REVIEW
published: 29 January 2019
doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00123
Edited by:
Xiaodong Yue,
City University of Hong Kong,
Hong Kong
Reviewed by:
Anguo Fu,
Hainan University, China
Li Lin,
Hong Kong Polytechnic University,
Hong Kong
*Correspondence:
Yubo Hou
houyubo@pku.edu.cn
Specialty section:
This article was submitted to
Cultural Psychology,
a section of the journal
Frontiers in Psychology
Received: 26 November 2018
Accepted: 14 January 2019
Published: 29 January 2019
Citation:
Jiang T, Li H and Hou Y (2019)
Cultural Differences in Humor
Perception, Usage, and Implications.
Front. Psychol. 10:123.
doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00123
Cultural Differences in Humor
Perception, Usage, and Implications
Tonglin Jiang1, Hao Li2 and Yubo Hou3
*
1
Department of Psychology, University of Hong Kong, Pok Fu Lam, Hong Kong, 2
School of Psychological and Cognitive
Sciences, Peking University, Beijing, China, 3
School of Psychological and Cognitive Sciences and Beijing Key Laboratory of
Behavior and Mental Health, Peking University, Beijing, China
Humor is a universal phenomenon but is also culturally tinted. In this article, we reviewed
the existing research that investigates how culture impacts individuals’ humor perception
and usage as well as humor’s implications for psychological well-being. Previous
research has substantiated evidence that Easterners do not hold as positive an attitude
toward humor as their Western counterparts do. This perception makes Easterners less
likely to use humor as a coping strategy in comparison with Westerners. Despite this
difference, Westerners and Easterners have similar patterns in the relationship between
their humor and psychological well-being index, though the strength of the relationship
varies across cultures. Implications and potential future research avenues discussed.
Keywords: humor, humor perception, humor usage, psychological wellbeing, cultural difference, Eastern,
Western
CULTURAL DIFFERENCES IN HUMOR PERCEPTION, USAGE,
AND IMPLICATIONS
Humor refers to the tendency to experience or express what is amusing and funny, which is
always accompanied with emotional response and vocal-behavioral expressions, such as laughter
and smiling (Chen and Martin, 2007; Martin and Ford, 2018). Generally, humor is present in all
human cultures (Fry, 1994). However, people from different cultural backgrounds may see humor
in different ways. As it is remarked by Martin and Ford (2018):
Humor is a universal human activity that most people experience many times over the course of a typical
day and in all sorts of social contexts. At the same time, there are obviously important cultural influences
on the way humor is used and the situations that are considered appropriate for laughter (p. 30).
Humor is universal but also culturally specific. Previous literature has shown that Easterners
and Westerners differ in humor perception (e.g., Chen and Martin, 2005, 2007), however, the
results about East-West cultural difference in humor usage, the relationship between humor and
psychological well-being are rather mixed and inconsistent (e.g., Kazarian and Martin, 2004; Chen
and Martin, 2007; Hiranandani and Yue, 2014). Whether there is East-West cultural difference
in humor perception, usage, as well as humor and psychological well-being relationship remains
unclear. Understanding how culture influences humor perception, humor usage, as well as humor’s
implications for psychological well-being is of great importance because humor has significant
consequences for human psychological well-being (e.g., Martin, 2001; Chen and Martin, 2007;
Martin and Ford, 2018). To clarify this question, we need to have a systematic view about cultural
differences in humor. The aim of this article provides a review of how culture influences humor
perception and usage as well as the relationship between humor and psychological well-being so as
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Jiang et al. Cultural Differences in Humor
to shed light on the issue of using humor to promote individuals’
psychological well-being. Lastly, we also suggest some revenues
for future research.
CULTURAL DIFFERENCES IN HUMOR
PERCEPTION
Since the era of Ancient Greece, it has been a long tradition
among Westerners to embrace humor (Grant, 1924/1970; Martin
and Ford, 2018). Westerners have associated humor with
positivity and seen humor as natural amusement expressions
(Apte, 1985). In the late nineteenth century, Freud (1928)
regarded humor as a defense mechanism against obstacles
and distress. In the perspective of Psychoanalysis, humor was
regarded not only as a way to help people release fear and
anxiety, but it also provides an amusing, funny, and less scaring
perspective toward people’s inner fear (Martin and Ford, 2018).
