A twin study on humor appreciation : The importance of separating structure and content

The present study focused on genetic and environmental influences on appreciation of structure and content of humor. Monozygotic (n = 135) and dizygotic (n = 60) adult twin pairs rated their trait-like humor appreciation using the 3 WD humor test (Ruch, 1992) which assesses three basic humor stimuli (incongruity-resolution humor; nonsense humor; sexual humor), and two basic components of responses to humor (funniness; aversiveness). Additionally, two indices were derived from these scales, namely structure preference and liking of sexual content (i.e., controlled for humor structure). Intraclass correlations and behavior genetic model-fitting analyses indicated a moderate genetic effect for funniness ratings of liking the sexual content. The remaining funniness scales seemed entirely influenced by environmental effects. Aversiveness scales mainly showed environmental effects represented in reduced CE models, although twin similarity coefficients showed hints of genetic influences as well, which needs to be unraveled in future research. The results demonstrated clearly that funniness ratings should be separated for structure and content, to obtain detailed information about heritability of humor appreciation. Future research should validate these promising initial findings by utilizing larger samples. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1027/1614-0001/a000136 Posted at the Zurich Open Repository and Archive, University of Zurich ZORA URL: https://doi.org/10.5167/uzh-103052 Accepted Version Originally published at: Weber, Marco; Ruch, Willibald; Riemann, Rainer; Spinath, Frank M; Angleitner, Alois (2014). A twin study on humor appreciation: The importance of separating structure and content. Journal of Individual Differences, 35(3):130-136. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1027/1614-0001/a000136 This	  manuscript	  was	  published	  as: Weber,	  M.,	  Ruch,	  W.,	  Riemann,	  R.,	  Spinath,	  F.	  M.,	  &	  Angleitner,	  A. (2014).	  A	  twin	  study	  on	  humor	  appreciation:	  The	  importance	  of separating	  structure	  and	  content.	  Journal	  of	  Individual	  Differences,	  35, 130-­‐136.	  doi:	  0.1027/1614-­‐0001/a000136 RUNNING HEAD: TWIN STUDY ON HUMOR APRRECIATION 1 A twin study on humor appreciation: The importance of separating structure and content Marco Weber and Willibald Ruch Department of Psychology, University of Zurich, Switzerland Rainer Riemann Department of Psychology, University of Bielefeld, Germany Frank M. Spinath Department of Psychology, University of Saarland, Germany Alois Angleitner Department of Psychology, University of Bielefeld, Germany Author Notes Marco Weber, Department of Psychology, University of Zurich, Switzerland; Willibald Ruch, Department of Psychology, University of Zurich, Switzerland; Rainer Riemann, Department of Psychology, University of Bielefeld, Germany; Frank M. Spinath, Department of Psychology, University of Saarland, Germany; Alois Angleitner, Department of Psychology, University of Bielefeld, Germany. Marco Weber is currently at the Department of Psychology, University of South Carolina, SC, USA. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Marco Weber, Department of Psychology, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC 29208, USA. Email: m.weber@sc.edu TWIN STUDY ON HUMOR APRRECIATION 2 Abstract The present study focused on genetic and environmental influences on appreciation of structure and content of humor. Monozygotic (n = 135) and dizygotic (n = 60) adult twin pairs rated their trait-like humor appreciation using the 3 WD humor test (Ruch, 1992) which assesses three basic humor stimuli (incongruity-resolution humor; nonsense humor; sexual humor), and two basic components of responses to humor (funniness; aversiveness). Additionally, two indices were derived from these scales, namely structure preference and liking of sexual content (i.e., controlled for humor structure). Intraclass correlations andThe present study focused on genetic and environmental influences on appreciation of structure and content of humor. Monozygotic (n = 135) and dizygotic (n = 60) adult twin pairs rated their trait-like humor appreciation using the 3 WD humor test (Ruch, 1992) which assesses three basic humor stimuli (incongruity-resolution humor; nonsense humor; sexual humor), and two basic components of responses to humor (funniness; aversiveness). Additionally, two indices were derived from these scales, namely structure preference and liking of sexual content (i.e., controlled for humor structure). Intraclass correlations and behavior genetic model-fitting analyses indicated a moderate genetic effect for funniness ratings of liking the sexual content. The remaining funniness scales seemed entirely influenced by environmental effects. Aversiveness scales mainly showed environmental effects represented in reduced CE models, although twin similarity coefficients showed hints of genetic influences as well, which needs to be unraveled in future research. The results demonstrated clearly that funniness ratings should be separated for structure and content, to obtain detailed information about heritability of humor appreciation. Future research should validate these promising initial findings by utilizing larger samples.