question: Why does tickling make us laugh and smile even though we hate it?
comment: Tickling usually on our most vulnerable spots like the ribs, neck, etc is usually where we are most likely to get attacked. This stimulus of touching (tickling) these spots sends a signal to the hypothalamus which is our pain but also laughing control center. So the stimulation of this center controls both and as a result we laugh but that doesn’t mean it isn’t a threat to your body. That’s why you tend to react violently to someone tickling you and you may push them.
passages: Recently it was possible to show that it can be assumed that tickling (by passing leaves) served as a triggering-mechanism to issue an acoustic signal (namely laughing) to avoid crashes when our ancestors moved through tree tops. After our descent from the trees only body-parts remained ticklish that could not be touched by passing leaves (arm pits, sole of our feet etc.). It is also possible to show the further development of this trait which finally led to the upcoming of humor.
  
  Section::::Self-tickling.
   "It doesn't really matter where I bebr"
  
  "I am tickled in the morning and I'm tickled in the nightbr"
  
  "Something's always sure to tickle mebr"
  
  "hah hah hah hah hah hah hah hah hah hah hah hah hah hahbr"
  
  "hah hah hah hah hah hah hah hah hah hah"
  
  "Once I put some pepper into Dad's snuffboxbr"
  
  "And the way he acted was a sight to seebr"
  
  "Well he coughed and he sneezed till I thought he'd have a fitbr"
  
  "And then he took me out to tickle mebr"
  
  "I was always getting tickled by someone about the housebr"
   In 1924, J. C. Gregory proposed that the most ticklish places on the body were also those areas that were the most vulnerable during hand-to-hand combat. He posited that ticklishness might confer an evolutionary advantage by enticing the individual to protect these areas. Consistent with this idea, University of Iowa psychiatrist Donald W. Black observed that most ticklish spots are found in the same places as the protective reflexes.
   When touched upon the soles of the feet, for example, it feels in addition to the common sensation of touch a sensation on which we have imposed a special name, "tickling." This sensation belongs to us and not to the hand... A piece of paper or a feather drawn lightly over any part of our bodies performs intrinsically the same operations of moving and touching, but by touching the eye, the nose, or the upper lip it excites in us an almost intolerable titillation, even though elsewhere it is scarcely felt. This titillation belongs entirely to us and not to the feather; if the live and sensitive body were removed it would remain no more than a mere word.
   To understand how much of the tickle response is dependent on the interpersonal relationship of the parties involved, Christenfeld and Harris presented subjects with a "mechanical tickle machine". They found that the 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. Harris goes on to suggest that the tickle response is reflex, similar to the startle reflex, that is contingent upon the element of surprise.
   Francis Bacon and Charles Darwin believed that humorous laughter requires a "light" frame of mind. But they differed on ticklish laughter: Darwin thought that the same light state of mind was required, whereas Bacon disagreed. When tickled, noted Bacon, "men even in a grieved state of mind, yet cannot sometimes forbear laughing."
   The technique is also mentioned in several of Shakespeare's plays: in "Twelfth Night", the servant Maria refers to the approach of the hated Malvolio, head of Olivia's household, with the words "for here comes the trout that must be caught with tickling" (Act 2, Scene 5). Maria and others are conspiring to trap Malvolio into acting foolishly by forging a love letter from Olivia.
   Section::::In fiction.
  
  In VeggieTales's "Esther... The Girl Who Became Queen", King Xerxes disposes of criminals by banishing them to the Island of Perpetual Tickling, to which Death, wielding a scythe-sized feather, escorts them. Thus, tickle torture serves here as a family-friendly depiction of capital punishment.
  