In the twentieth century, psychologists in Western world began
to talk about the positive effects of humor. For example,
humor is regarded as a desirable positive trait of an individual
(Allport, 1937; Maslow, 1968; Mintz, 1983; Mindess et al., 1985).
Humorous people are thought to be more attractive (e.g., Regan
and Joshi, 2003; Fraley and Aron, 2004) and more motivating,
creative, and capable (e.g., Sternberg, 1985; Priest and Swain,
2002). Humor also takes on meaning as an essential element
of psychological health associated with self-awareness, welladjustment,
and affability (Allport, 1961; Martin and Ford, 2018).
In sharp contrast, Easterners’ attitudes toward humor are
not that positive. Specifically, in China, Confucianism has
devalued humor. Chinese self-actualization denigrates humor
while stressing restriction and seriousness (Bond, 1996; Liao,
1998, 2007; Yue, 2010). Chinese are reluctant to admit they are
humorous out of fear of jeopardizing their social status. Chinese
do not think that humor is a desirable personality trait (Rudowicz
and Yue, 2002; Yue, 2011).
The views toward humor are reflected in behaviors. Surveys
and empirical research provide evidence for the cultural
differences in humor perception. For example, Chinese do not
see humor as an essential element of creativity (e.g., Rudowicz
and Yue, 2011; Yue and Hui, 2011, 2015) like Westerners do
(e.g., Murdock and Ganim, 1993; Kellner and Benedek, 2017;
Lu et al., 2019). Yue X. et al. (2016) found that Canadians rated
humor more importantly than their Chinese counterparts. They
also provided evidence for the assumption that Easterners do not
associate humor with positivity as Westerners do by finding that
Hong Kong participants who were primed with Western culture
would like to use more positive words to depict a humorous
person than participants who were primed with Chinese cultural
icons. Moreover, Chen and Martin (2005) found that Chinese
students rated themselves as being less humorous than Canadian
students. Yue X. et al. (2016) also found similar results. East
Asians, including mainland Chinese, Taiwanese, and Hong Kong
people, were consistently found to report lower self-rated humor
than Westerners (e.g., Liao, 2001; Chen and Martin, 2005, 2007;
Liao and Chang, 2006). This research provides direct evidence
that Westerners associate humor with positivity, which is not the
case for Chinese.
However, Chinese culture is not purely dominated by
Confucianism. Other philosophies also impact Chinese attitudes
toward humor (Yue, 2010, 2011). One of these philosophies
is Taoism. Different from Confucianism’s despising on humor,
Taoism regards humor as “an attempt of having witty, peaceful
and harmonious interaction with nature” (Yue, 2011, line 4,
p. 464). The tug between different philosophies makes the
appreciation–despising complex toward humor deeply rooted
in Chinese culture, which makes Chinese have quite an
ambivalent attitude toward humor (Yue, 2010, 2011). Yue (2011)
summarized three ambivalent attitudes toward humor among
Chinese. The first is valuing humor but considering themselves
to lack the trait of humor. The second is how being humorous
is not associated with being an orthodox Chinese. The third
is that humor is not important for everyone but exclusively
for those with expertise. He also conducted survey research to
test his assumptions, which showed that even though Chinese
thought that humor was important in daily life, they would not
say that they were humorous themselves. When asked to choose
personality attributes, the top 10 important personality attributes
that Chinese chose for humor were fundamentally different from
those they chose for the Chinese personality. Chinese were likely
to nominate a person with humorous expertise rather than an
ordinary person as being a humorous person (Yue, 2011). Other
research evidence supports this assumption as well. As Yue X.
et al. (2016) found in the humor nomination study, Chinese
prefer to name experts rather than their friends or relatives as
humorous people, whereas the opposite was true for Canadians.
