Sophie Scott: Why we laugh
Sophie Scott: Waarom we lachen
While exploring the neuroscience of speech and vocal behavior, Sophie Scott stumbled upon a surprising second vocation: making audiences laugh as a stand-up comic. Full bio
Double-click the English transcript below to play the video.
to you today about laughter,
wat vertellen over lachen.
by thinking about the first time
I would've been about six.
ongeveer zes jaar.
doing something unusual,
ongewoons deden
laughing at, but I wanted in.
maar ik wilde meedoen.
going, "Hoo hoo!" (Laughter)
what they were laughing at
om een liedje dat mensen zongen
in de wc van een trein,
signs in toilets on trains
and could not do
en niet mocht doen in deze wc's.
about the English is, of course,
is, natuurlijk,
sophisticated sense of humor.
gevoel voor humor hebben.
understand anything of that.
gaat het mij weer om lachen.
I've come to care about it again.
is just play some examples
van mensen die lachen.
het geluid kan zijn dat mensen maken
people make and how odd that can be,
laughter is as a sound.
than it is like speech.
dan op spraak.
The first one is pretty joyful.
De eerste lach is best vrolijk.
where I'm just, like,
moment dat ik denk,
like he's breathing out.
(Laughter)
(Gelach)
this is a human female laughing.
Dit is een vrouw die lacht.
odd places in terms of making noises.
soms erg raar klinken.
what is that?" in French.
in het Frans.
I have no idea.
Denk ik.
you have to look at a part of the body
kijk je naar een lichaamsdeel
vaak niet lang naar kijken, de ribbenkast.
don't normally spend much time looking at,
continu gebruiken.
your ribcage all the time.
-- niet stoppen -- is ademen.
at the moment with your ribcage,
om lucht in en uit te ademen,
the muscles between your ribs,
en samen te drukken.
and contracting your ribcage,
een ademband,
around the outside of your chest
at that movement,
sinusvormige beweging.
movement, so that's breathing.
Iedereen doet het. Niet stoppen!
completely differently.
helemaal anders.
something much more like this.
hele kleine bewegingen,
movements of the ribcage
that can do this.
has a mortal enemy,
hebben één aartsvijand,
heel gelijkmatig samen,
start to contract very regularly,
sort of zig-zagging,
the air out of you.
of making a sound.
voor hetzelfde effect.
it's having the same effect.
Ha! -- gives you a sound.
geeft een geluid.
kun je spasmes krijgen,
you can get these spasms,
these -- (Wheezing) -- things happening.
there isn't very much,
everything we think we know
over lachen, blijkt fout.
to hear people to say
het enige dier is dat lacht.
are the only animals that laugh.
throughout the mammals.
and well-observed in primates,
mensen, mensapen, ratten,
with things like tickling.
zoals kietelen.
and all mammals play.
en alle zoogdieren spelen.
it's associated with interactions.
wordt het geassocieerd met interactie.
a lot of work on this,
onderzoek gedaan heeft,
more likely to laugh
eerder geneigd bent te lachen
than if you're on your own,
dan als je alleen bent,
like conversation.
"When do you laugh?"
about humor and they'll talk about jokes.
dat mensen lachen met hun vrienden.
they're laughing with their friends.
dan lachen we zelden om grappen.
hardly ever actually laughing at jokes.
that you understand them,
dat je ze begrijpt,
of tot dezelfde groep behoort.
part of the same group as them.
of zelfs van ze houdt.
that you like them.
as talking to them,
dat emotionele werk voor je.
of that emotional work for you.
zoals je hier ziet,
has pointed out, as you can see here,
toen we gelach hoorden
funny laughs at the start,
toen mijn ouders lachten...
when I found my parents laughing,
behaviorally contagious effect.
als je iemand kent.
off somebody else if you know them.
door de sociale context.
by this social context.
en denk aan de sociale betekenis,
meaning of laughter
is different kinds of laughter,
in de verschillende manieren van lachen.
about how human beings vocalize
hoe mensen geluid maken,
two kinds of laughs that we have.
twee soorten lachen zijn.
