Why are they laughing?

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I watched a few videos on youtube of Temple Grandin speaking and giving lectures. The audience laughs at her a lot. It seems inappropriate. I don't really understand why they are laughing or what they think is so funny. It just seems really disrespectful. Are those people there because they appreciate her views, or just to laugh at her?

At one point, in one of the lectures, she told the audience "No I'm serious!" and repeated that several times, but they still went on laughing. It seemed rude and immature of those people not to listen to her and take her seriously.

I have difficulty telling whether laughter is good or bad, what it is directed at, appropriate or inappropriate, etc. The bad part is I tend to laugh a lot.

I can't tell.do you have a link to the video?

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bgEAhMEgGOQ[/youtube]

Sometimes NT people consider direct and to the point statements to seem funny because they make them uncomfortable, its their way of disarming their fears. Chances are they think she is joking. People think I am joking when I say very direct things all the time. They think it makes me bold or something.

People laughing at things is actually a very useful indicator for me, I can sort of gauge how well an audience is listening based on if they react like that.

I am sure there are times that people laugh at things I say and think poorly of me but luckily I've gained a bit of respect in my field for my honesty and accuracy so the only time I feel bad from reactions I get is when people's feelings get hurt and they feel sad or bad about themselves.

If people laugh, then they are probably listening, even if they don't understand.

I went through the video to see where people laughed. She said something that genuinely was funny but was not a joke per se. When she talked about the importance of controlling outbursts at work, she gave her own workplace, the meat industry, as an example. She said there was a no-tolerance policy because there everybody had knives (in the slaughterhouse). The audience laughed quite a bit and I laughed too. Why is this funny? It's literally true and that's how she meant it, not as a joke.

Freud analyzed why people laugh at such things.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humor_in_Freud

In some cases, light references to scary things make people laugh. This is one of those cases. According to Freud, humour is a way to lightly touch on the things that bother us very much. Grandin implied that angry outbursts in a slaughterhouse are not tolerated because people might wind up stabbing each other with one of the many, many knives found in the workplace. Why this would cause laughter doesn't make sense until you read Freud's theory of the different types of humour and how they act as a release valve for the subconscious.

Other places where people laughed, although only a little and just a few, were what I call the "Oh yea, I've seen that too" sorts of laughs. She talks about the importance of contact information on a resume and then cited some resumes where people had asked to be contacted but included incomplete contact information. That got a few chuckles because people recognized it. There were some chuckles in other similar places.

This is one of the videos I watched. I linked to a specific part of the video where an audience member asks about dating advice. She says, "I was one of the ones that just totally didn't do it" and the audience laughs. Are they laughing at the way she delivers the line, or the fact that she is saying she never had a relationship? or both?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pl ... oU#t=4580s

She suggests that the son should try meeting girls who have the same interests, ie at a computer convention. The audience laughs again, rather obnoxiously and this is where she says 3x that she is being serious. I don't know what is supposed to be so funny about what she said.

Surprise engenders laughter. Speaking directly can sometimes surprise people.
There is recognition laughter, which is a form of empathy.
The reason that the advice to meet girls at a computer convention was met with laughter is because popular perception is that girls don't go to computer conventions, so that was surprising advice and seen as ridiculous.
Or so I think.

I watched about a third of the video. Temple Grandin is an experienced and accomplished public speaker who is using humour deliberately in her talk. She intends that her audience laugh at these particular points and she has built the laughs into this talk which is lengthy and packed with information. She talks quite fast and she is covering a lot of material here. This talk is well planned, with a series of slides to illustrate what she is saying.

She uses humour for a variety of reasons. It provides a natural pause letting her listeners absorb what has just been said; it allows for a move onto the next bundle of information and gives her a slight break before moving on so her points are punctuated; the use of humour helps her listeners remember better what she has said as they can link the facts to an example to which they can relate and of which there is a shared understanding and recognition; it provides variety and interest, making it more engaging and enjoyable to listen to.

She is a smart, smart lady who knows exactly what she's doing and understands how to communicate well with her audience.

I watched the video that deadinhead posted, not the second one. Had a look at the second one, but am getting the whole thing. How many minutes in are the comments being referred to?

Ok, I found it. First thing I noted is that that question and her responses were almost at the end of a lecture which lasted over an hour and in which there was a lot of humour and a lot of laughter. She does emphasise that she is being serious, but the laughter isn't malicious or obnoxious. It is more the laughter of recognition, I would say. These people do recognise the truth of what she says.