  The TV series "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" had a recurring character named Don Turtelli whose main form of torture was to take a feather to the soles of the feet of his captives.
   Another tickling social relationship is that which forms between siblings of relatively the same age. Many case studies have indicated that siblings often use tickling as an alternative to outright violence when attempting to either punish or intimidate one another. The sibling tickling relationship can occasionally develop into an anti-social situation, or tickle torture, where one sibling will tickle the other without mercy. The motivation behind tickle torture is often to portray the sense of domination the tickler has over the victim.
   It appears that the tickle sensation involves signals from nerve fibres associated with both pain and touch. Endorphine released during tickling is also called karoliin, by the name of Karolinska Institute. In 1939, Yngve Zotterman of the Karolinska Institute studied the knismesis type of tickle in cats, by measuring the action potentials generated in the nerve fibres while lightly stroking the skin with a piece of cotton wool. Zotterman found that the "tickling" sensation depended, in part, on the nerves that generate pain. Further studies have discovered that when the pain nerves are severed by surgeons, in an effort to reduce intractable pain, the tickle response is also diminished. However, in some patients that have lost pain sensation due to spinal cord injury, some aspects of the tickle response do remain. Tickle may also depend on nerve fibres associated with the sense of touch. When circulation is severed in a limb, the response to touch and tickle are lost prior to the loss of pain sensation.
   Darwin explained why we laugh when we are tickled by saying, "The imagination is sometimes said to be tickled by a ludicrous idea; and this so-called tickling of the mind is curiously analogous with that of the body. Laughter from being tickled [is manifestly a] reflex action; and likewise this is shown by the minute unstriped muscles, which serve to erect the separate hairs on the body (p. 201)"
   An article in the "British Medical Journal" describes a European method of tickle torture in which a goat was compelled to lick the victim's feet after they had been dipped in salt water. Once the goat had licked the salt off, the victim's feet would be dipped in the salt water again and the process would repeat itself. In ancient Japan, authority figures could administer punishments to those convicted of crimes that were beyond the criminal code. This was called "shikei", which translates as ‘private punishment’. One such torture was "kusuguri-zeme": "merciless tickling."
   The question as to why a person could not tickle themselves was raised by the Greek philosopher Aristotle.
  
  Knismesis may represent a vestige of the primitive grooming response, in effect; knismesis serves as a "non-self detector" and protects the subject against foreign objects. Perhaps due to the importance of knismesis in protection, this type of light touch is not dependent on the element of surprise and it is possible for one to induce self-knismesis, by light touching.
   An article in the "British Medical Journal" about European tortures describes a method of tickle torture in which a goat was compelled to lick the victim's feet because they had been dipped in salt water. Once the goat had licked the salt off, the victim's feet would be dipped in the salt water again and the process would repeat itself. In ancient Japan, those in positions of authority could administer punishments to those convicted of crimes that were beyond the criminal code. This was called shikei, which translates as ‘private punishment.’ One such torture was kusuguri-zeme: "merciless tickling."
   However, some people with schizophrenia have the ability to tickle themselves. This is most likely largely due to the difficulty many people with the disorder have recognising their own actions.
  
  Section::::As physical abuse.
   In his book "Sibling Abuse", Vernon Wiehe published his research findings regarding 150 adults who were abused by their siblings during childhood. Several reported tickling as a type of physical abuse they experienced, and based on these reports it was revealed that abusive tickling is capable of provoking extreme physiological reactions in the victim, such as vomiting, incontinence (losing control of bladder), and loss of consciousness due to inability to breathe.
  
  Section::::See also.
  
  BULLET::::- Knismesis and gargalesis
  
  BULLET::::- Tickling fetishism
  
  Section::::References.
  