Similar results were also found by Yue et al. (2010b) and Yue and
Hiranandani (2014). Moreover, using the Implicit Association
Test (IAT), Jiang et al. (2011) found that despite Chinese students
not showing significant differences in explicit attitudes toward
humor in comparison with American students, they were more
likely to associate humor implicitly with negative adjectives.
In summary, Westerners and Easterners’ views toward humor
fundamentally differ from each other. Westerners regard humor
as a desirable trait of an ideal self, associate humor with positivity,
and stress the importance of humor in their daily life. On
the contrary, Easterners’ attitudes toward humor are not that
positive. Specifically, the apprehension–despising complex makes
Chinese have ambivalent attitudes toward humor. Even though
Chinese might sometimes admit that humor is important in
daily life, they do not think they are humorous themselves. For
Chinese, humor is a talent that exclusively belongs to experts and
is not a desirable trait of their ideal personality.
CULTURAL DIFFERENCE IN HUMOR
USAGE
Cultural difference in humor perception directly influences
humor usage. In Western culture, humor has become an
indispensable coping strategy for Westerners (Moran and
Massam, 1999; Lefcourt, 2001). According to psychoanalysis
theory, humor acts as a defense mechanism to help people fight
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Jiang et al. Cultural Differences in Humor
against negative events (Freud, 1928; Shurcliff, 1968). On the one
hand, humor serves as a catharsis for negative energy (Freud,
1960/1905). On the other hand, humor allows people to perceive
the anger and fear arising from incongruity in different ways
(Martin and Ford, 2018). However, the appreciation–despising
complex makes things different in Chinese culture. As we
discussed above, Westerners tend to regard humor as a common
positive trait, whereas Chinese tend to see humor as a special
talent that is not commonly seen in ordinary people. Thus, it is
unsurprising that Westerners tend to use humor more frequently
than Chinese (e.g., Liao, 2001; Chen and Martin, 2005, 2007; Liao
and Chang, 2006; Yue, 2011). Research has found a West-East
cultural difference in humor usage. For example, humor is not an
important coping device in Japan as it is in the United States (Abe,
1994). Chinese students were less likely to use humor as a coping
strategy with stress than their Canadian counterparts (e.g., Chen
and Martin, 2005, 2007). Similarly, Singaporean students were
less likely to use humor to cope with difficulty than American
students (Nevo et al., 2001). As suggested by Yue X. et al.
(2016), in Western countries, no matter who they are, people
have a general tendency to use humor in coping with stress or
difficulties, which is not true in Eastern countries.
To be specific regarding cultural differences in humor usage,
we turn to the four types of humor: self-enhancing, affiliative,
self-defeating, and aggressive humor (Martin et al., 2003). The
four types of humor have been found to be applicable in different
countries, such as Canada, China, the United States, Lebanon,
and Belgium (Saroglou and Scariot, 2002; Martin et al., 2003;
Chen and Martin, 2007; Taher et al., 2008). However, people from
different cultural backgrounds may use them in different ways.
Research on usage differences in the four types of humor
across countries or regions indicates that Easterners tend to
use more adaptive humor, while Westerners tend to use more
maladaptive humor. For example, Hiranandani and Yue (2014)
found that students from India and Hong Kong, both having
cultures prizing collectivism, used more affiliative and selfenhancing
humor than aggressive and self-defeating humor.
Similarly, Hong Kong students reported more use of aggressive
and self-defeating humor and less use of affiliative and selfenhancing
humor than mainland Chinese students (e.g., Yue
et al., 2010a, 2014b; Yue X. D. et al., 2016). This could
be explained by the fact that the bicultural background of
Hong Kong makes Confucianism and collectivism less influential
there than in mainland China.
In addition, Chen and Martin (2007) asked Chinese and
Canadian students to complete the Humor Styles Questionnaire
(HSQ) and Coping Humor Scale (CHS). They found that
Canadian students reported using the four types of humor
more than their Chinese counterparts did, especially aggressive
humor. No significant relationship was found between aggressive
humor and coping in Chinese students, indicating that Chinese
are less likely to use aggressive humor as a coping strategy.
