Essay On Sense Of Humor

2.2 Sense of humor

An individual can appraise a stimulus as either humor-related or funny, based on his or her inclination towards experiencing or instigating the emotional state of hilarity. This inclination is what better known as sense of humor. According to Thorson and Powell (1993), the concept of sense of humor, by itself is quite ambiguous. Sense of humor comprises a vast variety of psychological and social abilities and traits, such as wanting to get the joke, getting the joke, creating the joke, the effort put forth to create the joke, comfort in a social setting, need for social approval, desire for control, need to go onto the offensive, extraversion, and the willingness and ability to communicate (p. 808).

Thus, it is evident that an individual’s sense of humor depends on a variety of personality traits. The idea of sense of humor, though complex, is important to enlighten us on why people’s mental health may be influenced differently by humor-related social exchanges. The association between sense of humor and

These include: emotions (guilt, fear, worry, anxiety, grief, or depression), cognitive reactions (i.e., their appraisal of stressful situations and strategies), behaviours (crying, smoking, substance abuse, abuse of self or others, and irritability) and physiological (weight loss or gain, sweating, stuttering, headaches, trembling, body aches) (Misra et al., 2000, p. 238). (Hudd et al., 2000) states that individuals who experience high levels of stress have more affinity towards unhealthy behaviours. Moreover, these students also tend to be less satisfied with their health overall, including their weight and fitness level. Students with higher level of stress experience dissatisfaction with factors of life that are related to self-esteem. However, it is still unclear whether stress brings down the self-esteem of an