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Health and Humor

AATH: Association of Applied and Therapeutic Humor

Their 2016 Annual Meeting will be in Mesa, Arizona

By Alleen Nilsen and Don Nilsen

The Nilsens at the 2014 AATH ConferenceRed Skelton Museum in Vincennes, Indiana

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The Bible tells us “A merry heart doeth good like a medicine; but a broken spirit drieth the bones.”

Of course this picture of our laughing grandson makes us want to believe that laughter is good for people.

Modern writers who have explored the idea include:• Patch Adams• Regina Barecca• Rod Martin• Mary Kay Morrison• Paul McGhee• Norman Cousins• William Fry• Vera Robinson• Patty Wooten

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Patty Wooten as Nancy Nurse

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http://www.jesthealth.com

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Rod Martin, and his colleagues in Canada have found that:

1. Affiliative and self-enhancing humor is potentially beneficial.

2. Aggressive and self-defeating humor is potentially detrimental.

3. Anyone doing research with humor and health needs to be aware of these differences.

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Martin also works with “A State-and- Trait Cheerfulness Inventory.”

• It defines a sense of humor as an emotional temperament (i.e., the tendency to be habitually cheerful and playful), which is consistent with the way humor is most often conceptualized in the humor and health literature.

• However, Martin warns against “simplistic, exaggerated, and unsubstantiated research.” He is especially critical of methodological weaknesses in the research on humor and the immune system.

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A Sense of Humor Questionnaire was administered to all 65,000

adults in one county in Norway

•Researchers were searching for correlations were between a person’s sense of humor and illness symptoms such as nausea, diarrhea, pounding heart, muscular-skeletal pain, blood pressure, overall health satisfaction, and obesity.

•After controlling for age, no meaningful relationships were found between sense of humor and other illness symptoms.

• The researchers concluded that although high-humor individuals do not seem to have objectively better health, they are somewhat more subjectively satisfied with their health.

• Martin concluded that despite reports in the popular media, the research findings on health benefits of humor and laughter were not as strong, consistent or unambiguous as is commonly believed.

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Paul McGhee, in his The Laughter Remedy: Health, Healing, and the Amuse System, takes these kinds of criticism into his book

but nevertheless advises:

“Become more playful; surround

yourself with humor you enjoy. Begin telling jokes and

funny stories. And laugh at yourself.”

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Definition of “calories”:

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Two “Answers” to the Calories Problem

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They’re too beautiful to eat.

John Morreall writes about the power of hearty laughter in the way that it . . .

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• increases blood circulation,• ventilates the lungs, • increases oxygen intake, • reduces water vapor and carbon

dioxide in the lungs, • and decreases the risk of pulmonary

infection.But Rod Martin cautions that hearty laughter may also

have deleterious effects because while extroverts tend to laugh more, they also are likely to drink alcohol, to smoke cigarettes, and to be obese.

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• John Morreall, in his writing explains that the relief theory has two forms. Humor can be a relief from pre-existing nervous energy as when rambunctious kids are forced to sit quietly for a long time. Once the pressure is off, they often resort to horseplay, buffoonery, and laughter.

• The second kind is the “set-up” for a joke or cartoon that may require concentration, attention to detail, and emotional engagement. The punch line is a release of either type of pent-up energy. For an example he gives:– I had written to Aunt Maud–Who was on a trip abroad– Then I heard she’d died of cramp,– Just too late to save the stamp.

Conundrums:

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Other Research Findings• Humorous laughter lowers the level of stress

hormones (epinephrine, cortisol, dopac, and growth hormone).

• In the brain, catecholamines are secreted, which may increase alertness, reduce inflammation, and trigger the release of endorphins, the brain’s natural opiates.

• This may account for the reduction of pain as reported by researchers including Norman Cousins and Ofra Nevo, who does research in Israel.

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Ironic Truths:

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If Humor Is So Good For Us, Where Can We Find It?

• One place is at Alcoholics Anonymous meetings where humor helps transcend the moment and attain a broader perspective.

• One member told how even when she was drunk or hung over, she tried to be what society expected her to be. She volunteered to help with her son’s Cub Scout troop on a day they were sewing moccasins.

• Of course she got a laugh when she reported, “I remember sewing it, honest-to-God I can still feel it, onto my finger.”

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Clowns have a long history dating from the 15th and 16th centuries and the Italian commedia

dell’arte.

Shakespearean Harlequin Modern Scary Clown

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All Cultures Have ClownsIt takes nothing more than a prop of some kind to turn ordinary people into clowns.

More formal clowns include circus performers and character clowns.

• Charlie Chaplin was world-famous because he did not rely on language.

• Sports mascots are also clowns as they mime in huge arenas, wear over-sized costumes, do acrobatics, and use huge props.

