The Playful Brain Development of Children’s Humor

1. The Playful BrainDevelopment of Children’s Humor Paul McGhee, PhD The Laughter Remedy, Wilmington, DE Virginia Head Start Association, April 11, 2018

2. Goal of this Workshop • Better understanding of the nature of young children’s humor • What is humor? • When do infants first experience humor? • How do you determine that? • Is the earliest humor based on something the infant does? Or something parents do? • How does children’s humor change as they get older? • What causes these changes?

3. Goal of this Workshop • Learn • How you can use humor to support young children’s learning. • Especially using books • How humor contributes to children’s social, emotional & intellectual development. [See handout at conference website.] • What you can do to nurture the development of young children’s S.H. [See handout at conf website.]

4. The Key to Understanding Children’s Humor • It’s just another form of play - play with ideas

5. Play is our Biological Heritage(So humor  also our Biol. Heritage!)

6. A Key (generally overlooked)DistinctionExploratory vs. Playful PlayWhat is the Difference? • Think about 2- to 4-year-olds you’ve seen playing. Does this distinction make sense to you? • What differences have you noticed in their • Behavior? • Frame of mind—mentally & emotionally?

7. Exploratory Play • Serious frame of mind  interest & curiosity  focused attention • A fundamental driving force behind learning & cognitive development

8. Exploratory Play

9. Playful Play • Playful frame of mind  often laughter, even when no humor • What function does it serve? Why do we do it?

10. Child’s point of view - just having FUN, but • Learning also occurs during playful play - even thought the focus is having fun

11. Early Childhood Educators have Long Recognized the Importance of Play for Learning

12. Results of Animal Play Research • Animals that play more  “larger brains with more complex neurological structures” • The same is sure to occur with children

14. Learning through 3 Different kinds of Play • Exploratory play (most common ECE approach) • Serious frame of mind; high curiosity/interest • Focused attention • Playful play (including pretend) – indirect learning • Playful FM; focus on having fun • May say silly or incongruous things in pretend • Humor • Playful FM; focus on silliness, wrongness or absurdity • Supports new learning by holding attn. & interest • Consolidates past learning - by drawing attn to “wrongness” • All 3 are important  HIGH “ENGAGEMENT” & positive emotion

15. An Important Message to Pass on to Parents:Play IS Important • All 3 types of play - important for parents to engage in these with young children • Exploratory • Playful physical & pretend play • Humor

16. Playful vs. Exploratory PlayIn the following Slides, Which do you see?

23. Well, sometimes it’s hard to tell

24. No Doubt Here!

25. Koko Plays with her Mind

26. Playful Play More Common in Higher Species What Function does it Serve for Animals? • Learning • Skills essential for survival as an adult • Just as important in human children • Knowledge about the world, social skills & more • Pretend play often switches back & forth between playful & exploratory play (e.g., exploring social roles, relationships) • Humor  just a more advanced form of play  play with ideas

28. When do Infants First Experience Humor? What have you seen that = earliest humor?Partner Exercise What is Humor?

29. Partner Exercise • Think of one example of what you’ve seen a child say/do that is • Typical of the sense of humor shown by the age level you most often work with

30. What is a Sense of Humor? • Humor is intellectual play, play with ideas. It is the experience of deriving pleasure from playfully • Creating / appreciating distortions of the world as the child understands it • Expressing / reacting to taboo or emotionally sensitive ideas or actions

31. Children’s Humor: Basic Concepts • Children love to create in their own minds a world they know is at odds with reality • This is biologically built in – reflects a general predisposition to play with new capacities • They do this in different ways as they get older • The changes reflect new intellectual skills that have recently developed

32. Two Basic Kinds of Humor(in young children, as well as adults) • Incongruity, absurdity, nonsense, etc. • Distortions of the world as child understands it • Biologically built in to enjoy this • “Tendentious” (term coined by Freud) • “Pee pee.” “Ka ka.” “Poop.”  very funny

33. Young Children’s “F” Word

35. Stages of Humor Development • Stage 0: Laughter without humor • Stage 1: Laughing at the attachment figure • Stage 2: Treating an object a different obj. • Stage 3: Misnaming objects or actions

36. Stages of Humor DevelopmentOverview • Stage 4: Playing with word sounds (not meanings) & distortion of features of objects, people or animals (late toddler - 5 or 6 yrs) • Pre-riddle stage • Transition stage • Stage 5: Riddles & jokes • Discuss now briefly

37. Stage 0: Laughter without Humor(Birth - 5 months) • How do you decide when humor begins? • Onset of smiling? Laughter? • 3- to 5-mo-old infants laugh at unusual beh’s/sounds by parents (who usually laugh when they do them(Mireault, et al., 2014) • They appear to be using parent laughter as a cue to laugh • Some Youtube videos  Can see the baby gradually responding to parent’s own laughter • Physical (non-humor) causes of infant laughter • Bouncing on knee, “raspberries” • Is this laughter the same as laughing at incongruity? • Gen. rule: Anything that’s physiologically arousing in a safe/familiar env. may  laughter (60-yr-old woman  1st time on roller coaster) • So if humor involves playful distortion of things already learned, this probably not humor

