Universitas Indonesia Conferences, International Conference on Intervention and Applied Psychology (ICIAP) 2018

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Effect of Laughter Exercise on Memory
Md.Shahinoor Rahman, Farida Binte Wali, Dr.Shane T Muller, Abdur Rahman

Last modified: 2018-08-09

Abstract


Laughter is a psychophysiological response to humor or to any other stimulus (Mora-Ripoll 2010) consisting typically contractions of the diaphragm, rhythmic, often audible with facial expression and a series of neurophysiological process such as cardiovascular and respiratory system (Mora-Ripoll 2010, Yim 2016). Laughter exercise is a technique where people laugh without any reason with some specific body movement and deep breath. Past research showed laughter exercise increased psychological wellbeing (Martin et al. 2003; Weinberg and et.al. 2014;) and decreased anxiety (Bridgman T. et al. 2012; Yazdani et al. 2012). However, very few researchers focus on potential effect of laughter on memory. Thus, this study examined the effectiveness of laughter exercise on memory in young adult. It was hypothesized that Laughter exercise will improve memory of the adult. A total of 30 participants were recruited in the study from undergraduate students. Their average age range is They were, randomly assign 15 participants to the experimental group and 15 to the control group. In experimental group, participants were engaged laughter exercise in a four weeks period, total 8 sessions, two times a week. Each session lasted 30 minutes long. Measurements were taken at baseline and at every second session of the week. In the control group, no intervention was given and their measurements were taken only two times; at baseline and after 4 weeks. Before-and-after with control design was used for this study. A total of 3 tests, among 2 of them Corsi block test and Digit span were used to measure working memory and a free recall test was measured for short term memory. Paired sample t-tests were used to analyze the data of both Laughter exercise group and control group. The results of the study revealed significant improvements in memory span and percentage of recall in Laughter exercise group while no significant difference was found in control group. These findings indicate that Laughter exercise improve memory.

 


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