Self-ticklers rewrite science of laughter | The Sunday Times


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Self-ticklers rewrite science of laughter

Jonathan Leake, Science Editor Published: 3 April 2016

PSYCHOLOGISTS have found that some people can make themselves laugh by tickling themselves.

Experts have long been baffled about why people who were tickled under the ribs or armpit, or had the soles of their feet stroked, were sent into paroxysms of laughter, but were confident that, in people who were not suffering from mental illness, someone else had to do the tickling.

The underlying belief was that people respond to being tickled partly because they feel powerless while simultaneously recognising the good-natured intentions of their assailant. This tension was resolved as laughter.

However, psychologists from Lille University in France have now reported in the journal Consciousness and Cognition that they have found people who can tickle themselves.

What such people have in common, they found, is that although within the range of normality, they are high in traits linked to “schizotypy” — meaning they have mild versions of features seen

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