Professor Glenn Wilson, Gresham College, London

1

HAVING A LAUGH?
COMEDY AND COMEDIANS

• Professor Glenn Wilson, Gresham College, London

2
THATS AN OLD ONE

• The earliest recorded joke is a riddle found
  among the hieroglyphics in the tomb of Pharaoh
  Snefru (2613-2589 BC). Attributed to an
  impertinent architect who may have risked
  execution (Lowis, 2013).
• Q. How do you entertain a bored pharaoh?
• A. You sail a boatload of young women down the
  Nile, dressed only in fishing nets, and invite
  the pharaoh to go catch a fish.
• Apparently little has changed in 4500 years.

3
TOUCHING THE TABOO

• Humour is a safety valve. Emotional power often
  derives from an instinctive, libidinal element
  (e.g., sex, aggression, fear of death).
• Tension is relieved by some trick or twist that
  makes clear it is all just in fun, what Freud
  (1905) called the joke technique.
• If people are sexually aroused (e.g., by viewing
  erotic movies) they find most jokes funnier.

In The Meaning of Life John Cleese is a
schoolmaster attempting to give a sex education
lesson to a typically bored and disruptive
classroom of boys.
4
THE PUT-DOWN

• One form of hostility is disparagement
  (assertion of superiority against a background of
  shortcomings in others).
• May be directed against an individual or type of
  person (e.g., ethnic and sexist jokes).
• My mother-in-law has more chins than the Beijing
  telephone directory (Les Dawson).
• Put-downs are enjoyed by the in-group (those who
  get the joke share the stereotype) but are
  usually unfunny or offensive to the victims
  (Ferguson Ford, 2008).
• We also smile at the misfortune of others
  (schadenfreude), esp. when victim is disliked,
  high-status and envied, e.g., bankers (Cikara
  Fiske, 2013).

5
INCONGRUITY RESOLUTION

• Some jokes are neither libidinous nor targeted
  at out-groups but focus on intellectual conceits,
  word-play, juxtaposition and surprise.
• Hurley et al (2011) consider this cognitive
  puzzle-solving aspect is central to humour.
• The mind is constantly engaged in anticipation
  of events and correction of presumptions. Mirth
  arises from a sudden debunking of expectation or
  restructuring of perception (a reward for
  exercising an important survival skill).
• How do you stop an elephant charging? Take
  away its credit card.

6
BENIGN VIOLATIONS

• A theory covering many types of joke is that
  humour depends on an overlap between what is a
  violation of normal and what is benign (McGraw
  Warren, 2010).
• It applies to intellectual violations (e.g.,
  absurdities and non-sequiturs) as well as immoral
  and embarrassing behaviour.
• An example is play fighting, which is
  simultaneously threatening and harmless.
• A joke is not funny when it is either too tame
  or too risqué (a boundary that is constantly
  changing).

7
OBSERVATIONAL HUMOUR

• Jokes may be funny because we recognise truth
  in them (Lynch, 2010).
• Stand-ups like Jo Brand or Michael McIntyre work
  with stereotypes but also detail the little
  hassles of everyday life (e.g., public transport,
  shopping trolleys, ill-fitting clothes, dating
  mishaps).
• Pleasure derives from familiarity with the
  plight of the characters. They reassure us that
  others experience similar frustrations to our
  own. We are all in the same boat.

8
CRINGE COMEDY

• Some comedy focuses on social awkwardness and
  violations of political correctness.
• Often takes the form of mockumentaries, e.g.,
  The Office (Ricky Gervais), or Summer Heights
  High (Chris Lilley), with characters unaware of
  how excruciating they are. In others the
  embarrassment is shared (Extras, Curb Your
  Enthusiasm).
• Fear of social stigma or exclusion is a major
  source of anxiety in humans (Clegg, 2012), hence
  shyness and stage fright.
• At a funeral, most people would rather be the
  guy in the coffin than the guy delivering the
  eulogy (Jerry Seinfeld) .

