Attitudes to Sex, Sexual Behaviour and Enjoyment of Humour

Freudian (1905 Wien; Der Witz und seine Beziehung zum Unbewu�ten. Deuticke) and Salience (Goldstein, Suls and Anthony, 1972; The Psychology of Humor. Academic Press, New York) theory make opposite predictions about the effects of attitudes to sex and sexual behaviour on appreciation of sex humour. Male and female students (N=115) answered a questionnaire of attitudes toward sex, a sexual behaviour inventory (Eysenck, 1976; Sex and Personality. Open Books, London) and a humour test. The results generally supported a positive correlation between appreciation of sex humour and the sex scales (sexual libido, satisfaction, experience and pleasure), although the resulting pattern was very complex. Separation of sex humour according to the jokes structure yielded different predictor patterns. Funniness of humour based on nonsense correlated most frequently and most highly with the sex scales libido, experiences and pleasure. Low sexual satisfaction, low permissiveness, and prudishness were correlated with aversiveness of all types of humour. Furthermore, it was hypothesized that these variables are better predictors of enjoyment of sexual humour than the more general factors of conservatism and toughmindedness (T) which turned out to be potent predictors in a recent study (Ruch and Hehl, 1986; Person. individ. Diff.7, 861–874). It turned out that the predictive sex scales were located on the toughmindedness axis and were thus as predictive of sex humour as T itself. A refinement of the salience hypothesis was undertaken. DOI: 10.1016/0191-8869(88)90132-8 Posted at the Zurich Open Repository and Archive, University of Zurich ZORA URL: http://doi.org/10.5167/uzh-77528 Originally published at: Ruch, Willibald; Hehl, Franz-Josef (1988). Attitudes to sex, sexual behaviour and enjoyment of humour. Personality and Individual Differences, 9(6):983-994. DOI: 10.1016/0191-8869(88)90132-8 This manuscript was published as: Ruch, W. & Hehl, F.-J. (1988). Attitudes to sex, sexual behaviour and enjoyment of humour. Personality and Individual Differences, 9, 983-994. ATTITUDES TO SEX, SEXUAL BEHAVIOUR AND ENJOYMENT OF HUMOUR WILLIBALD RUCH AND FRANZ-JOSEF HEHL Department of Experimental Biological Psychology, University of Düsseldorf, Universitätsstraße 1, D-4000 Düsseldorf, F.R.G. Summary—Freudian (1905) and Salience (Goldstein et al., 1972) theory make opposite predictions about the effects of attitudes to sex and sexual behaviour on appreciation of sex humour. Male and female students (N=115) answered a questionnaire of attitudes toward sex, a sexual behaviour inventory (Eysenck, 1976) and a humour test. The results generally were supporting a positive correlation between appreciation of sex humour and the sex scales (sexual libido, satisfaction, experience and pleasure), although the resulting pattern was very complex. Separation of sex humour according to the jokes structure yielded different predictor patterns. Funniness of humour based on nonsense correlated most frequently and most highly with the sex scales libido, experiences and pleasure. Low sexual satisfaction, low permissiveness, and prudishness were correlated with aversiveness of all types of humour. Furthermore, it was determined, whether these variables are better predictors of enjoyment of sexual humour than the more general factors of conservatism and toughmindedness which turned out to be potent predictors in a recent study (Ruch and Hehl, 1986). It turned out that the predictive sex scales were located on the toughmindedness axis and were thus equally predictive of sex humour than T itself. A refinement of the salience hypothesis was undertaken. I N T R O D U C T I O N Sexual themes apparently are one of the most prominent contents in humour. Sex as a salient ingredient in humour was stressed by many humour theorists (e.g. Freud, 1905, Berlyne, 1972) and turned out in nearly all factorial investigations in this realm too (e.g. Eysenck, 1942; Cattell and Tollefson, 1966; Ruch, 1981). Sex jokes and cartoons, like other humorous stimuli, are characterized by their content but also by their structure. Rothbart and Pien (1977), Suls (1983), McGhee (1977) and Shultz (1976) developed informationprocessing models to illustrate the cognitive processes necessary to understand humour. These models are not specific for certain contents; i.e. they serve as general models for the structure of jokes and cartoons irrespective of their content. Generally, two principal models can serve as a theoretical framework for deriving hypotheses for research on appreciation of content of humour. According to Freud (1905) repressed impulses find relief in a disguised form in jokes as well as in dreams. Therefore, Ss repressing their sexuality should show a preference for sex humour. Generally, funniness of sex humour should go along with a negative attitude towards sex, low sexual experience and a low degree of satisfaction. The hypotheses deducible from Freudian theory are discussed by Kline (1977). An alternative model was provided by the salience theory (Goldstein, Suls and Anthony, 1972). Goldstein et al. (1972) showed that experimentally established salience of certain themes (in their case aggression, but also automobiles and music) leads to enhanced attention to these themes, to a better availability of the information necessary to understand the joke and finally to enhanced funniness of jokes with these themes. Salience theory was not applicated so far to predict individual differences in appreciation of humour. Nevertheless, one can assume that sex is habitually more salient for Ss with positive attitudes towards sex, with more sexual experience and a higher degree of satisfaction. Therefore, a positive correlation can be expected between sexual experience and libido on one hand and