Volume 27, Issue 3

This study tested how source knowledge affects enjoyment of self-deprecating humor about a minority group. Participants made aware that the source of a message poking fun at people with disabilities was himself disabled had more positive evaluations of the cartoon and author than participants unaware of his disability. Participants initially given no source information judged the author more positively the second time when they were given follow-up source information. Finally, some effects were moderated by the disability status of the message receiver, such that having a disability or knowing someone who does predicted higher liking of the cartoons when the author is disabled but lower liking when he is not. The results suggest a role for self-deprecating humor in intergroup relations, and predict when such humor will be accepted by minority and non-minority group members.

This study investigated how the use of different humor styles by individuals described as being either socially anxious or non-anxious can have an impact on the perceptions and evaluations made by others about these individuals. Participants read a set of scenarios describing brief interactions with a casual acquaintance (either socially anxious or non-anxious) who made four different types of social comments (affiliative, self-enhancing, aggressive or self-defeating). When the affiliative and self-enhancing comments were delivered humorously, participants indicated more positive evaluations and less social rejection of the casual acquaintance. This finding was obtained for both the socially anxious and non-anxious casual acquaintances. In contrast, the use of self-defeating comments, both with or without humor, was particularly detrimental to evaluations of the socially anxious acquaintance. In addition, participants were generally less interested in future interactions with a socially anxious acquaintance, and rated themselves more negatively when this acquaintance was portrayed as being socially anxious. Discussion focused on the pervasive role of humor in facilitating more positive reactions and responses to social comments made by both socially anxious and non-anxious individuals.

We conducted two studies to investigate whether the degree to which people identify with women as a social category affects amusement with sexist humor (humor that disparages women) apart from their affective dispositions toward women. Both studies supported our hypothesis showing that male and female participants were more amused by sexist humor the less they identified with -- the more they felt psychologically distant from -- women as a social category. Study 2 further demonstrated that empathy with women as a social category was not related to amusement with sexist humor.

Utilizing Attardo's general theory of verbal humor and Meyer's rhetorical functions of humor, as well as insights from conversation analysis, this paper presents a model linking form and function in conversational humor. In the model, an initial pair of incongruous scripts (i.e., a script opposition) is activated as membership categories are referenced in the set-up. The punch- or jab-line introduces a second script opposition that “resolves” or makes sense out of the first opposition in terms of preference organization (presenting either a preferred or dispreferred response). When examining conversational humor, those preferences have implications in terms of uniting or dividing interlocutors. If the resolution aligns with the preferred entity/activity of the set-up, then the effect should be unifying. If the resolution does not align (i.e., is dispreferred), then the effect should be divisive. The model is used to analyze two jokes and two conversational sequences.

The adaptation and validation of a Chilean Spanish version of the State Trait Cheerfulness Inventory (STCI-T-60) including a couple evaluation, is presented. The inventory was developed by Ruch (1990) to measure three traits (cheerfulness, seriousness, and bad mood), considered to enable exhilaration, which is the main indicator of the sense of humor experience. Ruch suggested studying basic temperamental traits and stable dispositions involved in the possibility of experiencing humor. The inventory was applied to three Chilean samples: a validation sample of 500 adults individuals, evaluated in a stratified manner considering gender, age and socio-economic level; a replication sample of 298 middle-class adults; and a couple sample of 53 middle-class couples. The results showed adequate internal consistency and solid validity of the constructs in all groups. The study contributes to research in the field of the sense of humor from local and transcultural perspectives. The validation of a couple form will contribute specifically contribute to the study of the sense of humor as a couple relational dynamic and its relations with other relational variables.

Two preliminary studies were conducted to identify (1) the contents of an ideal research and statistics reference book, and (2) the suitability of using humor cartoons in writing a research book. The results indicate that a majority of the respondents strongly agreed that humor should be used, and not suppressed, in academic writing. Hence, a book entitled Research Methods and Statistics was written. It contains five volumes with a total of 58 chapters and 1760 pages. Altogether, there are 143 humor cartoons spread throughout it. Published by McGraw-Hill Education (Malaysia), the five volumes were its top ten bestselling titles for 2007 to 2011. A follow-up e-mail survey and an experimental study on the values of the humor cartoons in the book were conducted. The majority of the readers (n = 379) opined that the cartoons had a positive impact on their reading and had made learning more meaningful. Results of the experimental study indicate that humor cartoons in the book had significantly increased reading comprehension and reading motivation of the participants. The findings suggest that if humor is used in the right place, it will be an effective strategy to enhance reading, counteract and balance the highly academic pattern of writing, provide a way to bridge the gap between the reader and author, as well as help to increase the marketability of an academic book.