Why do Americans clap so much?

Especially during late night talk show monologues. They mostly clap instead of laugh.

In the UK panel shows and that Graham Norton talk show I used to watch, the people laughed at the jokes and only ever clapped if they were directed to (as at the end or beginning of certain segments) or if something actually remarkable happened.

In my darker days when I used to watch Stephen Colbert’s drumpf drubbing hour, the audience clapped after nearly every joke. Why? Why I ask you?

Does this happen elsewhere and I’m just not aware?

Americans clap at the end of movies, when the plane lands, when waiters drop plates by accident (always a fat alcoholic looking boomer type who thinks it’s funny) when they come home and see their wife, after sex, when they get their McDonald’s meal, when they wake up, when they successfully manage to shit without having a coronary.

Am I just imagining things and other countries excessively clap too? I’m American and not worldly so I wouldn’t know. All I know is that I clap whenever I see myself in the mirror – it’s instinctual. Must be something in the water.