Volume 36, Issue 3

The purpose of this field experiment was to examine whether food servers who used other-enhancement, opinion conformity, or humor would be rewarded with higher tips from restaurant customers than food servers who did not use such ingratiation tactics. Consistent with predictions, humor and simple opinion conformity resulted in significantly higher tip percentages compared to the control condition. In contrast, other-enhancement (i.e., compliments) and exaggerated opinion conformity did not. Humor also resulted in higher tips than all other tactics, except simple opinion conformity. These results and their implications are discussed.

Recently, ethnic humor (targeting ethnoreligious identities) is increasingly questioned in European and Western countries, sparking controversy on online and traditional media platforms. Absent from the mediated and academic debate are the opinions from targeted subjects of the joke. This qualitative audience study aims to add to critical humor scholarship by providing insight into how targeted groups make sense of disputes of offense. We interviewed 35 participants (ages 15–24) with a minoritized ethnic identity (mostly a Moroccan or Turkish diasporic background) and religious identity (all identified as Muslim) on how they negotiate offensive (ethnic) humor. Moreover, we asked participants to reflect on the politics of offense (i.e. the power relations underlying the process of publicly claiming offense) and the role media play in the discussion of offended feelings in relation to (ethnic) humor. A thematic analysis of three focus groups indicates how participants’ negotiations were always influenced by contextual factors and tied to their identities, both on a sociopolitical and personal level. Further, participants were highly conscious about their minoritized position in debates on offensive ethnic humor and how this relates to societal power inequalities. As such, they recognized how the politics of offense regarding ethnic humor highlight boundaries between social groups.

Thomae and Viki (2013) reported that increased exposure to sexist humor can increase rape proclivity among men who score high on measures of Hostile Sexism. Here we report two pre-registered direct replications (Total N  = 530) of Study 2 from Thomae and Viki (2013) and assess replicability via (i) statistical significance, (ii) Bayes factors, (iii) a small-telescope approach, and (iv) a mini meta-analysis across the original and replication studies. The original results were not supported by any of the approaches. Combining both the original studies and replications yielded strong evidence in support of the null over the experimental hypothesis (Bayes factor = 0.04). The evidence provided by the current studies therefore suggests sexist jokes do not increase rape proclivity among males high in hostile sexism. We encourage researchers to continue to conduct pre-registered and open research to further understand the potential (lack of) impact of sexist humor in the future.

Clown doctors’ artistic interventions directed to hospitalized children in the Portuguese public hospitals have been performed over the last 20 years, uninterruptedly. During the Covid-19 pandemic, the doctor clowns’ visits were interrupted, but soon after resumed in some hospitals, by means of visits online. The present study evaluates hospital professionals’ perception ( n  = 152) regarding clowns’ online visits. Participants were mostly nurses ( n  = 76), and child educators/teachers ( n  = 39) working in pediatrics ( n  = 139). Six months after the beginning of the visits, an online questionnaire was used to collect the data. A mixed-methods approach was used to analyse the data. Results indicate that most hospital professionals have a positive perception of online visits, considering that the quality of performance was preserved, and that children were engaged and benefited from the interactions. Moreover, participants acknowledge the organizations’ ability and promptness in developing an alternative way of visiting the children, even though some stressed that in-person visits are the most desirable format.

Humor and sarcasm are closely related – sarcasm is often identified with aggressive humor or humorous mockery. Research in this area is common in Western European languages, but not in non-WEIRD populations. The aim of the study was to examine the relationship between humor styles and sarcasm use in the Turkish-speaking population. We also attempted to predict the use of different sarcasm types (general sarcasm, embarrassment diffusion, face-saving, and frustration diffusion) by the scores of the Humor Styles Questionnaire (Martin, Rod A., Patricia Puhlik-Doris, Gwen Larsen, Jeanette Gray & Kelly Weir. 2003. Individual differences in uses of humor and their relation to psychological well-being: Development of the Humor Styles Questionnaire. Journal of Research in Personality 37(1). 48–75) scales (aggressive, affiliative, self-enhancing, and self-defeating humor). The data from 329 Turkish-speaking participants were collected: 250 women and 79 men ( M age  = 37; SD  = 12.32; age range: 18–70). Participants filled out online questionnaires including Sarcasm Self-Report Scale (Ivanko, Stacey L., Penny M. Pexman & Kara M. Olineck. 2004. How sarcastic are you? Individual differences and verbal irony. Journal of Language and Social Psychology 23(3). 244–271) adapted into Turkish, and the Humor Styles Questionnaire (Martin, Rod A., Patricia Puhlik-Doris, Gwen Larsen, Jeanette Gray & Kelly Weir. 2003. Individual differences in uses of humor and their relation to psychological well-being: Development of the Humor Styles Questionnaire. Journal of Research in Personality 37(1). 48–75) in Turkish adaptation (Tümkaya, Songül. 2011. Humor styles and socio-demographic variables as predictor of subjective well-being of Turkish university students. Egitim ve Bilim 36(160). 158–170). The results showed positive correlations between all humor styles and all sarcasm types, with the strongest correlation with aggressive humor. Regression analysis was used to find predictors of sarcasm use. Our results show that aggressive humor style is the main predictor of all self-reported sarcasm use scales.

As a minority in the USA and globally, Mormons ( The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is also known as the ‘Mormon Church’, and its members are typically called ‘Mormons’, ‘Latter Day Saints’ or ‘LDS’. This paper uses its preferred abbreviations – ‘the Church’ and ‘Latter-day Saints’) and their distinctive religious doctrines/practices have for 190+ years been publicly ridiculed. Typically, they have responded to mockery with tolerance and, occasionally, good-natured humor of their own (Hale, Adrian. 2021a. Do Mormons think The Book of Mormon is funny? HUMOR 34. 659–677, Hale, Adrian. 2021b. Mormon reactions to The Book of Mormon. Comedy Studies 12(2). 186–202). However, little is known about Latter-day Saints’ humor, and they have a reputation for being conservative, dour, and pious (Wilson, William A. 1985. The seriousness of Mormon humor. Sunstone 10. 6–13). This paper views this situation as regrettable, since humor can function as a great social leveler, and knowing more about minorities’ humor practices can generate social bridges. This paper therefore seeks to overturn some preconceptions by reporting on an exploratory survey (The survey received Institutional and National ethics approval: HREC Approval Number: H14364) of 131 Latter-day Saints across various nations, to find out what makes them laugh. Results indicate that the Latter-day Saints’ sense of humor seems to be, like the membership itself, livelier and more diverse than their reputation might suggest.

Humor is a pervasive part of our daily lives that has several important social functions. Although past literature has suggested the existence of a link between certain components of humor and well-being, the extent and specific characteristics of this link are still unclear. To shed light on this issue, we conducted a scoping review of the literature through which we identified 128 publications examining the association between humor components (i.e., styles of humor, coping humor, sense of humor, comic styles, and laughter) and psychological, physical, social, and general well-being. Overall, findings support a clear positive relation between all components of humor and psychological well-being, and a less pronounced positive association between humor and physical, social, and general well-being.