Well quite a few actually, which leads to the
conclusion that if you have to explain it, you don’t really get it. Many have
tried to capture the essence of “funniness”. Aristotle claimed it is a derogatory device
for expressing one’s superiority over others or groups and Freud claimed it
releases nervous sexual tension. One thing is for sure, humour is present across
all human cultures.
One of the most popular theories as to what makes a
joke funny is the recognition of an incongruity followed by its resolution. For
example: Two cup cakes in the oven and one says to the other “uff it’s hot in
here” and the other replies “Oh my god, a talking cup cake!!” First we set up a
hypothetical fictitious world where indeed cupcakes talk, we may even feel
sympathy for the poor cupcake, but this illusion is finally shattered by the punch
line as we are reminded of the reality that cupcakes can’t talk.
At a neurological level, jokes seem to act on
different parts of our brain, as the joke is being told and we are resolving
ambiguity, our left inferior frontal and temporal cortices are stimulated, this
could be considered as joke detection. Then once the punch line has been
analysed this then activates the reward system in the nucleus accumbens, which
of course is why we find jokes so pleasurable.
Humour could be considered as a mental erogenous zone
and plays an important role in the mating game. In surveys it has been shown
that a sense of humour and ability to make other people laugh is considered
attractive for both men and women in evaluating a potential partner. Alas I’ve
never been very good at telling jokes so would have difficulty in France where
studies have shown that women were three times more likely to share their phone
number with men who they had just heard tell a funny joke, oh la la!
Based on an article by Christian Jarret in “the
Psychologist” vol 26 Nº 4
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