Are you laughing Uncontrollably?

Hey, have you ever laughed at someone else’s pain? Come on, now be honest. What about chuckling at a joke? You didn’t actually think was funny or even understand. The list goes on and on when we’re talking about situations when we laugh but they don’t have anything to do with something being funny. The real question is, why do we do it? 

There are countless memes gifts, even entire TV shows and movies where the whole point is to make us laugh at other people’s mishaps. But in real life it’s unlikely that we crack up at something as unfortunate or dangerous. This in fact we’d probably be emotionally scarred and if we did laughs, it wouldn’t be because we thought it was funny.

Researchers found that only 10 to 20% of laughter is a genuine response to a shared Joe that leaves a whole 80 to 90% of laughter unaccounted for according to neuroscientist dr. Robert probe a laughter is mostly something we do more when we’re together. Then when we’re alone Dr. Provine also says that it’s ingrained in our DNA. It’s intuitive and instinctual. We were born knowing how to laugh and we use it to connect to other humans, so that 80 to 90% of unaccounted. For laughter is when people are laughing because something isn’t funny. Any guesses as to what the other reasons could be. If you said sadness, fear, nervousness and awkward feeling seeing something that makes you uncomfortable or something of that nature, then you were spot-on.

Speaking of awkward laughter? Why is it that we sometimes laugh when were uncomfortable? I think all of us can remember a time when we interacted with someone. We didn’t know well or who made us feel on easy. So we just laughed it off.

Laughing in the awkward

Laughing in the awkward – sense often helps us deal with things that mostly stem from Fear. Dr. Margee Kerr a sociologist from the University of Pittsburgh who specializes in the study of fear and wrote a book called scream chilling. Adventures in the science of fear. Says that we laugh at things like this because they violate our expectations. Basically, we get scared when things don’t go as we expect them to in an extreme sense, we could actually be laughing because we’re in physical shock and are in denial. About the situation, we’re witnessing.

It’s a way to mentally, run away from our fear and literally laugh it off. It’s a comforting mechanism to calm down our mind in a high-stress situation.

This Is why horror movies that use kids or animals’ things that are supposed to be cute and make us? Happy are, especially terrifying to us and we might even nervously laugh, when watching things of this nature, it’s said that fear and laughter are very closely related when we’re talking about mental state. According to dr. Kerr they’re both what she calls. High arousal States in other words times when we’re feeling some really intense emotions, it then makes sense that the brain might use these two things interchangeably in this highly charged state.

Does laughing scares you?

But why do certain types of laughter scare us? Like the guy with that haunting laugh, who narrates Michael Jackson Thriller video? Or a robot that unexpectedly laughs. Why would a robot laugh? They don’t feel things, so we expect them to be stoic. Apparently not too long ago. Amazon’s Alexa virtual assistant had a glitch and just started laughing in people’s homes. Completely unprovoked and unasked-for, can you imagine how utterly terrifying that would be Amazon claims?

That Alexa thought people were saying Alexa? Laughs obviously this incident didn’t fail to completely freak. Some people out perhaps a I really is becoming self-aware and learning how to a moat. Do you have an iPhone or Google home device? Are you nervously laughing yet? We also sometimes laugh when we’re sad. Helena Bala wrote an article for man repeller.com, the starts off describing a group of older women laughing at a funeral.

Have you ever laughed during an intensely sad and emotional moment? Like the old saying goes, if we don’t laugh, we cry. Bala describes laughter as the great equalizer. Almost like a reset button. It neutralizes that intense, emotion was experiencing. She explains that our brain responds to this emotional overload by releasing stress in the form of laughter.

Actually, laughing is stress remover but….

I know it’s not the best way to de-stress and a really sad situation, but it does work for the body. Our system even stops releasing cortisol. The stress hormone as a result of this stress induced laughter. It’s almost like your own body is trying to trick you into entering a stress-free state that is when you’re happy and laugh. Laughing.

There’s actually a term in Psychology for this laugh reaction. It’s aptly called the inappropriate effect. By allowing us to laugh in the face of a stressor. Our subconscious is trying to soothe us and assure us that everything is fine but because the situation doesn’t call for it by societal or cultural expectations. You know you just don’t laugh at a funeral. It comes off so weird and even rude. That’s white nervous. Laughter can end up having the opposite effect. It makes a person feel even more stressed out, but these two types of laughter are totally different. They even come from different parts of the body. Nervous, laughter originates in the throat rather than in the Torso or belly like Real laughter does.

Psychological reasons are more clear

Psychologically, speaking motivations for nervous, laughter can be for reasons like embarrassment, discomfort or confusion. It’s a verifiable physical reaction to anxiety, stress, tension, and disorientation. For some laughter is an attempt to take control of an uncontrollable situation. They’re in. It’s often a crutch for shy people, that helps them alleviate some of the social anxiety. They might be feeling when stepping out of their comfort zone and interacting with others. Sometimes laughter can just provide relief from a tough day at work or school.

Laughing in the positive sense is supposed to be contagious and make us feel good and it certainly accomplishes this task. It’s a method. We used to connect to others. It lifts our mood, and it creates Good Vibes. Realizing that you share a sense of humor with someone, which is something that’s really specific and unique. To each person is an easy way to recognize the common ground. You might have with a stranger or acquaintance. Therefore, it can be a really quick bridge to Friendship. What type of effect laughter can have on our pain tolerance, there were two groups, both of which had to go through painful procedures, where their pain tolerance was recorded. They were then split up one group was shown boring videos.

Well, the other read funny posts, it turned out that the group that spent their time watching. Funny videos, and laughing actually saw their pain tolerance, go up the group that watched the boring videos. On the other hand, saw their pain tolerance go down. This means that laughter really is the best medicine. You were waiting for that one, more until now.

So next time you find yourself laughing nervously during a really sad awkward scary or even painful situation. Just remember that your body is trying to soothe itself from the stress and discomfort. I know it kind of makes you feel bad and weird. What according to science it’s totally natural. Hmm. So which kinds of interactions or situations make you laugh, awkwardly let us know down in the comments.