What Terpenes and Cannabis Strains Make You Laugh?

Are there any better moments in life where you and your friends are laughing so hard no one is making any noise? Those moments where you’re clutching your ribs and are struggling to find you breath because you’re laughing at something so hard. For some, those moments can be few and far between, but cannabis and specific terpene profiles can certainly help.

Laughing is one of the most under appreciated forms of therapy. It diffuses stress, elevates mood, and is proven to be good for heart and cardiovascular health. The key is finding someone or something that makes you giggle.

Terpenes that have a more cerebral effect will have a greater impact on mood, happiness, and laughter. There is research into both topics that show the same parts of the brain are affected by cannabis and associated with laughter. For cannabis specifically, these are the cerebellum, the right frontal lobe, and the left temporal lobe. Cannabis increases blood flow to these areas. This could well be caused by THC in particular – remember that the brain has a huge concentration of CB1 receptors, more than any other type of neuron, and these are activated by THC.

This activation in turn triggers increased production of dopamine and serotonin, both ‘happy’ neurotransmitters that elevate mood. Simply put, consuming cannabis makes you more likely to laugh.

Laughing Buddha

As the name suggests, Laughing Buddha is one giggly cannabis strain. Prominently considered the best strain for laughter, consuming this strain before watching Rick & Morty, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, or take you pick of comedy film of TV show. This strain is a very strong head high and will have you feeling uplifted, talkative, and giggly, due to terpenes ocimene, myrcene, β-caryophyllene, limonene and pinene. It is hard to know exactly what terpene does what in a strain, as they react differently around different combinations of terpenes, but any strains with a high concentration of these terpenes will guarantee a cerebral, giggly head high.

Chemdawg

The effects produced by Chemdawg's high THC content can manifest in many ways, one of which is clearly fits of laughter. This one’s a personal favorite of mine for creative collaborations and chilling with close friends, since it lends both social and artistic energy.

Related: Terpenes For Creativity Boosts

Sweet Diesel

With a champion heritage from OG Kush and Sour Diesel, Sweet Diesel masterfully captures everything we love about sativas: a little boost of wakefulness, creative energy, social engagement, and nonstop giggles.

Blue Diesel

Introduced by strong flavors of sour blueberry, Blue Diesel is a hybrid to elevate you to an uplifted and jovial mindset. Its nimble cerebral effects make Blue Diesel a perfect daytime companion strain, and the giddy euphoria is sure to bring on spells of laughter.

Mango Kush

First comes that unforgettable mango flavor, and then it’s all giggles. Few strains have more to offer the flavor enthusiast and the social butterfly alike than Mango Kush. Named for its strong fruity mango aroma, this hybrid keeps you chatty and upbeat for social outings or when you’re just kicking it with best friends. Mango Kush has an abundance of myrcene, a terpene also found in mangoes, which makes the strain enhance the THC's effect and will have feeling giddy and giggly.

Liberty Haze

Liberty Haze has a powerful terpene profile which provides a happy-go-lucky demeanor. It is uplifting, energizing, and great for social occasions or for seshing with some close friends. As a Haze strain, this bud is euphoric and perhaps a bit on the psychedelic side. Like the other strains in this list (and other Haze strains), this one is heavily loaded with limonene, beta-caryophyllene, and myrcene, a great combination for a giggly head-high.

Experiment with strains and terpene profiles and see which ones have you feeling the best.

Does cannabis encourage a sillier type of humor?

It is interesting to reflect upon the tendency of cannabis to increase empathy for others, and to enhance pattern recognition. I think many cannabis users can attest to finding strange, obscure things to be hilarious when under the influence of cannabis. For beginning users, THC and terpenes can bring you to a place where everything feels surreal, new, and unrealized. One common subjective experience of cannabis use is that it helps the user to see the absurdity of everyday life, and this is enough to reduce them to helpless giggles, it makes the mundane seem profound and the trivial quite novel.

By 79 CE, Pliny the Elder had written of cannabis “If this be taken in myrrh and wine all kinds of phantoms beset the mind, causing laughter which persists until the kernels of pine-nuts are taken with pepper and honey in palm wine”. He referred to cannabis as “gelotophyllis”, which literally translates from Latin as “leaves of laughter”. The study of laughter is known as gelotology.

We are thirty times more likely to laugh in company than alone. So next time you ingest some terps and cannabis, offer some to a friend and share some laughs.