39. Baby Micah Laughter on YouTube What common themes do you see in most of these examples? • Non-stop laughter at tearing paper (8 mo.) • Dad bouncing laundry basked down on floor (9 mo) • Dad makes an inhaling “Uhhh” sound & throws a plastic package that makes a loud “splat” sound on table (18 mo) • Dad blowing rubber block out of his mouth (18 mo)

40. Role of Parent Laughter • Clowning & “absurd” actions & noises by parents  most common approach to getting their babies to laugh (because it’s most effective) • Key: Parents of 3- to 6-month-old infants gen. laugh when they (parents) initiate odd beh’s/noises Mireault, et al. (2012). • So parents’ own laughter may play an important role in stimulating infant laughter & communicating to babies the kind of things that are to be laughed at

41. Stage 1: Laughter at the Attachment Figure (5-12/15 mo.) • Earliest humor  reacted to, not created Mo/Fa  emotionally imp. & well-learned • Peek-a-boo? (esp. if done in animated way) • Mo. sucking baby’s bottle • Mo. waddling like a penguin • Any unusual behavior of attachment person (e.g., putting bowl on your head; Loizou, 2005) • Key difference: Will now laugh more often in absence of parent laughter

42. Zachary Examples • Half a banana sticking out of my mouth - 5 m • Dad barking (but not mooing or meowing) - 5 • Dad holding rubber duck in front of face while quacking – 5 m • Dad looking at Z with Diaper under nose - 7 m • Q: If an infant’s parents had been doing these things from birth would there be any humor or laughter?

43. Basic (non-humor) ResearchA Key Transition Occurs between 8 & 12 months (Baumgartner, H.A. & Oakes, L.M. (2011). Infants’ Developing Sensitivity to Object Function: Attention to Features and Feature Correlations. J. of Cognition & Development, 12(3):275–298. • 8 months • “Infants learned individual features but were not sensitive to the relations between those features.” (e.g., an object known to be RED and ROUND, but not both) • 12 months • “Infants were sensitive to the relation among the features.” (e.g., is LONG and YELLOW) • So by the end of the first year, infants are learning that • A given action goes with objects with certain features, but not others • E.g., people walk like “this” (demonstrate), but not like a penguin • Certain featuresgo with some objects, but not others • E.g., People make talking sounds, but not barking sounds. • Violating these learned associations may humor

44. Stage 2: Treating an Object as a Different Object (12/15 mo - 3/5 yrs) • Earliest humor that is created by child • Bowl, diaper, washcloth as hat • Stick as brush or toothbrush • Shoe as telephone • Any unusual/incongruous action with an object • KEY POINT: The child’s frame of mind determines whether it’s humor or not • Research: when 19- to 24-mo-olds reproduced a funny beh of a parent, they look at the parent longer--apparently wanting the behavior to be noticed • Are they checking to see if the parent laughs?(Hoicka & Gattis, 2008)

45. Remember: Sometimes its just pretend play, and nothing is funny

47. Stage 2 Zachary Examples(These examples involve language; but the key  using objects in wrong way) • Mother brushing Z’s teeth. Z asks, “Brush nose? Brush ear?” & laughs – 22 m. • “Look, shoes on.” Put them on hands – 24 m. • “Give tape diaper.” Didn’t want diaper changed; saw videotape on floor - 26 m

48. Stage 3: Misnaming Objectsor Actions (2 - 3/4 yrs) • As language mastery continues, the joy of doing things “wrong”  extended to language • Supporting evidence: Starts at 2, but does not become common in most ch until 3 yrs (Hoicka & Akhtar (2012). • “Show me your nose” game (as early as end of 2nd year) • Calling a cat a dog, a shoe a sock, etc. • Opposites: a special case of misnaming

49. Stage 3 Zachary Examples • “Where’s your nose?”  knee – 22 m. • “Here kitty, kitty” to stuffed dog – 26 m. • To tune of “Head, shoulders …”, substitutes wrong word for “toes.” (Light, toast, mommy, etc.) • “A, B, C, D, E, F, ___ (Substitutes any name – 26.)

50. Stage 4: Distortion of Features of objects, people, animals (3-5 yrs)[Very common in children’s books.] • Supporting evidence:Starts at 2, but does not become common in most ch until 3 yrs(same as Stage 3 humor) Hoicka & Akhtar (2012). • Adding features that don’t belong (can also take away features) • Sesame Street  Dog’s head on man’s body • Dog  “Oink” or “miaow,” etc. • This is now much funnier than just calling a dog a pig.