--- title: "Tickled Apes Point to the Ancient, Shared Roots of Laughter" description: "A study comparing the laughter of tickled great apes and humans finds that the basic rhythm of a laugh has stayed remarkably stable for millions of years — suggesting the giggle is far older than our species." category: "Science" category_url: https://newsparlor.com/category/science author: "Priya Sharma" published: 2026-06-25T15:13:45.000Z updated: 2026-06-25T15:13:45.000Z canonical: https://newsparlor.com/article/tickled-apes-point-to-the-ancient-shared-roots-of-laughter tags: ["evolution", "great apes", "laughter", "science", "animal behavior"] --- # Tickled Apes Point to the Ancient, Shared Roots of Laughter A study comparing the laughter of tickled great apes and humans finds that the basic rhythm of a laugh has stayed remarkably stable for millions of years — suggesting the giggle is far older than our species. Laughter can feel like one of the most human things we do. New research suggests it is nothing of the sort: the basic rhythmic structure of a laugh appears to have been shared among great apes — including our own ancestors — for millions of years. ## What the researchers found Scientists compared tickle-induced laughter across the living great apes — orangutans, gorillas, chimpanzees, bonobos and humans — and found a common thread: in every species, the bursts of sound came at evenly spaced, rhythmic intervals, [Popular Science reported](https://www.popsci.com/environment/apes-humans-laughter-evolution/). That shared rhythm, the researchers argue, most likely traces back to a common ancestor of all great apes — a lineage stretching back on the order of 15 million years. The findings were reported in the peer-reviewed literature and summarized by several science outlets; specific details of the new paper are attributed to that coverage. ## How you study a laugh The method is as straightforward as it sounds: researchers gently tickle apes — on the palms, feet, neck and underarms, the same spots that set off human children — and record the sounds they make, then analyze the timing and spacing of each call, [Science News reported](https://www.sciencenews.org/article/tickling-apes-reveals-laughters-origins). The approach builds on a landmark 2009 study, published in [Current Biology](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2889984/), which used tickle recordings to map laughter across apes and humans and found that the family tree built from laugh sounds closely matched the one built from DNA — strong evidence that laughter has deep, shared evolutionary roots. ## Same beat, different tempo Shared rhythm does not mean identical laughs. Across the evolutionary tree, laughter has sped up and changed: earlier-branching species such as orangutans tend toward longer, slower calls, while chimpanzees and bonobos laugh faster and in shorter bursts. Humans sit at the far end of that trend — our laughter is the fastest and most variable, and, uniquely, we can produce it voluntarily. Researchers say that progression is revealing. Human speech depends on fine control of breathing and the voice, and the new work suggests that control was not a sudden invention but a refinement of capacities already present in our ape ancestors. Apes also tend to laugh on both the in-breath and the out-breath, while human laughter rides almost entirely on the exhale — a shift linked to the breath control that underpins speech. ## Why it matters Beyond the charm of tickling gorillas for science, the finding speaks to bigger questions about the origins of language, music and social bonding. The ability to keep a regular beat is thought to be a building block for music and coordinated behavior, so finding it embedded in the laughter of all great apes strengthens the case that rhythmic vocal control is an ancient primate trait — one humans have elaborated far beyond our relatives, but did not create from nothing. Laughter, in other words, may be older than any joke. ## Sources - [Great apes — including us — have been giggling for millions of years](https://www.popsci.com/environment/apes-humans-laughter-evolution/) - [Tickling apes reveals laughter's origins](https://www.sciencenews.org/article/tickling-apes-reveals-laughters-origins) - [Reconstructing the evolution of laughter in great apes and humans](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2889984/)