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ERIC Number: EJ1478672
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2025-Aug
Pages: 9
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0961-205X
EISSN: EISSN-1467-9507
Available Date: 2025-05-06
Children Find Others' Misfortune Funnier than Adults
Social Development, v34 n3 e12805 2025
This study investigated the perceived funniness of misfortune in children and adults, examining the role of the misfortune victims' facial expressions. Participants included 100 psychology undergraduates and 97 4- to 5-year-olds from a middle-European country. Participants were presented with pictures in which misfortune victims exhibited either angry or painful expressions (affective), funny expressions (comic), or no visible facial expression (no-face). Children and adults rated comic pictures as the funniest, followed by no-face pictures, and affective pictures as the least funny. This suggests that children and adults perceive humor in misfortune similarly, in alignment with facial expressions. However, children rated all categories of pictures as funnier than adults, indicating generally heightened amusement. While children seem to consider the victims' facial expressions when judging humor (i.e., understanding of victim distress vs. bewilderment), their responses may be more strongly influenced by the unexpected nature of the misfortune compared to adults. As children develop, their ability to integrate facial expressions with the unexpected nature of misfortune may become more pronounced, leading to a more nuanced understanding of humor.
Wiley. Available from: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030. Tel: 800-835-6770; e-mail: cs-journals@wiley.com; Web site: https://www.wiley.com/en-us
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: Higher Education; Postsecondary Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: Europe
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A
Author Affiliations: 1Department of Psychology, University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland; 2Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, University of Zurich, Zürich, Switzerland; 3Department of Psychology, University of Zurich, Zürich, Switzerland; 4Jacobs Center for Productive Youth Development, University of Zurich, Zürich, Switzerland