Kret, ME;
Venneker, D;
Evans, B;
Samara, I;
Sauter, D;
(2021)
The ontogeny of human laughter.
Biology Letters
, 17
(9)
, Article 20210319. 10.1098/rsbl.2021.0319.
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Abstract
Human adult laughter is characterized by vocal bursts produced predominantly during exhalation, yet apes laugh while exhaling and inhaling. The current study investigated our hypothesis that laughter of human infants changes from laughter similar to that of apes to increasingly resemble that of human adults over early development. We further hypothesized that the more laughter is produced on the exhale, the more positively it is perceived. To test these predictions, novice (n = 102) and expert (phonetician, n = 15) listeners judged the extent to which human infant laughter (n = 44) was produced during inhalation or exhalation, and the extent to which they found the laughs pleasant and contagious. Support was found for both hypotheses, which were further confirmed in two pre-registered replication studies. Likely through social learning and the anatomical development of the vocal production system, infants' initial ape-like laughter transforms into laughter similar to that of adult humans over the course of ontogeny.
| Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Title: | The ontogeny of human laughter |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.1098/rsbl.2021.0319 |
| Publisher version: | https://doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2021.0319 |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | This version is the author accepted manuscript. For information on re-use, please refer to the publisher’s terms and conditions. |
| Keywords: | Science & Technology, Life Sciences & Biomedicine, Biology, Ecology, Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences & Biomedicine - Other Topics, Environmental Sciences & Ecology, laughter, vocalization, positive emotion, affect, ontogeny, primates, EXPRESSIONS, PHONATION, EVOLUTION |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Brain Sciences UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Brain Sciences > Div of Psychology and Lang Sciences UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Brain Sciences > Div of Psychology and Lang Sciences > Speech, Hearing and Phonetic Sciences |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10137156 |
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