A sense of humor gives us a comic point for laughter and escape. Laughter relaxes us: it brings with it a feeling of freshness and calm. Knowing how to tell jokes and how to make those around you have fun improves social communication and relationships, because who doesn’t want to have someone funny around who makes them laugh? That’s why we’ve written this article to explain its benefits.
A sense of humor improves blood pressure and reduces feelings of anxiety. Psychoneuroimmunology was born from the discovery of the large number of connections that exist between the central nervous system (our brain and spinal cord), the endocrine system (responsible for releasing hormones), and the immune system (responsible for producing antibodies to fight diseases).
One of the conclusions drawn from studies carried out in this field is that a positive mood protects us from diseases and improves the prognosis of others, such as cancer, diabetes, and asthma… and a sense of humor is precisely a great pillar of this positive mood .
In 2015, specialists from the Spanish Society of Neurology (SEN) presented a report showing that vascular problems were reduced by 40% in people who laughed regularly, which translates into about 4 and a half years more life.
When we laugh, our body releases endorphins, serotonin, and dopamine, which improve the feeling of calm and reduce the perception of pain. With this, we also manage to improve the current vision of problems, in many cases reducing worry by ridiculing them.
A sense of humor helps us relax our muscles and lower our blood pressure, so it’s a great way to keep our heart healthy and reduce our chances of having a heart attack or stroke.
Benefits for our social relationships
Laughter and humor improve our mood and help us feel better. When we do this, we can project it onto others. People are attracted to people who smile and make them laugh. In two experiments conducted in Sweden, the relationship between attractiveness and smiles was studied. They found that the stronger and more frequent a smile was, the more attractive the person was considered and the more attractive the face was rated.
And why do we lose this ability over time? One of the latest studies on the sense of humor found that adults tend to laugh between 15 and 100 times a day, compared to an average of 300 times a day for children.
Children are more spontaneous and less likely to analyze the long-term consequences that an event may have on their lives. The secret may be to laugh without shame and to enjoy a good laugh without hesitation.
“-Hi, do you have vegan food?”
-Clago and in winter! This is a gestaugante fgances.”
Benefits in our cognitive abilities
Laughter captures our attention, so someone who makes us laugh becomes an attractive person. Therefore, a sense of humor also favors the retention of information.