This difference is unsurprising. Aggressive humor is associated
with high individualism, which emphasizes independence
and assertiveness, and low collectivism, which de-emphasizes
interdependence and harmony (Kazarian and Martin, 2006;
Martin and Ford, 2018). Even as children, Chinese tend to
see humor as a sign of aggression and as disruptive to social
relationships, whereas Canadians tend to see humor as a socially
desirable leadership trait (Chen et al., 1992).
Additionally, Kalliny et al. (2006) found differences in Arab
and American humor usage, specifically that Americans used
significantly more self-defeating and self-enhancing humor, while
there were no differences in the use of affiliative and aggressive
humor. They suggested that the greater use of self-defeating
humor in American culture may be due to the desire to equalize
and lower power distances present in American culture, while
greater use of self-enhancing humor may be attributed to the fact
that self-enhancing humor helps them gain focus and attention
(Kalliny et al., 2006).
These studies were conducted to examine cultural differences
in humor usage across countries without taking specific cultural
variables into consideration. Thus, it is still not quite clear
whether individual or cultural differences account for the
differences in humor usage.
Kazarian and Martin (2004) systematically investigated the
relationships between culture and the four types of humor
usage in terms of specific cultural dimensions. Comparing
Lebanese, Canadians,’ and Belgians’ humor usage, they found that
individuals from horizontal collectivist cultures that emphasize
harmony and group cohesion are more likely to use affiliative
humor, whereas individuals from a vertical collectivist culture
that values self-sacrifice for the sake of group are more likely
to employ self-defeating humor. Furthermore, individuals from
vertical individualist cultures that embrace competitiveness are
more likely to use aggressive humor to enhance their hierarchical
status. It was also found that affiliative humor was used
to the same degree among the various cultural orientations
(Kazarian and Martin, 2004). This research helps to clarify how
culture impacts humor usage. However, a survey only provides
correlational evidence; more refinement is needed.
Moreover, specific humor types may have different
connotations across cultures, which would influence humor
usage in different cultural backgrounds. For example, Chen and
Martin (2007) found that Chinese considered the item “If I am
having problems or feeling unhappy, I often cover it up by joking
around, so that even my closest friends don’t know how I really
feel” to be more like self-enhancing humor than self-defeating
humor, like Canadians did. This indicates that using humor
to conceal one’s problems is more of a self-enhancing than a
self-defeating strategy for Chinese (Chen and Martin, 2007).
This may also be attributed to the fact that saving face is one of
the most important attributes for the Chinese personality (e.g.,
Gao, 1998; Yue, 2011). Thus, one would expect people to use
humor according to its culturally tinted connotations and thus
use humor differently.
In summary, generally, we could say that Easterners are less
likely to use humor as a coping strategy in comparison with
their Western counterparts because of the East-West cultural
difference in humor perception. When it comes to the specific
humor types, it seems that Easterners tend to use less aggressive
but more affiliative humor than Westerners. However, the result
is highly contingent on the specific cultural dimensions valued
in different cultural backgrounds. It is true when collectivism
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Jiang et al. Cultural Differences in Humor
that stresses harmony and interdependence dominates in Eastern
culture. The cultural difference in specific humor usage has yet
been conclusive due to a lack of consideration of specific cultural
variables. Furthermore, some humor coping strategies may have
different connotations under different cultural backgrounds,
which would directly impact how humor is used in different
cultural backgrounds.
RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN CULTURAL
DIFFERENCES IN HUMOR AND
PSYCHOLOGICAL WELL-BEING
Humor has implications for both physical and psychological
well-being. Martin (2001) proposed four theoretical mechanisms
underlying humor’s effect on health: positive changes in the
physiological system brought by laughter, positive emotions
accompanying humor, the stress-moderating effect of humor,
and the social support associated with humor’s social facilitation
function. Martin and Ford (2018) further suggested that the
buffering effect of humor comes from cognitive reframing and
emotional management.
In fact, psychologists have accumulated evidence for the
positive effects of humor: humor improves immunity, facilitates
creativity, saves face, relieves stress and tension, creates a more
positive self-concept, improves relationships with others, lowers
stress, and increases positive emotions and life satisfaction (e.g.,
Kuiper and Martin, 1993; Martin et al., 1993; Kuiper and Olinger,
1998; Parrish and Quinn, 1999; Lefcourt, 2001; Martin, 2001,
2002; Abel, 2002; Yue et al., 2010a; Cheung and Yue, 2012; Martin
and Ford, 2018).