for helpless, involuntary laughter,
voor het hulpeloos, ongecontroleerd lachen
screaming about a silly song,
door een grappig liedje,
than some of that more polite
sociale lachen dat je hoort,
which isn't horrible laughter,
maar lachen als onderdeel
as part of their communicative act to you,
of interactie met jou.
they are choosing to do this.
two different ways of vocalizing.
ontwikkeld om geluid te maken.
are part of an older system
komen uit een ouder systeem
like the speech I'm doing now.
zoals mijn praten.
twee verschillende wortels heeft.
might actually have two different roots.
in more detail.
recordings of people laughing,
van lachende mensen.
to make people laugh,
om mensen te laten lachen.
to produce more posed, social laughter.
gemaakt lachen.
you like your friend,
omdat je die vriend aardig vindt,
the joke's all that.
a couple of those.
of gemaakt.
this laughter is real laughter,
or more voluntary laughter?
Gemaakt?
Sophie Scott: Posed? Posed.
Sophie Scott: Gemaakt.
all they had to do was record me
hoefden ze alleen mij op te nemen,
something I knew she wanted to laugh at,
van wie ik wist dat ze om iets zou lachen.
tussen echt en gemaakt lachen.
are good at telling the difference
bijna hetzelfde doen.
quite similar with chimpanzees.
als ze gekieteld worden,
if they're being tickled
anders is dan 'sociaal' lachen.
something like that here,
being different from social laughter.
en is hoger in toon.
They're higher in pitch.
from your lungs
dan je bewust ooit zou lukken.
than you could ever produce voluntarily.
zo hoog kunnen zingen.
pitch my voice that high to sing.
en van die rare piepgeluiden.
contractions and weird whistling sounds,
gevoelsmatig zeer makkelijk herkenbaar is.
is extremely easy,
klinkt een beetje nep.
we might think it sounds a bit fake.
an important social cue.
Het is sociaal erg belangrijk.
to laugh in a lot of situations,
nasality in posed laughter,
in gemaakt lachen.
if you were laughing involuntarily.
these two different sorts of things.
twee verschillende dingen.
to see how brains respond
als je lachen hoort.
this is a really boring experiment.
real and posed laughs.
it was a study on laughter.
zeiden we niet.
to distract them,
om af te leiden.
is lying listening to sounds.
naar geluiden te luisteren.
and when you hear posed laughter,
completely differently,
which lies in auditory cortex,
more to the real laughs,
reageert op echt lachen.
ongecontroleerd hoort lachen
laughing involuntarily,
dat je in andere context nooit hoort.
hear in any other context.
with greater auditory processing
een hogere auditieve verwerking
laughing in a posed way,
met mentaliseren:
associated with mentalizing,
somebody else is thinking.
which is completely boring
wat heel saai en oninteressant is,
"A ha ha ha ha ha,"
why they're laughing.
waarom diegene lacht.
to understand it in context,
te begrijpen in de context.
at that point in time,
niets mee te maken hebt.
anything to do with you,
waarom deze mensen lachen.
why those people are laughing.
echt en gemaakt lachen horen
at how people hear real and posed laughter
met de Royal Society.
we ran with the Royal Society,
two questions.
hoe echt of gemaakt het klonk.
or posed do these laughs sound?
en gemaakt lachen in blauw.
and the posed laughs are shown in blue.
in het herkennen van echt lachen.
and better at spotting real laughter.
they can't really hear the difference.
zij kunnen het verschil niet echt horen.
word je er beter in.
peak performance in this dataset
late 30s and early 40s.
by the time you hit puberty.
als je in de puberteit komt
by the time your brain has matured
wanneer je hersenen volgroeid zijn,
gedurende je hele vroege volwassenheid.
throughout your entire early adult life.
not, what does the laughter sound like
en niet vragen of lachen echt is,
or posed, but we say,
jou aan het lachen maakt
make you want to laugh,
dan zien we wat anders.
we see a different profile.
when you hear laughter.
when I had no idea what was going on.
ook al wist ik niet waarom.
than the posed laughs,
dan gemaakt lachen.
less contagious to you.
wordt het allemaal minder aanstekelijk.
