BBC 6分钟英语学习 为什么笑是最好的药

English from BBC Learning English. Hello.

This is 6 min English from BBC Learning English.

I'm Sam, and I'm Ill. Have you heard this joke?

Neil question what's a rat's favorite game?

I don't know, sam, what is a rat's favorite game?

Hide and Squeak. Very funny. Well, I'm glad you're laughing, because, as will be finding out in this program, laughter is good for you.

In fact, laughter is often called the best medicine, and it seems that's really true.

Medically speaking. Laughing releases anti stress and orphins into the body, and there's evidence that people who laugh recover more quickly from illness, including covied Laughing is an essential part of what makes us human.

Babies cry straight from birth, but the next sound they make, often as young as two or three months, is laughter.

And who can hear a baby laugh without laughing themselves?

Laughter is catching. But before we start tickling off funny bones, I have a quiz question for union.

And it's no laughing matter. Laughter can be a serious business.

In fact, there's a scientific field of study into laughter and its effects on the human body.

But what is this study called?

Is it a gigology? B gelatology, or c pathology?

Did you make those words up?

Sam, they sound a bit funny to me.

I'll say the study of laughter is called B gelatology.

Can you? But you'll be laughing on the other side of your face if you're wrong Anyway, we'll find out the correct answer later in the program.

Someone who's an expert in the study of laughing, whatever it's called, is cognitive neuroscientist Professor Sophie Scott.

Here she explains to David Edmonds, presenter of BBC World Service program, the big idea exactly how a love is produced.

Laughing is a variation of breathing, like breathing.

It involves the whip cage. When you laugh, you get these very, very large, very fast contractions of the rib cage.

And it's a very primitive way of making a sound.

so you're really just squeezing air out in big bouts.

Each of those individual squeezes gives you a ha sound.

The ha ha sound you make when you laugh comes from your rib cage, a structure made of bones called ribs in your chest, which protects the heart and lungs.

The rib cage works like a drum to amplify a laugh.

It's the reason why jokes are sometimes called rib ticklers.

Professor Scott causes a very primitive way of making sounds, because it's simple, natural and essentially human.

The word primitive can be used to describe anything relating to the basic way humans lived at their early stages of development, before money, machines or writing were invented.

Primitive human noises like crying and laughing, link to a universal human experience, and this can be seen in the large number of words we use to talk about them in English.

Chuckle, giggle, chartle cackle and gaffor all describe different types of laughter, right?

So how would you describe a giggle?

Sam Hmm. I'd say a giggle is laughing in a quiet but uncontrolled way, like a child who finds something very funny or feels embarrassed, unlike a gaffor, which is when you blast out a very loud laugh, often at something stupid or rude, someone has said.

But humans aren't the only animals to laugh.

We belong to the same family as other primates, like chimpanzees, gorillas and orangutans, all of whom laugh.

Even rats tickle each other and make squeaky noises like laughter when they play.

Here s Professor Scott Again to take up the story for BBC World Service Program.

The big idea plays very important behavior for mammals.

All mammals play when their juveniles, and some mammals play their whole lives, and laughter is sort of an invitation to play, to sign that you are playing.

Professor Scott says, laughter is an important social tool for all mammals, animals, including humans, dogs and whales, which give birth to live young rather than laying eggs, and who feed they am with milk.

By laughing, young mammals, sometimes called juveniles, signal that they want to play, and young rats who don't laugh back are more likely to get a bite than a giggle.

And a rat bite is nothing to laugh about, what a lot of facts we've learned about laughter.

Now, yes, we could almost be experts on laughter, gophologists.

Isn't that what you called them?

Sir? Ah, yes. In my quiz question, I asked you to name the scientific study of laughter and its effects on the body.

I'm almost certain it's not gigology or gophology.

Must be gelatology. The correct answer.

Well done,

neil. I knew you were good for a laugh.

Okay, let's recap the vocabulary from the program before you think up

any more terrible jokes. 1st We had rib cage, the structure in your chest, which is made of ribs and produces the sound of laughter.

The adjective primitive relates to the simple, natural way humans lived in the early stages of development.

There are different types of life after including giggles, childlike laughter in a quiet but uncontrolled way, and gaffors, when you laugh out loud, often at something someone has said.

Mammals, or animals, including humans, which give birth to lie young and feed them with milk.

And finally, a young animal which is not fully grown can be called a juvenile.

Well, it's been a laugh for a minute, sam, but unfortunately, our 6 min are up.

Join us again soon for more changing topics, useful vocabulary, and, who knows, maybe some terrible jokes here at 6 min English.

Bye for now. Boy English. From BBC Learning English.

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