Could laughter become part of your new workout routine? Not exactly, but you could reap some of the same rewards, according to a new study.
Though there is no substitute for a grueling run or intense weight session, researchers suggest a hearty laugh can lower bad cholesterol, blood pressure and stress hormones, strengthen the immune system and improve mood.
In research presented in late April at the 2010 Experimental Biology conference in California, lead investigator Lee Berk says there is something to be said for getting a case of the giggles.
“We found that a healthy chuckle can also increase your appetite in a similar way to moderate exercise,” said the preventive care specialist and laughter researcher at Loma Linda University in California.
Stress relief from laughter?
The benefits from laughter are no joke — a good sense of humor won’t cure all your ills, but there’s growing data on the positive things giggling can do.
Short-term benefits
* Stimulate your organs. Laughter enhances your intake of oxygen-rich air, stimulates your heart, lungs and muscles, and increases endorphins.
* Activate and relieve your stress response. A rollicking laugh fires up and then cools down your stress response and increases your heart rate and blood pressure.
* Soothe tension and stomachaches. Laughter can also ease digestion and stimulate circulation.
Long-term effects
* Relieve pain. Laughter may ease pain by causing the body to produce its own natural painkillers.
* Increase personal satisfaction. Laughter can also make difficult situations a little bit easier.
Source: mayoclinic.com/health/stress-relief/SR00034
To determine the effects of laughter on appetite, Berk and his colleagues measured the levels of two hormones in 14 volunteers before and after they watched 20 minutes of a distressing or funny video clip. One hormone, called ghrelin, increases food cravings, while the other, called leptin, tells the brain that you’re satiated. Previous research has already established a clear link between these hormones and appetite.
During the study, the volunteers either watched the bloody and potentially upsetting battle scene opening in “Saving Private Ryan” or viewed a scene from a comedy or a standup comedian, such as Bill Cosby, Jerry Seinfeld or Jeff Foxworthy. After one week, each volunteer switched and watched a video from the other genre. The researchers took blood pressure measurements and blood samples immediately before and after watching the videos.
Berk found that watching the distressing video had no influence on the participants’ appetite hormones or blood pressure. However, after watching the funny video, their appetite hormone levels changed as if they had been exercising — gherlin levels rose by 15 percent, while leptin levels dropped by about 9 percent, causing a spike in hunger. Berk also found the same fluctuation in gherlin and leptin levels when the volunteers simply anticipated watching the funny video.
Berk stresses that laughing will not make your appetite skyrocket above normal levels and cause overeating. “Laughing just helps your body establish its optimum rhythms,” he says.
Berk suggests that this finding has potential therapeutic value for treating patients who have chronic depression or “wasting disease” — a debilitating condition in which patients wither away because they have lost his or her appetite and are too physically ill to exercise. Although potentially difficult to achieve, getting these depressed patients to laugh may offer a unique way to help rehabilitate them.
“As the saying goes, laughter may, in fact, be the best kind of medicine,” Berk says. “We have a pharmacy on our shoulders but we need to figure out how to best utilize it.”