Not all forms of humor are beneficial. As discussed earlier,
affiliative, aggressive, self-enhancing, and self-defeating humors
are four humor types that seem to exist in both Western
and Eastern cultures (Martin et al., 2003; Chen and Martin,
2007). Research on Western cultural background has suggested
that affiliative and self-enhancing humors are adaptive, whereas
aggressive and self-defeating humor are maladaptive (e.g., Martin
et al., 2003; Kuiper et al., 2004). Research has shown that affiliative
humor can promote adjustment; relieve anxiety, depression,
and attachment avoidance; and increase subjective well-being,
individuals’ sense of identity and belongingness (e.g., Chen and
Martin, 2007; Cann et al., 2008; Frewen et al., 2008). Selfenhancing
humor can help one cope with stress and misfortunes
in life; it is positively associated with optimism and self-esteem
and negatively associated with depression (Thorson et al., 1997;
Chen and Martin, 2007; Dozois et al., 2009; Martin and Ford,
2018). Aggression humor is maladaptive in terms of bringing
mental health benefits, as it may deter adjustment and resilience
and cause attachment avoidance, lower self-esteem, loneliness,
aggression, and maladjustment in the family (e.g., Martin et al.,
2003; Kuiper et al., 2004; Kazarian and Martin, 2006; Cann et al.,
2008). Self-defeating humor is also detrimental to adjustment, as
it may trigger depression or anxiety (e.g., Martin et al., 2003; Chen
and Martin, 2007; Cann et al., 2008; Martin and Ford; 2018).
Despite Easterners generally being less likely to use humor as
a coping strategy in comparison with their Western counterparts,
Easterners also benefit from humor. For example, affiliative
and self-enhancing humor could help sojourning mainland
Chinese students studying in Hong Kong cope with acculturative
stress, increase their level of life satisfaction, and decrease
their depressive mood (Cheung and Yue, 2012). It is positively
associated with higher levels of self-compassion for Hong Kong
students (Yue et al., 2017), higher levels of optimism, and lower
levels of loneliness and distress (Sun et al., 2009; Yue et al., 2010a,
2014b; Cheung and Yue, 2013), for both mainland Chinese and
Hong Kong students, and is positively associated with self-esteem
for mainland Chinese, Hong Kong, and Indian students (Yue and
Hiranandani, 2014; Yue et al., 2014a).
Maladaptive humor also seems to be detrimental to Easterners’
psychological well-being, although the results are not that
consistent. Consistent with Westerners, self-defeating humor
is positively correlated with loneliness and self-esteem for
Chinese (Sun et al., 2009; Yue et al., 2014b). Cheung and Yue
(2013) found that aggressive and self-defeating humor were
positively associated with depression, anxiety, and irritation for
Chinese students from Guangzhou, Hong Kong, and Macau.
However, when investigating how the four types of humor impact
mainland Chinese’s adjustment when studying in Hong Kong,
Cheung and Yue (2012) found that aggressive and self-defeating
humor did not consistently affect mainland Chinese adjustment.
Additionally, Hiranandani and Yue (2014) found that aggressive
humor was not significantly associated with self-esteem for
Indian or Chinese students. Using Hong Kong students as their
sample, Yue et al. (2014a) found that aggressive humor was not
significantly associated with self-esteem or subjective well-being.
These inconsistent results may be due to the Chinese dialectic
thinking style, which is characterized by contradiction (Peng and
Nisbett, 1999; Hou and Zhu, 2002; Ji et al., 2010). Take the
inconsistent results of aggressive humor, for instance. On the one
hand, Chinese culture emphasizes interdependence and harmony
(Hwang, 1987; Cheung et al., 2001), which makes Chinese less
likely to use aggressive humor in their daily life (Chen and
Martin, 2007; Yue, 2010, 2011). On the other hand, aggressive
humor can still buffer harm (Martin and Ford, 2018). The
contradictory characteristic of the Chinese thinking style makes
Chinese behave in different manners from how they think, thus
further blurring the relationship between maladaptive humor
and psychological well-being. Alternatively, this may be because
the direct translation of the English Humor Style Questionnaire
(HSQ) could not fully capture maladaptive humor types in China.
