SYSK TRENDING: What Makes Things Funny

You probably laugh every day—at something someone says, a scene in a show, or a random moment that just hits you the right way. But have you ever stopped to wonder why something is funny? Why one person bursts out laughing while another barely cracks a smile? Humor feels spontaneous, but researchers say there is actually a structure behind it. Certain patterns, expectations, and subtle violations of those expectations seem to trigger laughter. In other words, what makes something funny may not be as random as it seems. And laughter itself isn’t just entertainment. It can reduce stress, strengthen social bonds, and even influence how we connect with other people. That may explain why we actively seek out comedy—in movies, TV, and live performances—even when we don’t need it. Caleb Warren, assistant professor at the Eller College of Management at the University of Arizona and lead author of the study What Makes Things Funny (https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/1088868320961909), joins me to explain the science behind humor. He explores what triggers laughter, why humor varies so much from person to person, and what laughter reveals about how our brains process the world around us. If you’ve ever wondered why something makes you laugh—or why it doesn’t—this is a fascinating look at something we all experience but rarely understand. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:01Speaker 00

  Low energy, unfocused, foggy? You might be dehydrated. Whether it's hot yoga, over 100-degree weather, or too much sun. Gator Light, with a specialized blend of five electrolytes, was scientifically designed to help move fluids into the body faster for rapid rehydration. Shop now at retailers nationwide. Gator Light: Hydrates Faster Than Water. Is it in you? Symptoms noted are signs of mild to moderate dehydration. Consult a healthcare professional if symptoms persist.

• 0:32Mike Carruthers?

  There are many things to worry about today, and a lot of people are feeling on edge. But it seems that humor is always there to uplift people's spirits and make them feel better. So how does that happen? What makes something funny? Why do we laugh at a clever joke? An awkward moment? Or even something a little inappropriate? It turns out humor isn't just random. It follows patterns our brains are wired to recognize. So that's why today's SYSK trending topic is "What Makes Things Funny?" In my conversation with marketing and psychology researcher Caleb Warren, who studies humor and how it works, we explore the science behind what makes things funny.

• 1:16Mike Carruthers?

  From surprise and timing, to the fine line between comfort and discomfort. So get ready to rethink what makes you laugh and learn why humor is so important for all of us. Right after this. Now here's something that might be worth a minute of your time. How would you like $1,000 to spend on shopping? Especially with the holidays coming. Well, the people behind Shopify have a shopping site called shop.com. And to celebrate the new shop.com, they're giving away $1 million in ShopCash. But not to one person. 1,000 people will each win $1,000 in ShopCash.

• 2:00Mike Carruthers?

  And shop.com is actually a really clever idea. It brings lots of different stores together in one place. So instead of... Bouncing around from website to website, you can search across stores, find what you're looking for, and track your orders, all in one place. Clothes, electronics, gifts, things for the house, all kinds of stuff. And whether you win or not, it's worth knowing, but with a thousand chances to win $1,000, I'd certainly take a look. Enter to win the $1 million Shop Cash giveaway from now until November 1st. Just go to shop.com. There are so many ways to win.

• 2:44Mike Carruthers?

  That's shop.com. Shopping designed around you. No purchase necessary. Restrictions apply. Official rules available at shop.com.

• 2:58Mike Carruthers?

  I imagine that every day, you laugh, at least a little, or you smile because you saw something or read something funny. Laughter, humor, funny, it's all part of life. But what purpose does this serve? Why do we laugh? What is it that makes something funny? Is laughter the best medicine? Why do we seek it out? Why do we go to comedy shows, watch comedy movies? What does it all do? Well, as you might imagine, laughter is actually a serious area of study. And one of the people doing the research on this is Caleb Warren. He is an assistant professor at Eller College of Management at the University of Arizona,

• 3:41Mike Carruthers?

  a former assistant professor at Texas A&M University, and lead author of a study called, "What Makes Things Funny?", which, if you'd like to read it, there's a link to it in the show notes. Hi Caleb, welcome to Something You Should Know. Hi, thanks so much for having me today. Sure. So people obviously know what funny is, because we all laugh all the time. We all like to laugh. I think we all like to laugh. But why do you study it? Why is this important to study?

• 4:12Speaker 02

  The big reason that I find it important to study is that humor, comedy, laughter, are a reaction that we have, often when something seems wrong or off, or there are cultural differences, or miscommunications, or misunderstandings, something is potentially wrong. And it would be really easy to get overwhelmed by all of these, often minor or inconsequential, or sometimes really even more major, bad things that are happening to us personally and in the world. And humor is one of the tools, or at least one of the responses, a more adaptive and positive response that we can have to the either minor inconveniences, or sometimes

• 4:55Speaker 02

  even more major problems that we encounter.

• 4:58Mike Carruthers?

  So what is it that makes something funny? I mean, you just kind of alluded to it, but people laugh at the oddest things. They laugh at things that are clearly meant to be funny, but they also laugh at things because they weren't meant to be funny. So what is it that makes funny?