David Brent (Ricky Gervais) is a self-important ,
yet insecure, office manager lacking self-insight.
9
RIDICULE

• Satire mocks people and institutions that are
  too rigid and pompous. It points up stupidity,
  hypocrisy and social injustice (hoping to promote
  change).
• Molieres Tartuffe is a pious fraud who
  infiltrates a mans home, exploits his
  hospitality and tries to seduce his wife. The
  play lasted one night in 1667 before being banned
  by Church authorities.
• Gilbert Sullivans characters include a senile
  judge, an admiral who has never been to sea, a
  queen with the hots for a sentry and a man who is
  half a fairy commissioned to make the House of
  Lords sit through the grouse and salmon season
  and be opened to competitive examination.
• Like modern court jesters, comedians represent
  our eccentric and subversive nature and seek to
  knock down sacred cows.

When first released in 1979, The Life of Brian
was declared blasphemous in many parts of the
world. Some Christians saw it as making fun of
Jesus. In fact, it was aimed at blind faith and
the quest for gurus. In 2006 it was rated the
greatest comedy film of all time (Ch. 4 poll).
10
HUMOUR IN THE BRAIN
The cognitive aspects of humour (getting the
joke) and emotional (enjoying the joke)
have discrete neural correlates.

• Moran et al (2004) recorded fMRI responses to
  full episodes of Seinfeld and The Simpsons.
• Humour detection was associated with activity
  in the left inferior frontal brain (A and B)
  verbal processing.
• Humour appreciation went with bilateral activity
  in the insular cortex (C) and amygdala (D)
  emotional areas.

11
BRAIN DAMAGE

• Children with focal epilepsy find jokes less
  funny than controls (Suits et al, 2012).
• Damage to the corpus callosum impairs narrative
  jokes but cartoons are still enjoyed (Brown et
  al, 2005).
• Lesions in the right hemisphere affect humour
  appreciation more than left damage (Stammi
  Stuss, 1999).
• Autistic individuals and schizophrenics have
  difficulty with jokes that involve inference of
  mental states in others (Samson Hegenloh, 2010
  Marjoram et al, 2005).

This joke used by Bartolo et al (2006) requires
an inference of altruistic intent in Picture A,
reversed in B.
12
TODDLERS JOKES

• Children generate humour from an early age
  (Hoicka Akhtar, 2012).
• During their first year they copy jokes (e.g.,
  peekaboo, chasing). By age 2/3 novel jokes are
  produced, including deliberate conceptual errors
  (e.g., pig says moo), comic acts (e.g.,
  underpants on head) and breaching taboos (e.g.,
  spitting food).
• Parents signal joke-mode with special speech
  styles. Children share humour with them by
  smiling, laughing and looking for a reaction.

13
HOW TICKLED I AM

• Tickling is prototypic of humour (Provine 2004)
• 1. Occurs in many non-humans (producing sounds
  similar to laughter).
• 2. Is playful, teasing and usually pleasurable
  (with sexual overtones).
• 3. Involves stimulation of vulnerable parts of
  the body (requiring trust).
• 5. Cannot effectively be done to oneself (hence
  socially bonding).
• 6. Humour may be considered a mind tickle.

14
THE SUBMISSIVE SMILE

• Humour inhabits the overlap between laughing and
  smiling. These have separate, almost opposite,
  origins. Laughter signals triumph and dominance,
  smiling conveys appeasement and submission
  (closed teeth are harmless). Women smile more
  than men (even when on trial for murder). When
  boxers square up before a fight the one who
  smiles tends to lose (Klaus Chen, 2013).

15
LAUGHING WITH, LAUGHING AT

• Laughter is a primitive, pre-verbal from of
  emotional expression, seen in many animals from
  rodents to primates.
• Signals intent to play, not attack.
• A contagious social activity, occurring mostly
  in face-to-face interaction among friends. We are
  30x more likely to laugh with others than on our
  own (Scott, 2013).
• Confirms membership of a group (joyful bonding)
  but can also be used to exclude an individual
  from a group (taunting laughter).

