Laughter is great for your brain, and the more chances you get to have a genuine laugh, the better your overall health is going to be. “Laughter is the best medicine” is not just a popular saying; it has ample scientific backing too. It has multiple health benefits – for example improving immunity and the cardiovascular system – but its effects on the brain are truely amazing
Laughter is one of those things that benefit our brain in both social and individual scales. Whether you are laughing with others, or laughing alone, it has separate benefits for you, although they sometime overlap. Here are some of the things that laughter does to your brain:
- Lowers stress and pain – Laughter can work wonders for stress relief. Studies have shown that muscles stay relaxed for up to 45 minutes after a good, hearty laugh. Laughing also stabilises the flow of stress hormones like cortisol and epinephrine. Laughter has also been linked to the production of endorphins, which is considered the natural pain killer of the body.
- Helps learning and motivation – Laughter has an important role to play in the reward circuitry of our brains. Laughter produces Dopamine, known as the ‘reward hormone’, and responsible for regulating mood, motivation, learning and attention. The influx of Dopamine activates the reward circuit in brain, making us feel good and positive, and also motivated to move forward. When in a stressful and dead-end situation, try taking a few minutes off to share a laugh with co-workers, or maybe watch a stand-up routine. You’ll find renewed motivation and focus when you go back to work.
- Prevents short-term memory loss – Stress is bad for your short-term memory, especially when you are getting older. We tend to forget many things which should be ideally available to our working memory, like where we put our keys or the name of a particular thing, when we are under a lot of stress. Laughter can enormously help you with that. In a study conducted by researchers in Loma Linda University in Southern California, 40 older adults were tested for memory and stress levels in controlled condition. 20 of them were given a funny video to watch for 20 minutes before they took the tests, and 20 other were simply made to sit calmly. The people who watched the funny video and had laughed, performed better in short-term memory tests and their stress levels too were significantly lower.
Laughter is good for you in every way. It’s uncomplicated, it’s instinctive, and it has the power of bringing people together almost instantly. Let’s pledge to laugh, and spread laughter, a little more. Our brain needs it, and so does society.