The Relationship Between Sense of Humor and Cognitive Styles Among University Students
Asil Ali Özdoğru
Sense of humor is individuals’ tendency to appreciate, produce, and use humor in a variety of situations. Humor perception and generation involves a set of underlying cognitive processes such as working memory, verbal and visual reasoning, cognitive flexibility, and cognitive styles. Cognitive style refers to the preferred way individuals think, perceive, and process information. For example, individuals with knowing cognitive style prefer objectivity, logic, and precision, whereas those with planning style emphasize structure, control, and routines and, on the other hand, subjectivity, impulsivity, and openness are favored in creating cognitive style. This correlational study explored the relationship between sense of humor and cognitive style among Turkish university students. A group of 224 students (63% female) at a foundation university in İstanbul who had a mean age of 22.66 (SD=5.96) had completed demographic questions and two self-report measures. Sense of humor was measured through Multidimensional Sense of Humor Scale (MSHS), which is a 24-item five-point Likert scale that has a total score as well as four subscales for humor production and social uses of humor, coping or adaptive humor, appreciation of humor, and attitudes toward humor. Cognitive style was measured via Cognitive Style Indicator (CoSI), which is an 18-item five-point Likert scale with three subscales of knowing, planning, and creating. Correlation analyses showed that participants’ age was not related to sense of humor but slightly correlated with the creating cognitive style (r=.15, p<.05, n=204). There was no gender difference in MSHS scores, but females had slightly higher scores in planning cognitive style (M=28.8, SD=4.25) than males [M=27.5, SD=4.38; t(202)=1.97, p<.05]. A multiple linear regression to predict MSHS total score based on three CoSI scores yielded a significant equation [F(3, 213)=9.08, p<.001, R2=.11] where the creating style was the only significant predictor (B=1.13, t=4.84, p<.001). Results show that the university students with higher levels of creating cognitive style also have higher levels of sense of humor. These results add support to earlier findings on the relationship between humor and creativity and offer new questions for future studies on cognitive processes and individual differences.
Citation: Özdoğru, A. A. (2019, July). The relationship between sense of humor and cognitive styles among university students. Paper presented at the 16th European Congress of Psychology, Moscow, Russia.
Asil Ali Özdoğru
Sense of humor is individuals’ tendency to appreciate, produce, and use humor in a variety of situations. Humor perception and generation involves a set of underlying cognitive processes such as working memory, verbal and visual reasoning, cognitive flexibility, and cognitive styles. Cognitive style refers to the preferred way individuals think, perceive, and process information. For example, individuals with knowing cognitive style prefer objectivity, logic, and precision, whereas those with planning style emphasize structure, control, and routines and, on the other hand, subjectivity, impulsivity, and openness are favored in creating cognitive style. This correlational study explored the relationship between sense of humor and cognitive style among Turkish university students. A group of 224 students (63% female) at a foundation university in İstanbul who had a mean age of 22.66 (SD=5.96) had completed demographic questions and two self-report measures. Sense of humor was measured through Multidimensional Sense of Humor Scale (MSHS), which is a 24-item five-point Likert scale that has a total score as well as four subscales for humor production and social uses of humor, coping or adaptive humor, appreciation of humor, and attitudes toward humor. Cognitive style was measured via Cognitive Style Indicator (CoSI), which is an 18-item five-point Likert scale with three subscales of knowing, planning, and creating. Correlation analyses showed that participants’ age was not related to sense of humor but slightly correlated with the creating cognitive style (r=.15, p<.05, n=204). There was no gender difference in MSHS scores, but females had slightly higher scores in planning cognitive style (M=28.8, SD=4.25) than males [M=27.5, SD=4.38; t(202)=1.97, p<.05]. A multiple linear regression to predict MSHS total score based on three CoSI scores yielded a significant equation [F(3, 213)=9.08, p<.001, R2=.11] where the creating style was the only significant predictor (B=1.13, t=4.84, p<.001). Results show that the university students with higher levels of creating cognitive style also have higher levels of sense of humor. These results add support to earlier findings on the relationship between humor and creativity and offer new questions for future studies on cognitive processes and individual differences.Citation: Özdoğru, A. A. (2019, July). The relationship between sense of humor and cognitive styles among university students. Paper presented at the 16th European Congress of Psychology, Moscow, Russia.