16
CORPSING

• A volcanic, yet endearing form of laughter
  occurs when a person knows it is inappropriate
  to laugh but cant contain it. Attempts to
  suppress giggles turn to uncontrollable, highly
  contagious, fits of laughter.
• Said to derive from actors on stage attempting
  to make the corpse laugh, but could refer to
  the helpless, corpse-like state of the victim.
• Peter Cook was expert at getting Dudley Moore to
  laugh in the middle of their live sketches by ad
  libbing.

A famous case of corpsing occurred in a BBC
cricket commentary when Jonathan Agnew (Aggers)
observed that Ian Botham was out, having failed
to get his leg over. His co-commentator Brian
Johnston (Jonners) struggled some minutes to
regain self-control.
17
HUMOUR PREFERENCES

• Humour preferences relate to personality and
  social attitudes.
• Liberals like sexual, aggressive disparaging
  cartoons conservatives prefer safe,
  word-based, intellectual jokes, especially those
  that provide incongruity resolution (feelings
  of closure).
• (Wilson, 1990)

18
SEXISM IN HUMOUR

• Overall, men and women find the world equally
  funny (Azim et al, 2005) but they differ in what
  they laugh at. Men are more drawn to libidinous
  and competitive themes women to clever
  word-play.
• Despite a recent spate of advertisements in
  which men are depicted as incompetent fools, both
  men and women often prefer female-disparaging
  humour.
• This interacts with attitudes those with less
  traditional views of womens role show reduced
  preference for sexist humour (Moore et al, 1987).

19
HUMOUR AS FANTASY

• Although sexually explicit humour is often
  regarded as sexist, there are interesting
  variations within women as to which jokes they
  prefer.
• Women who were physically less attractive, as
  rated by external (male) judges, were more
  religious anti-hedonistic than attractive women
  on an attitude questionnaire. However, their
  ratings of seaside postcards revealed a
  preference for those depicting shapely women as
  the focus of lecherous male attention. Wilson
  Brazendale (1973) interpreted this vicarious
  gratification deriving from deprivation.
  Attractive women favoured more anatomical,
  female-assertive cartoons.

20
MAKE EM LAUGH

• Humour has mating value signalling
  intelligence and creativity (good genes).
• Attractive people are seen as funnier and humour
  boosts attractiveness (Cowan Little, 2013),
  particularly for short-term flings.
• Women are 3x more likely to give their phone
  number to a suitor they have just heard tell a
  joke to a friend (Gueguen, 2010).
• Women want a partner who is both receptive to
  humour and funny men just want a partner who
  will laugh at their jokes (Bressler, et al,
  2006).

21
BAD HUMOUR, BAD MARRIAGE

• Humour style relates to marital satisfaction and
  divorce (Saraglou et al, 2010).
• Constructive , affiliative and self-enhancing
  humour went with happy and stable marriages.
  Antisocial , sarcastic and vulgar humour went
  with poor relationships and divorce.
• Insecure, self-depreciating humour in women went
  with relationship satisfaction in their husband
  but an also an increased likelihood of divorce.

22
HUMOUR SELLS

• Humour is used in advertising to gain attention
  and to build warm, playful associations with a
  product.
• It is effective in increasing sales but only
  when the ad is likeable, not irritating. It
  operates to combat peoples natural resistance to
  aggressive marketing through a process of
  distraction.
• Viewers of funny ads do not necessarily remember
  the brand afterwards but make the positive
  association with the right product once in the
  store (Strick et al, 2013).

