Free The Definitive Book of Body Language by Barbara Pease, Allan Pease Page A

aerobic workout equal to that of a ten-minute session on a rowing machine. Medically speaking, this is why a damn good laugh is damn good for you.
    The older we become, the more serious we become

about life. An adult laughs an average of fifteen times a day

a preschooler laughs an average of four hundred times.
     

Why You Should Take Laughter Seriously
     
    Research shows that people who laugh or smile, even when they don't feel especially happy, make part of the “happy zone” in the brain's left hemisphere surge with electrical activity. In one of his numerous studies on laughter, Richard Davidson, professor of psychology and psychiatry at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, hooked subjects up to EEG (electroencephalograph) machines, which measure brain-wave activity, and showed them funny movies. Smiling made their happy zones click wildly. He proved that intentionally producing smiles and laughter moves brain activity toward spontaneous happiness.
    Arnie Cann, professor of psychology at the University of North Carolina, discovered that humor has a positive impact in counteracting stress. Cann led an experiment with people who were showing early signs of depression. Two groups watched videos over a three-week period. The group that watched comedy videos showed more improvement in their symptoms than did a control group that watched nonhumorous videos. He also found that people with ulcers frown more than people without ulcers. If you catch yourself frowning, practice putting your hand on your forehead when you talk, to train yourself out of it.

Why We Laugh and Talk, but Chimps Don't
     
    Robert Provine, professor of psychology at the University of Maryland, Baltimore, found that human laughter is different from that of our primate cousins. Chimpanzee laughter sounds like panting, with only one sound made per outward or inward breath. It's this one-to-one ratio between breath cycle and vocalization that makes it impossible for most primates to speak. When humans began walking upright, it freed the upper body from weight-bearing functions and allowed better breath control. As a result, humans can chop an exhalation and modulate it to produce language and laughter. Chimps can have linguistic concepts, but they can't physically make the sounds of language. Because we walk upright, humans have a huge range of freedom in the sounds we make, including speech and laughter.

How Humor Heals
     
    Laughter stimulates the body's natural painkillers and “feel good” enhancers, known as endorphins, helping relieve stress and heal the body. When Norman Cousins was diagnosed with the debilitating illness ankylospondylitis, the doctors told him they could no longer help him and that he would live in excruciating pain before he died. Cousins checked into a hotel room and rented every funny movie he could find: the Marx Brothers,
Airplane, The Three Stooges
, etc. He watched and re-watched them over and over, laughing as hard and loud as he could. After six months of this self-inflicted laughter therapy, the doctors were amazed to find that his illness had been completely cured—the disease was gone! This amazing outcome led to the publishing of Cousins's book
Anatomy of an Illness
, and the start of massive research into the function of endorphins. Endorphins are chemicals released from the brain when you laugh. They have a similar chemical composition to morphine and heroin and have a tranquilizing effect on the body, while building the immune system. This explains why happypeople rarely get sick and miserable but complaining people often seem to be ill.

Laughing Till You Cry
     
    Laughter and crying are closely linked from a psychological and physiological standpoint. Think of the last time someone told you a joke that made you buckle up with laughter and you could hardly control yourself. How did you feel afterward? You felt a tingling sensation all over, right? Your brain released endorphins into your system that gave