Some research has examined the cultural differences in humor
implications systematically. Investigating Chinese and Canadian
samples simultaneously, Chen and Martin (2007) did not find
cultural differences in the relationship between humor and
psychological well-being. A similar correlational pattern was
found in both Chinese and Canadian samples. They found that
for both Chinese and Canadian students, mental health was
positively associated with affiliative and self-enhancing humor
but negatively associated with aggressive and self-defeating
humor. Furthermore, Cheung and Yue (2012) found that for
mainland Chinese students who study in Hong Kong, affiliative
humor appeared to buffer all four kinds of hassles linked with
depression, whereas self-enhancing humor only buffered the
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Jiang et al. Cultural Differences in Humor
study hassles linked with depression. This indicates that selfenhancement
humor is not that potent in helping mainland
Chinese to cope with acculturative stress. This may be attributed
to Chinese not adopting the Western way of self-enhancement
(Sedikides et al., 2003). Yue et al. (2010a) reported that
adaptive humor types (affiliative and self-enhancing humor)
were positively and maladaptive humor types (aggressive and
self-defeating humor) were negatively associated with optimism,
for both mainland Chinese and Hong Kong students. The
correlation was stronger for mainland Chinese than for the
Hong Kong students. Yue et al. (2014b) found that self-defeating
humor explained social and emotional loneliness for Hong Kong
students but only social loneliness for mainland China students.
These results may be because that mainland Chinese students use
more affiliative and self-enhancing but less aggressive and selfdefeating
humor than Hong Kong students (e.g., Yue et al., 2010a,
2014b), as a consequence of the weaker influences of collectivism
and Confucianism in Hong Kong society (Yue et al., 2010a).
In sum, Westerners and Easterners do differ in the relationship
between humor and psychological well-being, not qualitatively
but quantitatively. Although Chinese students tend to appreciate
and use humor less than Western students do, Chinese are
still more likely to embrace adaptive humor styles, which have
the greatest influence on their mental health, while maladaptive
humor styles are less influential.
DISCUSSION AND FUTURE DIRECTIONS
Humor is a pan-cultural phenomenon but is also interculturally
different. Previous literature provides substantial evidence
suggesting that perceptions of humor, humor usage, and the
relationship between humor and psychological well-being differ
across cultures.
Specifically, Easterners do not hold a positive attitude
toward humor as their Western counterparts do. Among
Easterners, Chinese have ambivalent attitudes toward humor.
This perception makes Easterners less likely to use humor as a
coping strategy in comparison with their Western counterparts.
When it comes to the four humor types, Easterners seem to
use less aggressive but more affiliative humor than Westerners.
However, this result is highly contingent on the specific
cultural dimensions valued in different cultural backgrounds.
It is true when the Eastern culture that stresses harmony and
interdependence. It is not the case when the culture is not
characterized by harmony and interdependence. To sum up, we
argue that the cultural difference in specific humor usage has
not yet been made conclusive due to a lack of consideration
of specific cultural variables. Besides, different cultures interpret
specific types of humor differently, which influences how
humor is used in different cultural backgrounds. Moreover,
Westerners and Easterners have a parallel relationship between
humor and psychological well-being index. Both Westerners and
Easterners benefit from adaptive humor styles and get harm
from maladaptive humor styles. However, the strength of the
relationship varies across cultures, with maladaptive humor styles
are less influential in Eastern cultural background. This may be
due to the fact that Easterners are less likely to use maladaptive
humor styles, such as aggressive humor (Chen and Martin, 2007).
These findings inform the understanding of cultural differences
in humor and could assist practitioners in using humor to
promote human psychological well-being. However, most of
the research has not been conducted systematically and lacks
empirical evidence. No causal conclusions can be drawn, and
there is still a lot of need for future investigations.
