Humor as a therapeutic recreation intervention. (Therapeutic Recreation).

"Humor is the great thing, the saving thing. The minute it crops up, all our irritation and resentments slip away, and a sunny spirit takes their place."

-- Mark Twain

For centuries, people have speculated about the various effects of humor, often attributing to it more than just a sunny disposition. Long have people suspected that humor provides real psychological and physical benefits. Only relatively recently have the effects of humor been systematically examined and the use of humor been incorporated into the repertoire of therapeutic recreation interventions.

As the amount and quality of humor research has increased, a picture of humor's benefits has become clearer, and justification for including humor in therapeutic recreation programs is stronger. Generally, researchers have suggested that a well-developed sense of humor is associated with a wide range of benefits. Therapeutic recreation specialists should integrate humor into their programs.

Get Them Laughing

The most obvious, and perhaps popular, way to use humor therapeutically is to simply expose people to humorous materials such as movies and audio recordings. Passively watching or listening to funny materials or people appears to have some benefits, but research findings suggest that active or produced humor can lead to greater effects than passive humor. Specifically, it appears that the ability to make a joke in a stressful situation can help people cope better than merely laughing at someone else's joke. Thus, learning to produce humor appears to be an important skill.

In light of the potential benefits of both passive and productive humor, consider integrating humor into their service. There are a growing number of models used in the delivery of services, but the framework for this discussion will be the time-tested Leisure Ability model's basic organization of treatment, leisure education and recreation participation.

Treat the Funny Bone

Researchers examining humor's effect suggest several ways that recreation specialists can use humor to achieve therapeutic outcomes. For instance, exposure to humorous material appears to bolster the immune system, and therefore, could be beneficial to people with compromised immune systems, like people with AIDS or people recovering from burns.

Humor can assist in the learning process as well. People tend to memorize humorous material better than non-humorous. This aspect can be beneficial for use with people with cognitive or learning impairments. For instance, by infusing humor into cognitive training or skill instruction, you can help people to learn better.

Additionally, humor has been found to contribute to the cohesion of groups. Given that most therapeutic recreation programs are delivered to groups, humor is a great way to help the group bond. A joke shared among group members contributes to the affiliation they feel towards one another. When you share a laugh with your participants, you can appropriately bridge emotional divides that separate individuals.

Many people receiving therapeutic recreation services experience discomfort due to illness or injuries, and the management of pain is often a first priority. A number of researchers have concluded that exposure to humorous material increases pain thresholds. Thus, in the presence of humorous materials, like a video or audio presentation, people can tolerate pain better. Unmanaged pain can degrade the quality of life, add to the distraction of participants or undercut the effectiveness of therapeutic recreation services. To reduce pain, consider using some form of humor during uncomfortable treatments or recovery from surgery.

Learning to Laugh

Leisure education is a family of therapeutic interventions that facilitate the examination and expansion of skills and abilities related to recreation and leisure. Leisure education sessions are often cognitively based, making them an appropriate context for humor-based interventions.

Depression and anxiety are among the most common characteristics of people seeking therapeutic recreation services, and humor can effectively treat both. By its nature, humor seems plainly incompatible with depression, although surprisingly, little research has been conducted on its effect on depression. The few existing studies suggest that humor can alleviate symptoms of depression. Researchers have reported that people with strong senses of humor are less likely to experience depression and more likely to experience higher levels of emotional stability.

It is important to note that humor is not always the best response to stressful and important events. Grief is an appropriate, healthy and completely natural response to many events such as the loss of a loved one. Often emotional distance and time are needed before someone can find humor in a situation. Professionals should be attuned to the emotional state of participants. It is contrary to therapeutic goals if participants perceive that their pain is not taken seriously.

Many researchers and theorists have discussed humor as a healthy way to cope with anxiety caused by the variety of unexpected and stressful events. Professional comedians often credit a difficult childhood as the source of their exceptional senses of humor and use once-stressful events as material for their acts. Perhaps the most researched therapeutic benefit of humor is the use of humor in coping with stress. Researchers have concluded that humor can indeed help people cope. Specifically, people with strong senses of humor are more likely to perceive control over their lives and to generally perceive less stress. Although explanations vary, at least one researcher reported that frequent laughter significantly reduces levels of stress-related hormones.

Considering the potential effects on depression and anxiety, think how you might consider instructing people to appreciate and produce humor. Leisure education seems to be an appropriate venue for such instruction and might include many different elements. Most fundamentally, having knowledge and appreciation of different types of humor is important to helping people improve their senses of humor.

There is an additional note of caution concerning the use of humor in coping -- more may not necessarily be better. Research suggests that using humor too frequently to cope with stress prevents an individual from using more effective coping techniques such as taking action to resolve a stress-causing situation. Thus, as with most things, moderation is recommended.

