The Psychology of Forced and Spontaneous Laughter

"Laughter is the best medicine!" We may have heard this familiar phrase either in the exact or different contexts for years. There could be a reason why this phrase is still relevant today and it is usually due to the effects laughter has on our moods. Besides the fact that laughter requires no prescription or extreme efforts to perform it, we cannot deny that a good laugh can be an enjoyable thing to have. One interesting phenomenon is that sometimes we find ourselves trying to laugh or being forced to laugh instead of having it comes spontaneously. If laughter does not come spontaneously, why do we do it and would we still be able to receive anything out of it? If so, how would the results compared to the common spontaneous laughter? Interestingly, there has not been much definite research into this common phenomenon in terms of the exact mechanism and actual health benefits.

Because forcing ourselves to laugh is a conscious task, there should be a form of cognitive control undergoing the process. A related research by Wegner, D. M., Erber, R., Zanakos, S. (1993) focused on the ironic processes in the mental control of mood. Based on the ironic process theory, which states that people are unable to achieve the outlook they desire when they do not have adequate mental capacity, the researchers hypothesized that people would be able to control their mood if they were not distracted by a cognitive task. This is then operationalized by having participants to first reflect their thoughts about a happy or sad event, and then either make themselves feel positive, negative, or given no instructions. Some participants were also asked to remember a 9-digit number. After the self-report mood assessment, the results showed that mood control was generally effective, except for the 9-digit-task subjects. This exception led the researchers to conclude cognitive tasks can interfere with the ability to control one's mood.

Another study, probably much more closely related to the phenomenon of forced laughter is the study by Foley, E., Matheis, R., Schaefer, C. (2002). This study was conducted to determine whether forced laughter would improve one's mood. The researcher hypothesized that a brief period of forced laughter would improve the participants' moods. Participants were asked to laugh for 1 minute. Before and after the minute of laughter, participants assessed their moods. Mood was determined by having participants select one of seven faces to indicate their mood. The faces ranged from a broad smile to a broad frown. The results indicated that participants were generally in a positive mood prior to the experiment. After the laughing task, participants showed a significant increase in mood. The researchers conclude that 1 minute of forced laughter may significantly improve mood, even when a person already has a positive outlook.

Sometimes, the reasons why we force ourselves to laugh are due to the external environment that we are in, the influence of others' laughter, and the social pressures that come along with it. For this reason, a related study by Neuhoff, C., & Schaefer, C. (2002) actually controlled for the effects of spontaneous laughter and laughter in a social setting. This study was conducted to compare the effects of forced laughter, with smiling and howling, on mood. Participants were tested individually in three conditions. Participants were asked to smile, laugh or howl for 1 minute. Each participant completed a mood assessment before and after each condition. Mood was determined using self-reports by having participants select one of seven faces to indicate their current mood. The faces ranged from a broad smile to a broad frown. Howling did not significantly enhance mood, but smiling and laughing enhanced mood. Laughing improved mood more than smiling. The researchers conclude that adults can temporarily improve their mood by pretending to be happy for a minute, even when they are not in a social setting.

With these related studies and their suggestions in mind, there was still a missing principal not being discussed. Wegner, D. M., Erber, R., Zanakos, S. focused on mood control, with the underlying theory of ironic process. Foley, E., Matheis, R., Schaefer, C. and Neuhoff, C., & Schaefer, C. both focused on forced laughter on mood in different settings. However, the missing principal that they did not discuss is the comparison of forced laughter versus spontaneous laughter. For certain, both kinds of laughter can enhance mood, but which one can enhance better? Therefore, based on the theoretical hypothesis that since spontaneous laughter can enhance mood, we can also enhance our mood by consciously forcing ourselves to laugh, the curiosity of which form of laughter can enhance mood better needs to be operationalized. A possible way of operationalizing this is to have participants rate their current and after moods in response to certain stimuli. The stimuli, in this case, can represent the different settings of spontaneous versus forced laughter. The way we can compare these two forms of laughter is to look at how much each can enhance the mood of the participants. With this in mind, the IV would be forced laughter and spontaneous laughter, and the DV would be the mood being measured after the tasks. The operational hypothesis, then, would be that both spontaneous and forced laughter will yield the same increments in mood enhancements.