First, most of the research that has been done was largely
correlational and based on survey methods. Little research
has been conducted to systematically investigate the cultural
differences in humor. Future research should employ empirical
methods to provide causal evidence for a relationship between
humor and culture. In addition to using survey methods to study
the differences in humor across cultures, more efforts should
be dedicated to investigating how specific culture dimensions
influence humor perception, humor usage, and the relationship
between humor and psychological well-being across cultures.
Besides, empirical research on the relationship between humor
and psychological well-being has rarely been conducted; thus,
no causality can be drawn. Future research should also employ
empirical methods to clarify the causal relationship between
humor and psychological well-being. These efforts would help to
show the relationship more specifically and systematically.
Furthermore, research on how Eastern culture impacts
humor has mostly been conducted within Chinese culture (with
participants including mainland Chinese, Hong Kongers, and
Taiwanese). To have a comprehensive understanding of how
culture influences humor, it would be important to investigate the
relationship between culture and humor cross-culturally. Future
research should work on examining whether people in other
countries under the influence of Confucianism show similar
patterns of humor perception, its usage, and its implications on
psychological well-being as Chinese do.
Moreover, as we noted above, different cultures have different
interpretations of specific humor items. This could explain the
inconsistent results about humor across cultures. For example,
aggressive humor was not correlated with self-esteem or life
satisfaction among Hong Kong participants (Yue et al., 2014a).
We suggested that this may be due to the contradiction
characteristic of the Chinese thinking style. Alternatively, it
also could be due to different interpretations of specific humor
items across cultures. Some research (e.g., Cheung and Yue,
2012; Yue et al., 2014a) used direct translations of the English
version of the HSQ to tap the four humor types. The items
may be not fully reflective of aggressive humor for Chinese.
Further research is needed to test these two possible reasons.
What’ more important, in the future, researchers should develop
a reliable, well-established, having good psychometric property
humor style scale within Eastern cultural background instead of
direct translation.
Furthermore, the Chinese apprehension–despising complex
toward humor needs exploration. The little research on this
complex is just descriptive (e.g., Yue, 2010, 2011). The cognitive,
emotional, and motivational components of this complex
remain unclear, as does how this complex impacts humor
usage and the relationship between humor and psychological
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Jiang et al. Cultural Differences in Humor
well-being. We still do not know how other philosophies, such
as Buddhism, impact this apprehension–despising complex. All
of these questions need future investigation. Besides, different
philosophies exist in Western culture (Collins, 2016), and
these philosophies could impact how Westerners perceive
and use humor, as well as humor and psychological wellbeing
relationship. However, none of these previous research
has systematically investigated how different philosophies in
Western world influence humor perception, usage and humor’s
implications for psychological well-being. Future research should
work on this so as to further our understanding of humor in
Western cultural background.
Future research should also examine how other possible
moderators [such as individual personality traits, political
atmosphere, self-esteem, socioeconomic status (SES), context
salient needs, etc.] interact with culture in influencing humor
perception, usage, and its implications. For example, Westerners
with higher self-esteem were more likely to use adaptive humor
(Martin et al., 2003). Shy Westerners who were low on perceived
social competence tended to use less affiliative humor and more
self-defeating humor (Fitts et al., 2009). Will this be true for
Easterners as well? Besides these individual differences, one
should also consider the contextual factors. For example, people
may use humor as a tactic to cope with failure, awkwardness, or
face threats (Kane et al., 1977; Cupach and Metts, 1994). Saving
face is one of the most important attributes for Chinese (e.g.,
Gao, 1998; Yue, 2011). Thus, despite Chinese generally being
less likely to use humor as a coping strategy, humor becomes
a useful tactic for Chinese to adopt when saving face. Chen
et al. (2013) found that for Chinese students, affiliative and selfenhancing
humor were positively associated with collectivism
and the willingness to save one’s own face, and aggressive and selfdefeating
humor were positively associated with the willingness
to save one’s own face. These results indicate that despite their
general tendency to use less humor, Chinese like to use humor in
coping with face threats. Future research should continue to work
along this direction to investigate how other possible individual
or situational factors interact with culture in influencing humor
perception or usage.