really grumpy as we get older,
naarmate we ouder worden,
understand laughter better,
naarmate je lachen beter begrijpt,
dan gelach van andere mensen.
hearing people laugh to want to laugh.
lay assumptions are incorrect,
there's even more to laughter
dat lachen nog veel meer is
die we moeten bestuderen,
we should look at,
people are phenomenally nuanced
waanzinnig genuanceerd te gebruiken.
set of studies coming out
heel mooi onderzoek uit
a longitudinal study with couples.
met echtparen.
men and women, into the lab,
moeilijke gesprekken voeren
stressful conversations to have
aan een leugendetector,
so he can see them becoming stressed.
and he'll say to the husband,
dat jou ergert.'
that irritates you."
briefly, you and your partner --
more stressed as soon as that starts.
van zoiets gestrest raakt.
people become more stressed.
who manage that feeling of stress
die dat gestreste gevoel
positieve emoties als lachen,
positive emotions like laughter,
physically feeling better,
unpleasant situation better together,
met deze onprettige situatie.
in their relationship
in hun relatie
at close relationships,
dan is lachen een hele handige indicator
their emotions together.
to show that we like each other,
dat we elkaar aardig vinden,
feel better together.
to be limited to romantic relationships.
voor romantische relaties geldt.
going to be a characteristic
such as you might have with friends,
zoals je met vrienden hebt.
young men in the former East Germany
van enkele jonge mannen in Oost-Duitsland
their heavy metal band,
hun heavy metal band te promoten.
and the mood is very serious,
en ze zijn heel serieus.
what happens in terms of laughter
als het mis gaat.
hoe het de stemming verandert.
and how that changes the mood.
Hij heeft zijn zwembroek aan.
He's got swimming trunks on,
They are already laughing, hard.
Zij lachen al hard.
is it's all very serious
is dat het heel serieus is,
as soon as he doesn't go through the ice,
of botten rondvliegen,
and bone everywhere,
with him standing there going,
dat het gebroken is'
I think this is broken,"
Dat zou stressvol zijn.
That would be stressful.
met een gebroken been
with a visibly broken leg laughing,
'je moet naar het ziekenhuis',
think we need to go to the hospital now,"
gênante, moeilijke situatie haalt
embarrassing, difficult situation,
waarom we kunnen lachen.
actually enjoying there,
die heel vaak voorkomt.
a really interesting use,
van mijn vaders begrafenis.
something like this happening
op het ijs rond.
on the ice in our underpants.
a relative who was being a bit difficult,
Ik had een lastig familielid,
vlak voor aanvang
just before the whole thing started
that happened in a 1970s sitcom,
uit een comedy uit de jaren 70!
waarom ik dit doe.
I don't know why I'm doing this,
-- wat dan ook --
something from somewhere
together with me.
samen met mij.
to find some reason we can do this.
om samen te kunnen lachen.
We're going to get through this.
dan gaat het beter.
are doing this all the time.
you don't even notice it.
dat het niet eens opvalt.
how often they laugh,
when you laugh with people,
a really ancient evolutionary system
een heel oud evolutionair systeem,
om banden te smeden en onderhouden
to make and maintain social bonds,
to make ourselves feel better.
en ons beter te voelen.
it's a really ancient behavior
het is echt heel oud gedrag
and makes us feel better.
en ons beter doet voelen.
als het om lachen gaat,
(Gelach)
but mammals. (Laughter)
ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Sophie Scott - Neuroscientist, stand-up comicWhile exploring the neuroscience of speech and vocal behavior, Sophie Scott stumbled upon a surprising second vocation: making audiences laugh as a stand-up comic.
Why you should listen
As deputy director of the University College London’s Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, Sophie Scott seeks out the neurological basis of communication, whether it’s speech or vocalized emotion.
As a pioneering researcher in the science of laughter, she’s made some unexpected discoveries -- including that rats are ticklish, and that the one tactic that’s almost guaranteed to get someone to laugh is to show them someone else laughing. But as an occasional stand-up comedian with UCL’s Bright Club, she shows that she’s no slouch at getting laughs herself.
Sophie Scott | Speaker | TED.com