ABSTRACT
The prime purpose of this chapter is to provide an integrated summary account of the author’s research on social aspects of children’s ‘humorous laughter’. The experimental studies so far completed relate to two distinct areas of social psychological theory. Most have been concerned with the social facilitation of laughter and have been designed to investigate important companion variables, while some of the most recent have been concerned with the ways in which humorous laughter may promote social intimacy. The concept of ‘arousal’ is common to both types of theory and is referred to also in relation to humour and laughter theory.