In addition, based on the literature review above, some
unique cultural factors may strengthen or weaken the
relationship between humor and psychological well-being.
However, we do not know what the factors are or how
these factors impact the relationship between humor and
psychological well-being index. This is worth investigating
in future research. For example, it would be interesting
to measure mainland Chinese and Hong Kong people’s
Confucian views and investigate whether Confucian views
could impact the strength of affiliative humor’s effects on
optimism.
More importantly, culture is not a static construct.
Globalization has brought massive changes in individuals’
psychology and culture. As suggested by Cai et al. (2019), there
has been a general increase in individualism and a decrease in
collectivism all over the globe. It is certainly true that this change
would be manifested in humor, which is worth investigating.
Moreover, most of the research on humor and culture has
basically been based on comparisons across countries. For
example, Saroglou and Scariot (2002) reported that Belgians
reported less use of self-enhancing humor and more use of
aggressive humor than Canadians. Kazarian and Martin (2004)
found that Lebanese reported lower use of self-enhancing humor
than Canadians, lower aggressive humor use than Belgians, and
lower use of affiliative humor than both Canadians and Belgians.
Kalliny et al. (2006) found that Americans scored higher on selfenhancing
and self-defeating humor than Arabs. Caution should
be taken when drawing conclusions about cultural differences in
humor from these research. Without specific cultural dimensions
being taken into account, it is hard to conclude that these results
could be explained by cultural differences. Besides, globalization
has brought about a multicultural context within a geographic
location (Cai et al., 2019). Thus, it may not be that accurate
to study cultural differences in humor by comparing different
nationalities or different geographic locations. Future research
should work on studying cultural constructs more precisely.
Studying how specific cultural dimensions influence humor
perception, humor usage, and the relationship between humor
and psychological well-being is one way to solve this problem.
Another possible direction for future research is to specify
the meaning of humor under different cultural backgrounds. For
example, Liao (2003) differentiated the Chinese term “youmo
(direct translation of English humor)” from “huaji (Chinese
word for humor since the Spring-Autumn Period)” (p. 1). The
results showed that youmo is regarded as a high-SES vocal act
triggering thoughtful a smile with profundity, while huaji is
described as low-SES, funny, shallow, and ridiculous actions that
trigger more laughter than smiles with ridiculousness. One may
expect Chinese to use youmo and huaji differently and that the
usages will have different implications for Chinese psychological
well-being. What’s more, the different perception of humor as
youmo and huaji might be associated with different philosophies
in Chinese culture. Specially, Confucianism devalues humor
(Liao, 1998, 2007; Yue, 2010), which may make people lack of
humor or demonstrate humor in a decent and sophisticated way.
On contrary, people who believe in Taoism would like to tell
witty jokes (Yue, 2011), which may make them prefer huaji to
youmo. Future research should devote efforts to examine these
possibilities.
CONCLUSION
Humor is an adaptive strategy with which individuals can survive
severe competition (Wilson et al., 1977; Martin and Ford, 2018).
No societies or groups have been found having no sense of
humor (Fry, 1994). In this article, we reviewed how humor
perceptions, humor usage, and the relationship between humor
and psychological well-being index differed across cultures. We
also discussed some limitations in this area that need research.
Understanding how people view and use humor, how humor
impacts psychological well-being, and how culture influences it
is an emerging area of empirical research that promises to be
an important area worth future investigation. More attempts
should be made to better understand the relationship between
Frontiers in Psychology | www.frontiersin.org 6 January 2019 | Volume 10 | Article 123
Jiang et al. Cultural Differences in Humor
humor and culture as a way of promoting better psychological
well-being.
AUTHOR CONTRIBUTIONS
TJ and YH conceptualized the manuscript. TJ wrote the first
complete draft. YH and HL contributed additional writing.
All authors edited the manuscript and approved the final
version.
FUNDING
This research was supported by grants from the Chinese National
Natural Science Foundation (31371053 and 31671159) to YH.
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Conflict of Interest Statement: The authors declare that the research was
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