Humor in Personality

Humor in general has a universal appeal to societies and cultures all over. Mendiburo-Seguel, Paez, and Martinez-Sanchez (2015) explain humor as, “[something] we can understand […] as a stable personality tendency referring to a sensation [or] a behavior […] as a way of coping, to an ability, and finally, to an aesthetic sense” (p. 335). Specifically in this paper I will be discussing the positive and negative forms of humor and how that may reflect the kind of person someone may be. Furthermore, humor has qualities that can affect a person in several ways, whether the humor and or outcome is positive or negative can change the effect in completely opposite ways. First of all, positive and negative humor in society is relevant and very prevalent to the people today. While positive humor can uplift someone’s mood, negative humor does the opposite. Positive humor has the ability to make people happier as well as more confident, whereas, negative humor has the power to lower people’s self esteem and causes social isolation.

Schermer, R. A. Martin, N. G. Martin, Lynskey, and Vernon (2013) conducted a study where they took twins and examined their phenotype, genes, and environment relationship between these four humor styles: affiliative, aggressive, self-enhancing, and self-defeating humor. Studies found there was a positive correlation between General Factor of Personality (GFP) with affiliative and self-enhancing humor (Schermer et al, 2013). The GFP measures five personality dimensions; these states gradually become more well-rounded, but begins with neuroticism, then follows extraversion, openness to experience, later agreeableness, and lastly conscientiousness. The positive correlation between the GFP with affiliative and self-enhancing humor means the more well-rounded and aware a person is, the more positive humor he or she may use.

Positive humor makes people happy. Across the happy spectrum there are four subcategories beneath it, this includes: extraversion, internal locus of control, higher self-esteem, and optimism (Ford, Lappi, and Holden 2016, p. 321–323). According to Little (2016), a Cambridge research professor, “extraversion is conducive to working well with others (3:40).” In fact, studies show extraversion carries social skills aspects that help people to become attracted to each other whether romantically or as acquaintances which in return helps people to relate and understand each other more comfortably. Internal locus of control is the belief that the individual has the ability and power in how that person may act, or how they may have control over the end result of the situation (Riggio, 2015). In this case, believing you are in control helps to comfort the individual that they are in control of their own life, which in the end aids that person to be more happy.

With this information, positive humor can be sub categorized as affiliative humor and self-enhancing humor. Affiliative humor is defined as “[involvement of] telling jokes about things that everyone might find funny” (Riggio, 2015). This type of humor shows a universal ability to bring people together; it also could be used throughout everyday life situations or objects. The ability to relate to everyone and anything is an extraverted trait, and not only are you able to get to know more people because of that extraverted characteristic, but with the use affiliative humor, it helps “protect the self and maintain a humorous outlook on life during times of stress” (Edwards & Martin, 2014, pg.514), in return furthers more happiness. While self-enhancing humor also is positive, it focuses more on the individual; this involves laughing at yourself, or making a joke when something bad happens to you. Being able to laugh and not take things too seriously helps to not dwell too much on negativity which helps uplifts the individual especially. Louis CK specifically uses self-enhancing humor with his ability as a comedian to talk about controversial topics like race and white supremacy. This opportunity opens up the topic and CK helps to make the subject more light hearted since he is a comedian, but still consists of impact.

With this in mind, readers can suggest positive humor makes people more confident in themselves and independent in their thinking; when people carry these traits it enhances their ability to be more comfortable to talk to others and share ideas. A higher self-esteem means the overall opinion of that person is thought to be valued greater which includes how they are more confident and proud of their abilities and accomplishments (Mayo Clinic, 2017). Being more confident not only helps you as a person but helps your health mentally as well. To have a greater scale of optimism is to expect positive outcomes in life, which will in return improve a person’s relationships with others as well as how that person views life. Optimism is a great characteristic to carry because people will be naturally drawn to people who are more positive and will likely go to those people for advice and encouragements.

Consequently, people who use positive humor benefit from a couple of things. Ford et al. (2016) supports this statement by saying, “they experience greater happiness because they are better at finding strategies to regulate their emotions” (p.330). Not only is positive humor a cause of happiness but it can also cause playfulness, while also helping make light of situations like from Louis CK’s example. When people display positive humor it’s viewed as socially desirable and it can attract people to them(Cann & Matson, para. 27–30, 2014). This type of humor is also very expressive, and helps people recognize how that person is feeling.