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Clowns Loved by Our Grandparents

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•Emmett Kelly was so skilled at pantomiming the role of Weary Willie that Ringling Brothers allowed him to remain in the circus arena for the whole performance. He would sweep a circle of light into smaller and smaller circles and then chase it under a rug or into a trash can.

•Harpo Marx was mute and communicated by honks, whistles, and pantomime. He wore a fright wig and an overcoat with enormous inside pockets from which he pulled out ice cream cones, cups of coffee, and once in a while, a blowtorch.

Canadian Association of Therapeutic Clowns:

http://www.therapeuticclowns.ca/index.html

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Patch Adams is the most famous American supporter of humor and health.

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Clowns Have a Code of Conduct

• While in character, clowns should not be seen doing “normal” things like shopping or eating.

• They should not appear in public wearing only part of their costume.

• When at sports events or community celebrations, they should be willing to fill in dead time, provide photo opportunities, give young children someone to relate to, and remember that their job is bringing happiness.

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Clowns Protested When . . . • Bob Dole referred to President Clinton as “Bozo.”

Larry Harmon, the creator of Bozo protested having his character’s name used as an insult.

• One Halloween, a Paulsboro, New Jersey police officer dressed as a clown managed to arrest 12 individuals wanted for routine traffic offenses.

• He bragged that the costume got him inside homes where if he had come in his uniform and asked for someone by name, he would have most likely been told, “He isn’t here.”

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There is no end to the types of clowns now being developed.

These “live” clowns at Disney World are plants.

• The newest clowns are connected to hospitals.

• In more than 100 U. S. hospitals, clowns either roam the halls pushing humor carts, giving out smiley faces, joke books, and clown dolls, or managing full scale “humor rooms.”

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The Humor in Hospitals is usually provided by nurses rather than doctors. • This might be because nurses

work more closely with patients than do doctors so they get to know them better.

• Also nurses are often caught in the middle of a hierarchy and gain power by joking and clowning around with patients, often at the expense of the doctors.

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2012-2013 Teddy Bear Toss for 12,947 Kids at Penn State Hershey’s Children’s Hospital:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P4ENgOxVZm0

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Norman Cousins

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• In 1979, Norman Cousins, editor of the Saturday Review of Literature, published his best-selling Anatomy of an Illness.

• He had a serious collagen disease that affected

the connective tissue of his spine and joints. The disease was life-threatening, his pain was intense, and the doctors gave him little hope for a full recovery.

• He was frustrated by the hospital routines and his slow progress, so he checked himself out of the hospital and into a nearby hotel.

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• Because of his celebrity status, the doctors visited him and delivered his medication, while he used “humor-intervention therapy.” He read humorous books, and watched funny movies, and tapes of TV’s Candid Camera.

• He found that the more he laughed, the longer his body was without pain.

• He persuasively made the case that if it is possible to have a psychosomatic illness, then it is also possible to have a psychosomatic wellness.

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• In 1971, Dr. WILLIAM FRY at Stanford University’s Medical School began empirical studies on the effects of humor and laughter. He went beyond anecdotal stories by objectively testing and measuring physical responses to humor.

• He found that the chemical compositions of tears are different when a person is laughing as compared to crying.

• Dr. Fry showed that people’s bodies are tense when listening to a joke, but relaxed at the end.

• He compared the body’s production of dopamine when laughing to a runner’s high, which is why he calls laughter “Internal Jogging.”

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• William Fry says that hearty laughter is a kind of internal jogging

• Here is an exercise that you might want to consider

• VERA ROBINSON, a Nurse Educator, published an influential book Humor and the Health Professions in 1977.

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American Association of Therapeutic HumorDoug Fletcher Lifetime Achievement Award Winners:

http://www.aath.org/lifetime-awards

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We know that humor is good for people, but we also want to offer some warnings

1. People have individualized senses of humor. What makes one person laugh might annoy or insult someone else.

2. Even if it’s true that people with a good sense of humor live longer it might be that people who are healthy and successful have more reason to be cheerful.

3. Also pleasant patients may receive better health care than do grumpy and hostile patients.

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4. While hearty laughter pumps adrenalin and other powerful chemicals into people’s blood streams, other things have the same effect on health and healing: e.g. visits from pets, family members, close friends, and clergy, etc.

5. If laughter enhances the immune system, then what what about implant patients. A stronger immune system might cause them to reject their implants.

6. At the least, we will go along with the scholar who compared using humor to changing a baby’s diaper.

It doesn’t permanently solve any problems, but it makes things more acceptable for a while.

In conclusion, here is a picture that made us laugh, not because Bruce Jenner wanted to be a woman but because he thinks this is how 65-

year-old women look.

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In Conclusion, Here is SomeHospital Humor at Christmas

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Thanksgiving Dinner Diets:http://www.youtube.com/embed/TX9EAavxrus

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