Unlike casual humor, laughter therapy is a structured practice that uses guided exercises to trigger laughter and, with it, measurable shifts in your body. This approach treats laughter as more than a reaction — it becomes an intentional tool to calm your nervous system, ease tension, and strengthen emotional balance.

Anxiety is one of the most common conditions people face today, marked by racing thoughts, pounding heartbeat, muscle tightness, poor sleep, and a lingering sense of dread. When it's ignored, anxiety spirals into depression, substance abuse, or long-term illness. Finding simple, safe ways to break that cycle is essential, and laughter offers one of the most direct paths to relief.

Stress physiology explains why this works. Cortisol, your body's primary stress hormone, surges under pressure and fuels problems like weight gain, weakened immunity, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease. By disrupting that stress response, laughter helps restore equilibrium and protects your long-term health.

Seen in this light, laughter stops being "just fun" and instead stands out as a no-cost, side effect — free intervention that influences both mental and physical well-being. With this foundation in mind, the next step is to look at what researchers discovered when they put laughter therapy to the test.