#tickle research

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The Tickly Research Masterlist has been updated to break down all Answered Asks into categories!

You can find the Masterlist either as the pinned post of my blog or by clicking HERE!

Keep sending in your questions to add to the Tickle Research Library!

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What are some of the best resources available online for the scientific study of tickling? I am thinking of studying psychology or physiology at college as I one day want to specialize in either in depth research or practice of tickling.

Honestly, most of my resources online have been through vigorous searching on Google Scholar and perusing many, many, many medical journals and psychological case studies. 

There is a surprisingly large amount of scientific information on tickling and laughter online! But because studies still are highly subjective and often inconclusive, especially as to why we tickle and are ticklish in the first place, I have yet to find any psychologists who specialize in tickling. 

With that being said, I hope you become the first! I’d love to be able to cite a true “Tickling Expert,” haha! Thanks for the ask, nonnie! 

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Google Scholar Series: "The Mystery of Ticklish Laughter" by Christine R. Harris (1999)

"Why do we laugh when we are tickled? Perhaps we enjoy being tickled or find it funny. But if so, why do most people, especially adults, say they hate to be tickled? And why do I not laugh when I try to tickle myself? If the answer to the peculiar riddles of tickling [...] were simple, the topic might not have engaged many of the great minds of the past."

Quick Facts:

Ticklish laughter is developed (on average) within the first six months of a baby's life.

Harris conducted an experiment to prove that tickling was strictly interpersonal (aka, people should only laugh when they believed that a person is tickling them) by testing if people would react more to a Tickler or to a (fake) tickle machine. The hypothesis was proven false when subjects laughed just as much when they believed they were being tickled by a machine as when they thought they were being tickled by a person.

The most ticklish areas of the body are not necessarily the areas of the skin where our sense of touch is the keenest.

Summary & Analysis:

A mystery, indeed! Harris' article on ticklish laughter and how tickling induces laughter raises more questions than answers, unfortunately. But for an article written twenty-two years ago, I thought it would be an interesting spot to begin researching.

Naturally, the foundation of the article hinged on trying to find the reason for laughter induced by gargalesis, or "heavy tickling." There is no clear-cut answer, but there are plenty of hypotheses:

Ticklish laughter could be the beginnings of the development of humor itself.

Tickling could be more of a reflex with the added component of "startle" that prevents people from tickling themselves deliberately. Harris states, "The world doesn't appear to jump every time you move your eyes, because the brain has taken into account the fact that it issued the command to move. Similarly, perhaps when the brain issues the command to tickle, it cancels out the sensation of ticklishness."

Of course, tickling is theorized as a primary means to facilitate the bond between parents and children.

However, Harris also cites an evolutionary function that the most ticklish areas of the body are places most vulnerable in arm-to-arm combat. Ticklishness may be an adaptive advantage to drive individuals to protect those areas, thus the almost involuntary, defensive response by the Ticklee.

Overall, questions about tickling can go back as far as 1922 - when even Aristotle raised the question of why one cannot tickle oneself. There are plenty of questions about tickling to this day. And while there is no conclusive way to determine exactly why tickling causes the laughter that it does, it's interesting to delve into the many hypotheses and experimentations involving tickling.

Which hypothesis do you think is the most likely to be true? Or do you have others reasons for why we laugh when tickled?

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Harris, C. R. (1999). The mystery of ticklish laughter. American Scientist, 87(4), 344-351. Retrieved from https://search.proquest.com/scholarly-journals/mystery-ticklish-laughter/docview/215262440/se-2?accountid=201395

(NOTE: Full access to this article does require either a paid subscription or permission through a university's library!)

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Thank you to everyone that has sent in questions for research! 💕

The next few questions require more personal experience and statistics. They are also longer posts that require more time to be written well. I'm working as fast as I can to ensure every ask earns a thoughtful, educational response! So please be patient if you've sent an ask. I promise I will get to all of them.

With that being said, feel free to keep asking questions to add to my Tickle Research Library!