23
HUMOUR AS COPING

• A sense of humour can operate as a defence
  against adverse, inescapable circumstances, e.g.,
  disability or mortality (Moran, 2003). It helps
  screen out negative aspects of reality and
  promotes optimism.
• Two recurrent themes in the comedy of Woody
  Allen, encapsulated in the title of film Love and
  Death, seem to reflect personal issues.
• He seems to have an unhappy, jaundiced view of
  the world, with particular anxiety concerning his
  perceived unattractiveness to women. In many of
  his films Allen seems engaged in self-therapy,
  playing the geek that gets the girl by dint of
  his wit (which he also achieves in real life).

24
GALLOWS HUMOUR

• A defensive form in which people make witticisms
  in the face of hopeless adversity.
• Sir Thomas More, ascending the scaffold I pray
  you Mr Lieutenant, see me up safe.
• Sick humour may seem insensitive in the wake of
  major tragedies like 9/11, yet clearly functions
  as a coping strategy.
• Widely used by undertakers, medical and
  emergency workers for catharsis and distancing
  from intolerable situations but danger of
  fostering disrespectful attitudes to clients
  (Sullivan, 2013).
• Always Look on the Bright Side is currently
  among the most popular funeral songs in the UK.

25
THE WAY OF THE COMEDIAN

• According to Force (2011) many comedians
  suffered unhappy, abusive childhoods and
  developed humour as a way of overcoming personal
  trauma.
• If you can find humour in anything you can
  survive it
• (Bill Cosby).
• Clowns are experts at reframing tragic
  circumstances into funny ones, hence serve as
  social therapists. They directly address fears
  and concerns that most people prefer to deny or
  conceal.

Glaswegian comedian Billy Connolly says he was
physically and sexually abused by his alcoholic
father from ages 10-15.
26
MYTH OF THE SAD CLOWN

• Despite some famous instances (e.g. Tony
  Hancock) the idea that comedians are especially
  prone to depression and suicide is not
  empirically supported.
• Stand-up comedians are not distinguished by high
  neuroticism, and their parents were no less
  caring than comparison groups (Greengross et al,
  2012).
• An elevated suicide rate in comics might have
  been expected because some suffer bipolar mood
  disorder (Spike Milligan, Ruby Wax) but these
  high profile cases may have led to an exaggerated
  estimate of psychopathology in comics.

Comedian David Walliams has suffered depression
all his life, with several attempts at suicide.
However, he is not typical.
27
LAUGHTER AS MEDICINE

• Numerous health benefits have been cited for
  humour and laughter, including mood improvement,
  stress relief, muscle relaxation, lowered blood
  pressure and strengthening of the heart. Most are
  intuitively plausible and findings are generally
  positive, though seldom meeting scientific
  criteria (Martin, 2002 Mora-Ripoll, 2010)).
• Widely held that humour and laughter bolster
  immune capability, but there are various measures
  and evidence is mixed and inconclusive (Bennett
  Lengacher, 2009).
• More persuasive, are reports that laughing
  releases endorphins, which have painkilling and
  social bonding effects (Dunbar et al, 2012).

28
HUMOUR AND LONGEVITY

• The ultimate health benefit might be an
  increased life expectation. Svebak et al (2010)
  sense of humour correlates with subjective health
  and independently improves survival, at least up
  until age 65.
• Longevity studies of professional comedians
  come from the premise that if laughter is good
  medicine clowns ought to live longer.
• Despite one or two famous examples (Bob Hope and
  George Burns) comedians, and other performers,
  actually die younger than comparable professions
  (Friedman, 2013).
• Suggests that health benefits of humour may
  apply more to audience than the clowns.

George Burns The secret of longevity is to live
to 100. You dont hear of too many people dying
after that
29
IN CONCUSSION

• There are many different types of humour and no
  single theory seems adequate to account for them
  all.
• Psychological investigations of jokes and how
  they help us to release tensions and cope with
  lifes problems are interesting and informative
  but of little help to comedians in honing their
  skills and generating funny material.
• Comedians make better psychologists than
  psychologists make comedians.

Ken Dodd The trouble with Freud is that he never
played second house at the Glasgow Empire on a
wet Tuesday.