Hand clapping is ubiquitous behavior for humans across time and cultures, serving many different purposes: to signify approval with applause, for instance, or to keep time to music. Acousticians often ...

What makes us clap more for some performances than others? You'd think it's obvious: The better the show, the more applause. Think again. Guest host Linda Wertheimer explores how and why applause ...

It might be hard to imagine yourself in ancient Rome, but if you were dropped into the audience of a play 2000 years ago, you’d probably know what to do when it finished – start clapping. Making a ...

Researchers elucidate the complex physical mechanisms and fluid dynamics involved in a handclap, with potential applications in bioacoustics and personal identification, whereby a handclap could be ...

The clapping hands emoji: When used repetitively in a row, it signifies applause, but as any social media user by now understands, that is not the emoji's primary placement in the world of Twitter.

ITHACA, N.Y. -- In a scene toward the end of the 2006 film, “X-Men: The Last Stand,” a character claps and sends a shock wave that knocks out an opposing army. Sunny Jung, professor of biological and ...