The Psychophysics of Humor

Psychological distance (due to the passage of time, degree of social familiarity, differences between geographical locations, or degree of reality) is an important factor in transforming tragedy into comedy (McGraw et al. 2012; Morreall 2009). Understanding how psychological distance influences humor perceptions has implications for happiness (enjoying life), advertising (knowing who to target with humorous ads, and when), coping (transforming pain into pleasure), and sensitivity (avoiding “too soon” comedy fails). In contrast to theories that explain why distance linearly increases perceptions of humor (McGraw et al. 2012), we draw from the benign violation theory to predict a curvilinear relationship. There is a sweet spot to comedy in which humor in response to a tragedy will rise and subsequently fall with distance. The benign violation theory proposes that humor occurs when something that seems wrong, threatening, or unsettling (i.e., a violation) simultaneously seems okay or acceptable (i.e. benign; McGraw and Warren 2010). For example, tickling is physical attack that does not cause true harm (Koestler 1964; Veatch 1998). The theory suggests two ways that something may fail to elicit humor: it can be purely benign (tickling oneself) or purely violating (a stranger does the tickling; McGraw and Warren 2010; Veatch 1998). Humor requires the right balance of threat. Too much threat reduces humor by making it difficult to see things as benign, whereas too little threat reduces humor by making it difficult to see a violation.