Hear the One About Men Being Funnier Than Women?

ScienceDaily (Oct. 26, 2011) — Why do we think that men are funnier than women? Because they are! And men are particularly responsive to other men's humor. Women, however, find men funnier because they mistakenly attribute funny things to men. Laura Mickes and her team, from the University of California, and Robert Mankoff from The New Yorker, explore the reasons behind the stereotype that men are funnier than women and find scientific proof to support it.

Their work appears online in Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, published by Springer.

Both men and women seem to believe that men are funnier than women. Why? One theory is that men use humor to impress potential partners. Women often say they prefer a man who makes them laugh and men prefer women who laugh at their jokes. Mickes and team wanted to find out if there was some substance behind the stereotype i.e. are men actually funnier than women or are they simply perceived as such?

In the first of two studies, men and women were asked to write funny captions to accompany cartoon images from The New Yorker. The researchers then asked a group of raters to evaluate how funny the captions were, without knowing whether they were written by a man or a woman. Both male and female raters judged captions written by men to be funnier. Males showed an even stronger preference for captions written by males, indicating a uniquely strong appreciation of male humor by male raters.

In the second study, men and women were shown the funniest and least funny captions from the first experiment and were told whether it was written by a man or a woman. On a memory test, they were asked to remember whether a man or a woman had written the funny captions. Overall, funny captions were remembered better, and the funnier the caption the more likely the raters were to remember the gender of their author. Interestingly, there was also a humor-based recall bias: individuals of both genders tended to misattribute humorous captions to male writers and the non-humourous captions to female writers.

The authors conclude: "Our findings suggest that men's view that men are funnier could be a result of their actually finding the humor they produce funnier, as well as their biased recall of funny things as having sprung from men's minds. Women laughing more at men, when the gender is known, may be largely due not to superior humor, but to more social influences, which are known to impact laughter."

Men funnier than women?

Not sure I agree with that,Stephen.

The best comedian I always enjoyed was Martie Caine,a British lady who passed from Cancer many years ago.
I saw her once at Windsor night club,she brought the house down!
There is also an American woman comedian,her name slips me for the moment.
Left Behind may remember her name.

Haven't seen her for a while.

Not even very good male comedians now,the good ones from the past are slowly dying off.
Just my opinion,of course.

Oh well,nothing profound here petal.I know my wife always
laughs at my silly jokes,nobody else does.Maybe you also laugh more with those
you love.
Stephen

This is a mainly UK list apologies to others....Jo Brand is a national treasure. Joyce Grenfell was funny and so profound. That lovely slapstick Miranda Hart. Sarah Millican as a stand up but NOT as a chat show host. Joan Rivers. That woman who impersonated Sarah Palin and writes all her own material. Pamela Stephenson Billy Connollys wife. June Whitfield for timing. Victoria Wood. Pam Ayres the poet. Edwina Currie is a hoot as an after dinner speaker. Jennifer Saunders and Joanna Lumley. Dawn French on a good day.
Those researchers are wrong Stephen women are as funny as men if they choose to be so. Possibly most women have better things to do.

Being wrong.Well that is also part of research.
I am of course delighted,that research into such a
mundane subject as"humour" can produce such
strong reactions or am I misreading things.
Either way it is always good to laugh.
Enjoy

It's good to hear of any research being funded today.
So much less money available hence fewer speculative projects and we all suffer accordingly.
I tell students that there is no such thing as research failure, only 'deferred success'.
If it doesn't pan out then you have discovered what NOT to try next time.

Indeed