The Benefits of Humor for Our Health Essay

"Successively, Selekman explains that fostering therapist-client cooperation is purposive use of self-disclosure, the use of humor, normalizing, demonstrating cultural and gender sensitivity, and therapeutic compliments. Mark Twain once said, 'Against the assault of laughter nothing can stand.' Humor can help generate a relaxed atmosphere, influence the client from his or her concerns, and heal those in pain. Madanes (1984) contend that what makes change possible is the therapist's ability to be confident and to see what is funny or desirable in a dire situation'. Laughter releases hormones from the

Starting a new job can be stressful, but workplace humor is a key aspect that can have a calming effect on the nerves experienced during that first day and those to come. Unfortunately, humor in the workplace has its downsides as well. Prior to incorporating humor in the workplace, it is important to assess the situation and the audience in order to determine whether it would be appropriate to tell certain jokes. After adapting to the environment and members of the organization, however, the use of negative humor may occur more often since new and preexisting coworkers have adjusted to each other. As with many other communication tools, humor must be used appropriately and effectively or else the message might be misinterpreted, which could

Central Idea/ Thesis statement: There are several benefits of laughter in terms of physical, mental and social.

People always say that laughter alleviates tension. If this is the case, then it makes sense that the use of humor when discussing uncomfortable topics can make the conversation easier and more light-hearted. One of Mark Twain’s most frequently used devices in works such as “Advice to Youth”, “To the Person Sitting in Darkness”, and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is satire, which can provide society a method to bond over uncomfortable topics, and facilitate the ability to sustain that bond through an easier way to create discussion.

Humor is viewed by some people as an important part of life. Most people enjoy amusement, and some turn to humorists as a source for that amusement. Some further view humorists as holding an important position in society because society allows humorists to say things that others can and will not say. Due to their unique position in society, humorists serve a role that is certainly unique and can be important, but not vital. Furthermore, humor can very well have a dangerous side, whether intentional or unintentional, so humorists should try to be careful with their powerful position.

Most often as people age, life happens, and their social world changes; therefore, so do their sources for humor. Thankfully researchers observed that less humor led to a less enjoyable life. One particular study of “laughter therapy” done by Kuru and Kublay showed positive outcomes in nursing home residents. The National Cancer Institute defines laughter therapy as one that “uses humor to relieve pain and improve well-being. It may include laughter exercises, clowns, and comedy movies, books, games, and puzzles.” Kuru and Kublay concluded that “[a]fter the laughter therapy intervention, general and subscales (physical functioning, role-physical, bodily pain, general health, vitality, social functioning, role-emotional and spiritual health) quality-of-life scores of residents in the experimental group significantly increased in comparison with the pretest.” If nothing else, this conclusion should motivate nursing home administrators to incorporate some type of laughter or humor therapy into the daily schedule of their

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to examine the effects of laughter/humor therapy on the outcomes of the adult patient population including biological, psychological, and the nurse-patient relationship, by analyzing current research. Implementation of complimentary

In this study, research is conducted to evaluate numerous activities to implement humor in pediatric clinical settings as well as determining the appropriate and inappropriate use of humor in the various stages of childhood development. However, little scientific research is done about using humor as a coping strategy and it is impressively supported

The student has strived to be able to use humor to ease tense situations in their own life while still portraying attentiveness, understanding, and loving. This research has helped the student to realize that attempting to make the people in their personal lives laugh and have a moment of less anxiety, can be translated into their future profession. The student is interested in supplementing their traditional schooling with courses such as The Laughing Body: The Art of Care and other related courses taught at The Gesundheit Institute. The student expects that the use of humor in their practice will both help ease their own tension and also the stresses of the friends they make throughout their

Second. Humor as Tension Reliever Humor prevents mistaken behavior and helps defuse problems to occur. Humor also relieves tension. As long as it is not at the expense of the child, a sense of humor complements firmness that teachers sometimes must show, and helps children and teachers alike put mistaken behavior in perspective.

One reason is that a good sense of humor may lead to emotional stability overall, the ability to look at the positive side of an issue (McGee & Shevlin, 2009). Men reported a sense of humor as desirable too, in addition to attractiveness and health, and there was not much difference between the genders (McGee & Shevlin, 2009). It is also thought that a good sense of humor is counted as socially attractive and this is why it is perceived as a healthy quality to have. The participants will also seek out their own attributes, as the participants rated themselves as having a sense of humor which was above average (McGee & Shevlin, 2009).

At the beginning of 13th century Humor has been used in the treatment. Surgeons used it to distract patients from pain during the surgery, also in the 20th century, theyapproachedtothe scientific study of the influence of laughter on physical and emotional wellness, The story of Norman Cousins who with Chronic disease and prolonged pain. Cousins has cured himself with the regimen of laughter and vitamins and he cured his cancer. Cousins wrote a book “Anatomy of an Illness (1979)”, which in this book he describes, watched comedy movies and this helped Cousins to cure himself, some scientists claim that cancer can be treated with laughter Therapy since in the most cases the stress is the major cause of cancer and laughter suppresses the stress.

Kuiper, Comeau, Klein & Maiolino (2014) conducted a study in which humor styles were examined on a sample of 94 first-year undergraduate students. The researchers pointed out that the inability to use affiliative humor prevents an individual to use this humor style to manage stress accompanied in social situations and results in increased rumination about negative emotions. In addition, it was also found that the use of self-defeating humor results in negative evaluation from others and social isolation, and thus, aggravate perceived stress.

While there is a limited number of resources that have done extensive studies on the topic of humor in persuasion there was a large push for this information in the late 80’s and early 90’s. Part of the difficulty with getting scientific data on the subject of humor is due to the subjectivity of humor. It is difficult to perform a test with experimentation that will be considered humorous by all of the participants. It is also difficult to interpret the results because of this. While the subject is slightly lacking in proper research it is still an important aspect to consider

For as long as I have been in school, there has been a negative stigma around laughing and making jokes in the classroom. As a potential psychology major, I am quite fascinated with why our brains work the way they do, and how they grow, develop, and learn. That is why I was so intrigued when research came out claiming that appropriate humor can be used as a tool in the classroom by alleviating anxiety, stress, and helping relate the content by using funny, real world examples. When an instructor successfully uses humor, the learning environment that is created can be a catalyst for success.