Negative humor on the other hand is seen in an entirely different view. First, negative humor consists of two types of humor: aggressive and self- defeating. Aggressive humor is when a person purposely or unintentionally puts someone down; sometimes it consists of insults, in which they are targeting a certain individual or group of people (Riggio, 2015). This aggressive humor style also is used to enhance themselves by harming others (Vrabel, Zeigler-Hill, & Shango, para. 1, 2017). When a person it intentionally trying to make themselves look better, it revolts people and their desire to talk to that person. Self- defeating humor is more personal, and in this case a person is putting their own self down, as Riggio explains it “in a aggressive ‘poor me’ way (2015)”. This type of humor is actually quite unhealthy for the individual because the person criticizes themselves in order avoid attacks by others or before another person can point out their flaws. Ford et al. also states, “People who disproportionately focus on their negative attributes are particularly prone to engage in self-defeating humor and thus experience lower self-esteem”(pg. 330). A person with a lower self esteem is not only is unattractive but makes people pity them if that person is always complaining about themselves. Spitefulness can also be a form of negative humor where the individual has the intention or desire to do evil. Spitefulness relating to humor has a strong correlation with injurious humor styles, which means the person is causing or likely to do harm on an individual (Vrabel et al., para. 1, 2017). These two types of humor, aggressive and self-defeating, are also characterized by negative moods such as depression, anxiety and anger (Zumra, Engin, & Sahin, para. 4, 2013). Brutsch and Ruch (2017) makes a statement on verbal irony, “the role of aggression as a function of irony — foremost in its sarcastic form” (para. 3) which helps to emphasize the likeness of verbal irony and sarcasm. Sarcasm is often used as a joke but will always have an negative underlying truth behind it. Masui and Ura (2016) conclude with, “The aggressive and self-defeating humor correlated positively with neuroticism, characterized by a strong inclination to negative moods such as depression, anxiety and anger” (p. 46- 47). The causation of these mental illness proves to show how negative humor can only do more harm than good.

Therefore, negative humor can also create social isolation. It’s harder for individuals who use negative humor to create friendships and connect with peers. Negative humor also had a positive correlation with people who were more injurious and neurotic. Injurious meaning causing or likely to cause damage or harm; and neurotic, which is being abnormally sensitive, obsessive, tense, or anxious. This being said, it isn’t people who have great reputations that use negative humor. At the same time there are comedians who can get away with using negative humor like Joan Rivers. She uses humor that sometimes even puts herself down — ”self-defeating” in which she would make fun of herself. Rivers (2014) often was very blunt and rash about her humor but regardless of how taboo her humor could be, she was good at telling jokes and it was funny. What negative humor causes today is many conflicting ideas, this includes: friction, conflict, differentiating oneself as better through attacking, and lastly demeaning comments. Even though negative humor may create these issues, it can often be taken lightly and not truly cause any trouble as well. But to use negative humor over positive can be risky, because it all depends on how the responder reacts and if he or she finds it offensive. In Rivers’ case, there are plenty of people who aren’t huge fans of her and do find her jokes offensive.

In conclusion, positive and negative humor both are very different and their users of the twos types of humor also have very different ways in how they approach it. With positive humor making people relatively happier and more confident, negative humor however lowers a person’s self esteem and may even cause social isolation. One common example through out research that continues to get repeated is related to the four types of humor: Cann and Matson (2014) specifically rely this message by stating, “Affiliative and self-enhancing behaviors reflect a good sense of humor and social desirability, while aggressive and self-defeating behaviors signal a bad sense of humor and undesirable social characteristics” (para. 26). Being socially desirable is a trait many people want to have; to be accepted, to have friends and to be able to connect to those peers may be important to many individuals. How a person may choose to use the two types of humor will reflect their character and relationships in either a favorable or harmful way.

References

Edwards, K., & Martin, R. (2014). The Conceptualization, Measurement, and Role of Humor as a Character Strength in Positive Psychology. Europe’s Journal of Psychology, 10(3), 505–519.

Ford, T., Lappi, S., & Holden, C. (2016). Personality, Humor Styles and Happiness: Happy People Have Positive Humor Styles. Europe’s Journal of Psychology, 12(3), 320–337.

Little, B. (Writer), & Ted Talk (Producer). (2016, Feburary). Who Are You, Really? The Puzzle of Personality [Video]. Retrieved from https://www.ted.com/talks/brian_little_who_are_you_really_the_puzzle_of_personality

Masui, K., Ura, M., Kenkel, Mary Beth, & Ford, Thomas E. (2016). Aggressive Humor Style and Psychopathy: Moderating Effects of Childhood Socioeconomic Status. Translational Issues in Psychological Science, 2(1), 46–53.

Mayo Clinic. (2017). Does your self-esteem need a boost?

Mendiburo‐Seguel, A., Páez, D., & Martínez‐Sánchez, F. (2015). Humor styles and personality: A meta‐analysis of the relation between humor styles and the Big Five personality traits. Scandinavian Journal of Psychology, 56(3), 335–340.

Riggio, R. (2015). The 4 Styles of Humor. Psychology Today. Retrieved from https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/cutting-edge-leadership/201504/the-4-styles-humor

Rivers, J. (Comedian). (2014, March 27). The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon [Television Broadcast]. New York City, New York: NBC Productions.

Schermer, Julie Aitken, Martin, Rod A., Martin, Nicholas G., Lynskey, Michael, & Vernon, Philip A. (2013). The General Factor of Personality and Humor Styles. Personality and Individual Differences, Personality and Individual Differences.

Vrabel, Zeigler-Hill, & Shango. (2017). Spitefulness and humor styles. Personality and Individual Differences, 105, 238–243.