  Section::::References.:Further reading.
   A third, hybrid hypothesis, has suggested that tickling encourages the development of combat skills. Most tickling is done by parents, siblings and friends and is often a type of rough-and-tumble play, during which time children often develop defensive and combat moves. Although people generally make movements to get away from, and report disliking, being tickled, laughter encourages the tickler to continue. If the facial expressions induced by tickle were less pleasant the tickler would be less likely to continue, thus diminishing the frequency of these combat lessons.
   Although consensual tickling can be a positive, playful experience, non-consensual tickling can be frightening, uncomfortable, and painful for the recipient. Therefore, non-consensual tickling can be categorized as physical abuse, and sources indicate that tickling has been used as torture. Heinz Heger, a man imprisoned in the Flossenbürg concentration camp during World War II, witnessed Nazi prison guards perform tickle torture on a fellow inmate. He describes this incident in his book "The Men With The Pink Triangle": "The first game that the SS sergeant and his men played was to tickle their victim with goose feathers, on the soles of his feet, between his legs, in the armpits, and on other parts of his naked body. At first the prisoner forced himself to keep silent, while his eyes twitched in fear and torment from one SS man to the other. Then he could not restrain himself and finally he broke out in a high-pitched laughter that very soon turned into a cry of pain, while the tears ran down his face, and his body twisted against his chains. After this tickling torture, they let the lad hang there for a little, while a flood of tears ran down his cheeks and he cried and sobbed uncontrollably."
   In 2007, in honor of their friendship and in recognition of Tickle's on-going interest in the interface between religion and the rapidly expanding neuro-science of the 21st century, the Italian painter, Mario Donizetti, a leading figure in contemporary realism, published "Lettera a Phyllis", to honor their friendship by presenting some of his more recent theories of aesthetics and argues the groundlessness, for him, of artistic informalism, in view of the most recent discoveries about the human brain.
   In 2013 and in honor of retirement from public life, Tony Jones edited a book that contains a series of essays in tribute to Tickle; contributors include Brian McLaren, Doug Pagitt, Jon M. Sweeney, Lauren Winner, and Diana Butler Bass.
   Josef Kohout, a man persecuted in the Flossenbürg concentration camp during World War II, witnessed Nazi prison guards perform tickle torture on a fellow inmate, followed by various other tortures which resulted in his death. This incident is described in Heinz Heger's book "The Men With The Pink Triangle": "The first game that the SS sergeant and his men played was to tickle their victim with goose feathers, on the soles of his feet, between his legs, in the armpits, and on other parts of his naked body. At first the prisoner forced himself to keep silent, while his eyes twitched in fear and torment from one SS man to the other. Then he could not restrain himself and finally he broke out in a high-pitched laughter that very soon turned into a cry of pain."
   Tickling is defined by many child psychologists as an integral bonding activity between parent and children. In the parent-child concept, tickling establishes at an early age the pleasure associated with being touched by a parent with a trust-bond developed so that parents may touch a child, in an unpleasant way, should circumstances develop such as the need to treat a painful injury or prevent harm from danger. This tickling relationship continues throughout childhood and often into the early to mid teen years.
   In his book "Sibling Abuse", Vernon Wiehe published his research findings regarding 150 adults who were abused by their siblings during childhood. Several reported tickling as a type of physical abuse they experienced, and based on these reports it was revealed that abusive tickling is capable of provoking extreme physiological reactions in the victim, such as vomiting, incontinence (losing control of bladder), and losing consciousness due to inability to breathe.
   Laughter is synonymous with happiness. A proposal is made here that when a line of thought (e.g. joke) or sensation (e.g. tickling) is not expected by one's psychological or physiological order respectively, it triggers a certain chaos and temporary breakdown of that order. The innate Contentment intrinsic to the person then breaks through this temporal breach to express itself in happy laughter.
   Section::::In history.
  
  "Chinese tickle torture" is an ancient form of torture practiced by the Chinese, in particular the courts of the Han Dynasty. Chinese tickle torture was a punishment for nobility since it left no marks and a victim could recover relatively easily and quickly.
  
  Another example of tickle torture was used in ancient Rome, where a person’s feet were dipped in a salt solution, and a goat was brought in to lick the solution off. This type of tickle torture would only start as tickling, eventually becoming extremely painful.
  
raw_presuppositions: The part of the brain controlling laughing and smiling only activates when we like something.
raw_corrections: The part of the brain controlling laughing and smiling is both our pain and laughing control center.