Humor and poignancy: Exploring narrative pathways to face death and bereavement

Themes of death and grief emerge in media entertainment ways that are both poignant humorous. In this experimental study, we extend research on eudaimonic narratives about to consider those hedonic. Participants read a story woman giving eulogy for her friend was manipulated be either poignant-focused or humor-focused, answered questions their responses the story, feelings connectedness with others, acceptance. The narrative conditions elicited similar levels engagement appreciation, but humor-focused more enjoyment than narrative. Connectedness did not differ between conditions. However, acceptance when controlling participants' personal loss severity, individual differences dark tetrad personality traits, trait depression, religious upbringing. We tested these effects an integrated path model found fit data well pathways explained variance connectedness. Our findings have implications how depicted entertainment: namely, is inherently topic addition humorous elements bereavement may especially effective increasing