![](http://pinterest.com/pin/create/button/?url=http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=sitcoms-on-the-brain&media=http://www.scientificamerican.com/media/expiredImg_320x320.gif&description=from the TV series <i>Seinfeld</i>, helped to reveal that one part of the brain "gets" a joke
and another part finds it funny.)
JERRY, KRAMER AND GEORGE, from the TV series Seinfeld, helped to reveal that one part of the brain "gets" a joke
and another part finds it funny.
Image: CASTLE ROCK ENTERTAINMENT/EVERETT COLLECTION
What do you get when you cross a television comedy with a brain scanner? A team led by Joseph Moran and William Kelley at Dartmouth College's Center for Cognitive Neuroscience tried to find out. The researchers used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) on subjects watching episodes of either Seinfeld or The Simpsons. The resulting scans showed that "getting" a joke occurs in specific brain regions different from those involved in finding it funny.
This dissociation between the cognitive and emotional parts of humor supports
This article was originally published with the title Sitcoms on the Brain.
Already a Digital subscriber? Sign-in Now
If your institution has site license access, enter here.
See what we're tweeting about
Comments
Add Comment