply such a reaction. Others need to understand that this is an involuntary syndrome. Traditionally, antidepressants such as sertraline, fluoxetine, citalopram, nortriptyline, and amitriptyline may be of some benefit in managing symptoms, but the disease is generally incurable.

Comments and reviews:

Nowadays, this happens more and more often, and I think primarily because of the large number of injuries. I believe that each of us should be aware of this topic in order to possibly help someone in the future.

When is laughter a medical symptom?

Uncontrolled, spontaneous, unreasonable, pathological laughter can be a medical symptom of serious health problems such as a brain tumor, stroke, Angelman's syndrome, Tourette's syndrome, as well as disorders of the nervous system due to drug abuse.

At first glance, the connection between laughter and illness seems strange. After all, we usually laugh when we are happy or find something funny. According to the science of happiness, intentional laughter can even lift our spirits and make us happy. But it's another matter if you're standing in line at the bank or at the supermarket, and suddenly someone suddenly and wildly laughs for no apparent reason. The laughing person may have a nervous tic, twitch, or appear slightly disoriented. A person can laugh and cry at the same time, while looking either childish or as a victim of violence.

If you began to laugh involuntarily and often, this may indicate a symptom such as pathological laughter. It is a sign of an underlying disease or pathological condition that usually affects the nervous system. Researchers are still eager to learn more about this phenomenon (pathological laughter is usually not associated with humor, or with fun, or any other expression of joy).

As you know, our brain is the control center of the nervous system. It sends signals that control involuntary actions such as breathing and heartbeat, as well as voluntary actions such as walking or laughing. If these signals go awry due to a chemical imbalance, abnormal brain growth, or a birth defect, bouts of involuntary laughter can occur.

Let's learn more about diseases and medical symptoms that may be accompanied by laughter, but not a smile.

Laughter due to illness

As a rule, any other signs of the disease are forced to seek help from patients or members of their families, but not laughter. However, laughter is sometimes a medical symptom that deserves close attention.

Here's an example: in 2007, a 3-year-old girl from New York began to behave quite unusually: periodically laugh and wince (as if in pain) at the same time. Doctors discovered that she had a rare form of epilepsy that caused involuntary laughter. Then they found a benign brain tumor in the girl and removed it. After the operation, the symptom of this tumor, involuntary laughter, also disappeared.

Surgeons and neurologists have repeatedly helped people with brain tumors or cysts to get rid of involuntary and uncontrollable fits of laughter. The fact is that the removal of these formations eliminates pressure on the areas of the brain that cause it. Acute stroke can also cause abnormal laughter.

Laughter is a symptom of Angelman syndrome, a rare chromosomal disorder that affects the nervous system. Patients often laugh because of the increased stimulation of the parts of the brain that control joy. Tourette syndrome is a neurobiological disorder that causes tics and involuntary vocal outbursts. People with Tourette syndrome usually do not need treatment unless their symptoms interfere with daily activities such as work or school. Medications and psychotherapy can help patients minimize their symptoms.

Laughter can also be a symptom of drug abuse or chemical dependency. In both cases, the damaged nervous system gives signals, including those that cause laughter. Dementia, feelings of anxiety, fear and restlessness can also cause involuntary laughter.

Prepared by Viktor Sukhov

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What is useful to know about children's laughter

Where did natural and artificial laughter come from, why does a child laugh when tickled, is it dangerous to laugh without a sound, and how to distinguish nervous laughter from a “chuckle”.

physiological laughter

Laughter is an innate human ability. Its first manifestations are visible on the 17th day of a child's life. Laughter - what is it? From a physiological point of view, these are involuntary movements of the muscles of the face, which may not necessarily be accompanied by sound. Many people mistake silent laughter for nervous laughter. No, it can rather be called a feature in which this reaction occurs without the involvement of the vocal cords. That is a kind of natural manner. You can't learn natural laughter. You can't artificially induce laughter.

Of course, this is a signal of pleasure and joy. Laughter is multidimensional and can be considered both as a physiological process and as an emotional reaction, as a communicative gesture, as a level of human culture. Laughter has its own history of development and cultural content. It appeared about 10 million years ago, and initially served as a signal indicating the absence of danger. Scientists are of the opinion that laughter as a physiological phenomenon was observed even in primates - with the help of laughter, they expressed victory and pleasure. Also during the struggle, they used laughter as a weapon to neutralize the danger.

From the point of view of physiologists, laughter is a manifestation of certain emotions and serves to defuse emotional tension. Laughter as a compensatory mechanism is opposed to fear and the seriousness of everyday life. For the same reason - ticklish laughter, for example. "Tickling" went to man from animals - this is a signal for the detection of insects on the skin. And a person laughs when tickled just because of a genetic danger - this is reflex laughter, and it is caused by a very high level of nervous tension.

social laughter

The child, as he grows up, learns to use laughter as a socialization mechanism. At the initial stage of a child's life, laughter indicates a good mood, which undoubtedly pleases parents. Further mastery of this skill can be alarming or even upsetting for parents.

Parents may observe intentionally attracting attention to themselves through laughter, intentionally "squeezing out" laughter, adjusting to another child or group of children. A child can laugh at the trouble of another child - all these are issues related to education. They are solved by explaining the behavior accepted in a given family and society.

Laughter is a cultural phenomenon.

English or, for example, Japanese children will not laugh at what a Russian child will laugh at. And vice versa.

