Humor as the Road to Physical, Social, and Mental Health

by Louis R. Franzini, Ph.D.

British actress Hannah Waddingham, who played Rebecca in the Emmy award-winning series Ted Lasso, cogently pointed out, “You don’t have to be cutting to be funny. You can be warm and kind and giving and supportive and accepting … and funny.”

What is funny is a very subjective conclusion and can be controversial. There are clear harbingers of changes in the tone and content of the material of professional stand-up comedians. Many of the historically all-star comedians have been aggressive and even hostile toward their audiences by using a high frequency of obscenities and obvious biases. Today the most popular current comedians are funny without being mean or obscene. For example, Jerry Seinfeld, John Mulaney, and Tom Papa all work “clean.” The Atlantic has described newcomer Nate Bargatze as “the nicest man in stand-up.”

Political correctness has definitely modified professional comedians’ acts. Similarly, humor-making by amateur funny folks has also been affected. Curse words and mentioning explicit sex acts are no longer very shockingly funny, while the genuine laughs now are more likely to come from well-honed stories and comedic punchlines.

Are we entering a new age of comedy? As once marginalized voices take center stage, fresh comedic genres are challenging assumptions about who and what can be funny. Comedians, academics, and social activists express well considered insights into gender and comedy and insist that laughter can actually deepen and transform our sense of humanity.

Leading academic institutions are acknowledging the changes occurring in humor making, especially in the directions of inclusivity and personal sensitivity, as revealed in their specific research projects and whom they will invite for campus programs. This increased awareness of the social dynamics and the potential value of humor to their personal benefit of their students along with all of their constituents has become a wise perspective for colleges themselves. Let's not ignore the wisdom in actor-comedian Ricky Gervais’ advice, “Just because you are offended doesn’t mean you’re right.”

Of course, most of us are not professional comedians, whose concerns can be partly different than ours. They are striving to make a living (or more) from their work in comedy. Most folks are more interested, properly so, in being well received socially, popular with increasing numbers of friends, and simply fun to know and be around. Such personal differences lead to different kinds of humor and joking by regular people who simply want to be liked and appreciated by others.

The research has shown us that there are clear health benefits to individuals' appropriate use of humor: physical benefits, such as blood pressure reduction, stress lowering, muscle relaxation, and calm. Psychological benefits include greater self-confidence, personal happiness, and social acceptance from new friends and even romance possibilities. People like to be liked. It is good for them and everyone who experiences smart humor making.

We do know that men and women can accrue great benefits from using their senses of humor wisely and frequently. The wise use of humor means being aware of others' likely sensitivities, that there is no need for obscenities or cursing in humor making, or belittling minorities or disabled people, and so on.

The academic study of humor and the encouragement of humor use in applied settings has recently become surprisingly controversial. Researchers and public speakers with expertise in humor are receiving increasingly serious pushback from activist lay citizens. For example, studies of Christian attitudes toward humor and satire, the differing humor skills between men and women, and an evolutionary approach toward understanding humor usage are just a few of the topics that have stimulated some vigorous negative reactions in the media.

It is vital to know what is funny and what is not. The characteristics of funny stuff and how best to recognize the funny are important for achieving the many available outcomes of successful humor making.  Once we know the characteristics of your “material” or even any brief "aside" comments which are likely to be funny to your listeners, it will maximize your chances of success in a large variety of settings and personal interactions.

The avoidable pitfalls in trying to be funny with friends and colleagues include biases based on religions, ethnicity, politics, sexual preferences, gender identity, age, national origin, and more, which indeed could be potential sources of discrimination as well as humorous hilarity.

We can all learn from both the successes of the pros and their performance errors as well. The classic advice of "know the room" is universally applicable for humor success, whether that "room" is just one person or hundreds.

You can be funny without offending.