Sensation seeking, social attitudes and humor appreciation in Italy

Abstract

The present study examines the role of sensation seeking, conservatism, toughmindedness, sex, and age in appreciation of humor in Italian adults. A sample of 100 females and 48 males responded to Italian adaptations of the 3 WD humor test, Form V of the sensation seeking scale, and the C-Scale. Funniness of incongruity-resolution humor correlated positively with conservatism, female sex, and age, and negatively with all components of sensation seeking. Funniness of nonsense humor correlated positively with experience seeking, general sensation seeking, and male sex and negatively with conservatism. Funniness of sexual content in humor correlated positively with male sex, disinhibition, boredom susceptibility, and toughmindedness. Aversiveness of humor yielded less significant correlations. Conservatism, sensation seeking, and age were potent predictors of structure preference. The investigation of indices of appreciation of sexual content in humor confirmed that structure and content have to be separated both theoretically and empirically in appreciation of sexual humor. Finally, the attitudes held by individuals appreciating a particular type of humor were explored. The results allow the conclusion that appreciation of humor is embedded into a similar nomological network in Italy than in other countries studied.