Effects of mirthful laughter on pain tolerance: A randomized controlled investigation

Chronic pain is a debilitating condition that affects many people. Currently, there is no single treatment known to cure or assure relief from chronic pain. Accordingly, the management of patients’ discomfort is an integral part of treating chronic pain. Such treatment, however, is not effective for...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of bodywork and movement therapies 2019-10, Vol.23 (4), p.733-738
Main Authors: Lapierre, Stephanie S., Baker, Brett D., Tanaka, Hirofumi
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Comedy
Delayed onset muscle soreness
Humor
Pain
Positive affect
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Summary:Chronic pain is a debilitating condition that affects many people. Currently, there is no single treatment known to cure or assure relief from chronic pain. Accordingly, the management of patients’ discomfort is an integral part of treating chronic pain. Such treatment, however, is not effective for many patients. We investigated whether mirthful laughter provided by comic relief can influence pain tolerance and muscle soreness in young healthy participants. Forty participants underwent a randomized controlled cross-over designed experiment. Each participant was exposed to a comedy video eliciting mirthful laughter and an uninteresting documentary. Delayed onset muscle soreness was induced in one leg at a time by eccentric exercise. Pain tolerance was tested using blunt force application and assessed subjectively using a visual analog scale. Watching the comedy video elicited a significantly greater irregular breathing pattern compared with watching the documentary video (p 
ISSN:1360-8592
1532-9283
DOI:10.1016/j.jbmt.2019.04.005