THE SCIENCE OF @#$%&!

Thanks to Lexington for highlighting this article about the relationship between pain and cursing. According to a study published in the current issue of NeuroReport, swearing helps to alleviate pain:

"Swearing has been around for centuries and is an almost universal human linguistic phenomenon," said Richard Stephens of Keele University in England and one of the authors of the new study. "It taps into emotional brain centers and appears to arise in the right brain, whereas most language production occurs in the left cerebral hemisphere of the brain."

Stephens and his fellow researchers proved the neurological efficacy of swearing with the help of 64 undergraduate volunteers. Amusingly, these undergraduates (lured with pocket-change, surely) had to submerge their hands in a tub of ice water for as long as possible while repeating a swear word of their choice; they then repeated the experiment without cursing. (It's hard not to giggle at the image of men in labcoats with clipboards monitoring the blue-mouthed pain of financially insolvent students.) When volunteers swore like sailors, they could keep their hands in the frigid water for longer.

Just what is happening to soothe the pain is not clear. Scientists suggest the amygdala has something to do with it, as it's the part of the brain that regulates emotions and our fight-or-flight response to pain (or the threat of pain). Regardless, it is always satisfying to know that science and profanity remain such constant bedfellows.

~ EMILY BOBROW

Picture credit: littledan77 (via Flickr)