Footballing legend Eric Cantona has revealed an inspired twist to his morning routine. Not the crostini with butter and jam that he has for breakfast, which sounds distinctly lacking in fibre, but what follows. “At the table, with my wife and children, I like to stand up and sing,” he said in an interview.

“My songs are surreal: the words come out automatically … some people get freedom from drinking alcohol. I lose control when I sing.” He later claims that he never loses his temper with his children, even at bedtime. Could the singing and the even temper be linked?

When I recount Cantona’s morning ritual to a psychologist Jacques Launay, who has studied the benefits of singing, his initial response is: “That’s weird.”

But it isn’t weird in my household, because crooning occurs around our dining table, too, although not as a prescribed routine: as Christmas approached, rounds of carols erupted spontaneously; I have an irritating habit of breaking into songs that echo whatever someone has just said; and, like Cantona, my household makes up songs, taking it in turns to come up with new rhymes on a theme. Sometimes, while our cereal goes soggy, we even get up and dance.

According to Launay, a lecturer at Brunel University, we’re bonding in a similar way to how other primates groom each other. As humans started living in much larger groups, the theory goes, singing evolved as a way to bond to many people at once.

Social singing and grooming have, says Launay, “the same psychological characteristics and associated neurohormonal mechanisms”. Namely, endorphins are released. We most commonly associate endorphins with feeling good after exercise, but, says Launay “our research suggests they are also involved in social bonding”. Ongoing research also shows that musical improvisation, as Cantona does with his songs, leads to even higher endorphin release.

Cantona’s immune system will be boosted, too. The body’s first line of defence against pathogens is a protein called salivary immunoglobulin A. This, says Launay, “has been shown to increase as a result of singing with other people”.

Meanwhile, singing in groups lowers levels of the stress hormone, cortisol, which naturally spikes in the morning after we wake up, making breakfast time the perfect time for a stress-busting singalong.