title: Ha ha! versus aha! a direct comparison of humor to nonhumorous insight for determining the neural correlates of mirth.
abstract: While humor typically involves a surprising discovery, not all discoveries are perceived as humorous or lead to a feeling of mirth. Is there a difference in the neural signature of humorous versus nonhumorous discovery? Subjects viewed drawings that were uninterpretable until a caption was presented that provided either: 1) a nonhumorous interpretation (or insight) of an object from an unusual or partial view (UV) or 2) a humorous interpretation (HU) of the image achieved by linking remote and unexpected concepts. fMRI activation elicited by the UV captions was a subset of that elicited by the humorous HU captions, with only the latter showing activity in the temporal poles and temporo-occipital junction (linking remote concepts), and medial prefrontal cortex (unexpected reward). Mirth may be a consequence of the linking of remote ideas producing high-and unexpected-activation in association and classical reward areas. We suggest that this process is mediated by opioid activity as part of a system rewarding attention to novel information.
authors: Department of Psychology.
authors: Ori
authors: O
authors: Amir
authors: Department of Psychology Neuroscience Program, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA 90089-1061, USA.
authors: Irving
authors: I
authors: Biederman
authors: Neuroscience Program, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA 90089-1061, USA.
authors: Zhuangjun
authors: Z
authors: Wang
authors: Department of Psychology.
authors: Xiaokun
authors: X
authors: Xu
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001921:Brain / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D009434:Neural Pathways / Q000502:physiology*; D009778:Occipital Lobe / Q000502:physiology; D017397:Prefrontal Cortex / Q000502:physiology; D012201:Reward; D013702:Temporal Lobe / Q000502:physiology; D014925:Wit and Humor as Topic / Q000523:psychology*; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: cortical µ-opioid gradient; fMRI; humor; medial prefrontal cortex; temporal pole