As they grow older, children along with natural laughter (an expression of joy, pleasant surprise, reaction to surprise) master the skill of artificial laughter - laughing at jokes. First, children imitate adults - hear them laugh at jokes, bring adult jokes to kindergarten or school, laugh themselves and teach or force other children to laugh. As a rule, they learn from the leader: the leader laughed - everyone else laughed.

Laughter is a complex, multifunctional phenomenon.

In terms of culture and communicative gestures, laughter is influenced by age, gender, education, language and cultural values: what is funny for some may cause sadness for others.

Laughter, performing social functions helps a person to become a part of society:

Laughter is an expression of inner joy and excitement.
Laughter to relieve stress.
Laughter to create or reduce social distance.
The laughter shared by the members of the group testifies to its cohesion, unanimity.
Laughter can be used to show devotion to someone.
Laughter is an attention grabber.
Laughter as a mask for experiences and true intentions.
Laughter to humiliate an opponent.

Nervous laughter

There is a state of "a laugh in the mouth" - let the child laugh. If it happens in the wrong place, let it come out. Who hasn't been in this situation?

How can parents distinguish between the states of “a laugh in the mouth” and “nervous laughter”? The first phenomenon is quite rare, episodic. "Nervous laughter" has other shades: it is sharp, it may be accompanied by a "sore throat" and it is constant. "Nervous laughter" accompanies the child's heightened agitation. If you observe a complex of symptoms, then you need to pay attention to your behavior, maybe you are harsh or rude to a child; maybe the child does not develop relationships with peers, and he needs the help of adults, a psychologist; You may need to consult a neurologist.

The child may also experience the following:

Fun and joyful mood that cannot be stopped. Usually it turns into increased motor activity, which ends in physical trauma (the child falls, collides with someone or something) and tears (reset of nervous excitation).

Sudden tears. An increased positive emotional background, unexpectedly for everyone, begins to be accompanied by tears, the so-called "laughter through tears." Such behavior of the child indicates that in the central nervous system the processes of excitation predominate over the processes of inhibition. When such moments appear in behavior, it is necessary to seek help from a psychoneurologist.

Laughter has several components. Jak Panksepp, to whom I will mainly refer, identifies three: laughter itself (contractions of the diaphragm, vocalizations), a feeling of joy, and a sense of "understanding" the joke, if it is a question of laughter caused by humor. The first part can be caused, for example, by tickling. There is evidence that the first and second parts are closely related, because even thinking about laughter or reproducing it artificially, you can cheer yourself up (see, for example, Clynes M., Sentics: the touch of emotions, 1978).

Laughter as a motor act, like almost any other behavior, is caused by several areas of the brain working together. There are centers that integrate signals from these different zones, as well as centers that suppress "laughter activity". Therefore, by stimulating/damaging different areas, it is possible to induce "ready" laughter, with the entire program of muscle movements that are required for this. This laughter may or may not contain the second component of laughter (a feeling of joy). For example, disinhibitory damage to the corticobulbar tract (descending repressive signals from the cortex to the medulla oblongata) is very effective in producing pathological laughter. But stimulation of some areas of the subcortical nuclei or an additional motor zone in the frontal cortex can lead to laughter with joy.

In the joy of laughter per se, the reward system seems to be involved, which is based mainly in the midbrain. As with many other "joyful" aspects of behavior and perception, this area of the brain receives "positive" information from the cortex and responds to it by releasing chemicals involved in the formation of positive emotions. That is, for laughter to be pleasant, the cortex must connect with the deeper, older, and more stupid parts of the brain and tell them why we, in fact, laugh.

Finally, the third component is the understanding of the joke, that is, the transformation of semantics into physiology. It is not surprising that the frontal lobes of the brain, the highest in the hierarchy in our brain, are primarily associated with this component of humor/laughter. Especially those that are involved in the perception and production of language - Broca's area in the left hemisphere, for example.

But here the most interesting question arises: what is the understanding of a joke? Why is a joke funny? And why is laughter the same motor (and, in general, emotional) reaction to completely different stimuli: an anecdote and a tickle, for example?

According to Panksepp (and many others), there is a unifying principle in all cases of laughter: it is a signal of non-dangerous social incongruity (incongruence - inconsistency, surprise). Social - because laughter alone is a rarity. The average person laughs thirty times more in front of other people. Non-dangerous - because if there is danger, laughter is suppressed. Incongruity is the most important thing. This is what combines tickling and anecdotes. In a joke, one model of reality is created, and then it abruptly overturns. The essence of tickling is that you do not know where you will be tickled. It is impossible to tickle yourself. By the way, the only category of people who can do this is schizophrenics. They seem to have two different people in their heads, and one can tickle the other in such a way that it is a surprise for the other.

Why is all this necessary? There are two versions of the evolutionary origin of laughter. The first is that laughter is information. "It's a game" or "it was a game". Play is a fundamental learning mechanism in all mammals with social behavior and is accompanied by laughter-like vocalizations, even in rats. Laughter can be a signal to another animal that the attack is actually make-believe, which means that it does not require an aggressive reaction. Another version (see Owren & Bachorowski, Journal of Nonverbal Behavior, 2003) is that laughter is like a mental virus. Laughter is very contagious, at least in humans. Perhaps it evolved not just to communicate good intentions, but to evoke them. That is, when you laugh yourself, you make other individuals also laugh and tune in positively towards you. That is, it is like aggression in reverse. This can explain, for example, nervous laughter in an uncomfortable situation: a person tries to break through social difficulties with his diaphragm.