Laugh off the extra pounds
Researcher: 15 minutes giggling = 50 calories
ATHENS, Greece (AP) -- Dieters looking for another edge might want to consider exercising their sense of humor -- scientists have found that a good laugh is a calorie burner not to be ignored.
It may not be as good for reducing the waistline as going to the gym or resisting that ice-cream sundae, but American researchers have found that 10-15 minutes of genuine giggling can burn off the number of calories found in a medium square of chocolate.
The findings on the weight-loss possibilities of the uniquely human experience of laughter were presented at the close of the annual European Congress on Obesity on Saturday.
Researchers at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee, recruited 45 pairs of friends, shut them in a room decorated like a cheap hotel -- scientifically known as a metabolic chamber -- played them comedy clips on a TV screen and measured how many calories burned when they laughed.
The researchers separately tested seven pairs of male friends, 17 pairs of female friends and 21 mixed couples.
"We didn't tell them that the goal of the study was to measure laughter, because then they might have forced it. And forced laughter is regulated by a totally different part of the brain. We wanted it to be genuine laughter," said the lead researcher, Maciej Buchowski, director of bionutrition at Vanderbilt.
The volunteers were told the researchers were testing emotional reactions to various video clips.
Read the complete article at CNN.com
ATHENS, Greece (AP) -- Dieters looking for another edge might want to consider exercising their sense of humor -- scientists have found that a good laugh is a calorie burner not to be ignored.
It may not be as good for reducing the waistline as going to the gym or resisting that ice-cream sundae, but American researchers have found that 10-15 minutes of genuine giggling can burn off the number of calories found in a medium square of chocolate.
The findings on the weight-loss possibilities of the uniquely human experience of laughter were presented at the close of the annual European Congress on Obesity on Saturday.
Researchers at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee, recruited 45 pairs of friends, shut them in a room decorated like a cheap hotel -- scientifically known as a metabolic chamber -- played them comedy clips on a TV screen and measured how many calories burned when they laughed.
The researchers separately tested seven pairs of male friends, 17 pairs of female friends and 21 mixed couples.
"We didn't tell them that the goal of the study was to measure laughter, because then they might have forced it. And forced laughter is regulated by a totally different part of the brain. We wanted it to be genuine laughter," said the lead researcher, Maciej Buchowski, director of bionutrition at Vanderbilt.
The volunteers were told the researchers were testing emotional reactions to various video clips.
Read the complete article at CNN.com
posted by Ray at 11:02 AM
1 Comments:
Excellent, love it! » »
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