Humor has been referred to as an adult form of play. Some authors have suggested that a playful attitude is important for experiencing humor. Although many people stop playing as they enter adulthood, it is possible for adults to relearn to play so they can be more receptive to humor. Additionally, some people go through their days without recognizing the wealth of humorous materials all around them. This so-called "found humor" can be discovered by, among other ways, examining newspapers and locating unintended funny headlines, road signs or other printed material. Jay Leno's "Headlines" segments (also in the Jay Leno's Headlines series available from Warner Books) provide numerous examples of found humor. Classic examples include the weather report headline "Sun or Rain Expected Today, Dark Tonight" and the article reporting "Study Says Snoring Drivers Have More Crashes." Learning to recognize and appreciate this type of humor can help people infuse more humor into their lives.

While learning to appreciate humor is helpful, learning to produce humor may be even more important. Creating humor such as writing jokes or making witty remarks appears to be a particularly valuable coping skill. While humor comes naturally to some people, others must learn how to be humorous. Several humor development programs are available for this purpose.

Klein's The Healing Power of Humor is a rich resource that includes exercises to help people develop their sense of humor. The techniques focus on developing a sense of humor to better cope with difficult situations. In addition to humor development exercises, the book includes theoretical and philosophical discussions of humor on such topics as the benefits of humor, the functions of humor and using humor to cope with loss and illness.

Perhaps the only existing sense of humor development curriculum is McGhee's How to Develop Your Sense of Humor. McGhee suggests the first step is to determine the nature of your sense of humor and surround yourself with the humor. Become more playful and learn not to take yourself too seriously. Laugh more often and learn to tell jokes and funny stories. Playing with language, puns, nonsense words, and exaggerations also enhances your sense of humor. Find humor in everyday life (such as irony or coincidences). Take yourself lightly and laugh at your mistakes. By finding humor in stressful situations, you will learn to use humor to cope.

Although both Klein's and McGhee's programs focus primarily on learning to produce humor, the appreciation of humor is another enjoyable and important aspect of therapeutic humor. Look for ways to program humor appreciation such as with the use of funny movies or audiotapes.

Laugh ... Just Do It

Perhaps the most obvious focus of humor in recreation participation could be the enjoyment participants experience through laughter. If humor development is included in leisure education, the recreation participation component of the service model could be a time for participants to practice these new skills. Also, humor in a recreation participation setting could be appropriate to facilitate social interaction between participants who are unfamiliar with one another, or with groups experiencing tension among members. Another opportunity for using humor may be in inclusive recreation settings to facilitate a sense of belonging -- like interests and social acceptance between people with and without disabilities. Make humorous materials available to participants in their free time or have informal meetings that encourage participants to share jokes and humorous stories.

Some facilities have humor rooms or humor carts that disseminate humorous materials to participants. These materials include video or audiotapes, books and bulletin boards with cartoons and other humorous resources. There are many free or inexpensive means for humorous materials. Public libraries often have humorous movies, books-on-tape, joke books and collections of comic strips. Videotapes and DVD's can be rented or purchased from commercial video stores or recorded using a television and a VCR. The Internet is loaded with humorous material (some more appropriate than others, of course).

Find ways to integrate humor into your programs. But be warned -- some degree of caution should be taken. Negative forms of humor including sarcastic, racial and sexist humor should be avoided and discouraged. The use of negative humor is destructive and contrary to therapeutic goals. If there is ever a question whether or not a piece of humorous material is appropriate for a therapeutic recreation program, the best advice is "If in doubt, don't."

Therapeutic recreation is about helping people improve the quality of their lives. Humor is yet another tool that can be usefully employed to this end. Although the "sunny spirit" described by Mark Twain isn't likely to appear in many therapeutic recreation objectives, there are benefits of humor that are important for our participants. More and more (and better and better) research offers evidence that humor has many physiological and psychological benefits. Humor is a justifiable, inexpensive and appropriate tool for use in therapeutic recreation services.

The Humor Project

There are a number of valuable resources to help therapeutic recreation specialists use humor in their programs. One great resource is the Humor Project, an organization of people dedicated to helping others develop a strong sense of humor and to use humor as a way to improve the quality of life. One focus of the Humor Project is the use of humor as a coping mechanism. The Humor Project publishes a newsletter, The Laughing Matters, which describes ways to use humor therapeutically and offers suggestions for practitioners who desire to include humor in their programs. For more information go to www.humorproject.com

Therapeutic Humor Resources

Publications

How to Develop your Sense of Humor: An 8-Step Humor Development Training Program

By P.E. McGhee (Kendall/Hunt)

The Healing Power of Humor

By A. Klein (Tarcher)

Other Resources

American Association of Applied and Therapeutic Humor www.aath.org/home_1.html

The Humor Project [phone] http://www.humorproject.com

International Center for Humor and Health www.humorandhealth.com/

Humormatters[TM] Web Site www.humormatters.com

Gilda's Club Web Site www.gildasclub.org

Richard Williams, author of "Humor as Therapeutic Recreation Intervention," is assistant professor in the Department of Recreation and Leisure Studies at East Carolina University. Along with studying the benefits of humor in therapeutic settings, he is interested in interactive leisure education computer games. His article appears on page 48.