• 5:15Speaker 02

  Yeah, this is one of the main questions I've been studying for over a decade now. And I want to begin with a wrong answer. And there was this whole website, I'm not sure if it still exists, but when I started, called The Secret to Humor is Surprise. I think that fits with a lot of people's intuitions. Like, well, what makes something funny? It needs to be unexpected. And that's just not the case. There are many instances of things that are unexpected that are not funny, like if you already get hit by a car, or you're, you know, love going where to die. And then there are plenty of things that are expected that are funny. So The Writers of South Park killed the same character in like seventy-seven of the first seventy-eight episodes, and people presumably continued to find that funny.

• 5:58Speaker 02

  Comedians often do callbacks to earlier jokes. And in studies that have systematically looked at this, when they had some people, they showed them stand-up routines of people like Phyllis Diller and Bill Cosby, before we knew he was a monster. And they would have, they'd have one group of people say, all right, what do you think the comedian's gonna say next, after stopping the tape right before a joke? And another group say how funny they thought the joke was when they heard it through. And the more predictable the joke was, the less surprising it was, the funnier it was. So this is sort of where I started looking at this question. So that if humor's not about what's surprising, then what is it?

• 6:38Speaker 02

  And the answer we came to is that humor tends to occur when something appears to be wrong or off, but at the same time, you think it's okay. So we call these benign violations. Maybe one of the more universal examples of humor because or laughter is tickling. A tickle is sort of a usually a light touch to a body part vulnerable from attack from someone you trust. And a tickle is basically a it's like an attack. So there's a violation, but at the same time, it's benign. You know, it's okay because it doesn't actually hurt and it's from someone you trust. Tickling doesn't lead to laughter. The same touch

• 7:19Speaker 02

  doesn't lead to laughter if you try to do it to yourself because there's no threat, there's no attack, there's no violation. Tickling also doesn't produce laughter if it's not someone you trust. If like some creepy dude in the street comes up to you and tries to tickle you, probably you would not laugh. You'd probably run away in fear. So that's one example of more of a physical type of violation. But violations can be linguistic. So many puns. One used in humor studies, like when is a door not a door? When it's a jar. So there's a logic violation. The door isn't a jar, like the object, a

• 8:00Speaker 02

  jar, but there's a second meaning of a jar, which does apply to the door. So the there's a linguistic violation mistake, but at the same time, it seems correct according to an alternative interpretation.

• 8:14Mike Carruthers?

  Is there a is there a some sort of evolutionary benefit, do you know? I mean, it doesn't doesn't it seem that humor kind of takes the edges off the day, that humor kind of brightens the day, that you know, laughter's the best medicine, that that there's some sort of therapeutic effect here that it other than just, you know, it's not serious, so it must be funny?

• 8:36Speaker 02

  The evolutionary story behind humor and amusement and laughter and why they evolved, it's still debated. So one piece of evidence is you see laughter before you see language. Babies laugh before before they can speak. And laughter is also far more common when other people are around. So it suggests that some form of communication. That it might serve a communication function. And if it does, then well, what would you want to communicate? That would be so important that it would be one of the first things to communicate. I mean, sort of crying, sort of help me, is the first, one of the first things, at least with babies happen, but laughter happens after and before words, so it's probably still something important.

• 9:21Speaker 02

  And if we look at when people laugh, a lot of times it's when there's something that seems like it's a threat, that it's wrong, but it's not. And my sense is laughter is a way to signal something that could be bad is actually okay. And this is useful in a number of situations. When you hear other people laughing, you know, okay, there's no, you know, that wasn't actually a bear, it was actually just a funny, it was actually just a shadow. It can help people sort into different groups. If you appreciate the same type of humor, then you can know like, all right, they're more likely to be on my side, they're a better alliance partner, a better friend. So I think humor can have multiple adaptive benefits, but my belief is the most likely

• 10:03Speaker 02

  reason humor initially involved was as a way to communicate that something that seems like it could have been a problem is actually okay, so you can relax.

• 10:12Mike Carruthers?

  I've always thought it was interesting how, as you just talked about, how you can watch something, say, at home on TV, and it's funny, but you don't laugh. But if you're in a group watching that same thing, people seem much more likely to laugh because there are other people in the room. And I've always found that interesting and never really understood why.

• 10:36Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's absolutely the case. There is a researcher, I believe he's passed, but he did fantastic research on laughter. And he basically went out into, rather than studying jokes, which is what, you know, 95% of humor researchers do, he went out and with a microphone and like recorded when people actually laugh. And he did diary studies, or I don't, he did a number of things to get where people were actually laughing, rather than either where they said they laughed, or looking in a lab where it's not a natural case for people to laugh. And by far, the best predictor of whether someone's laughing is when they're with someone else. And usually it's at these really mundane comments, like, hey, I'll see you later, which kind

• 11:21Speaker 02

  of... I think suggests that laughter serves some sort of social function. And even if you take some of the same things, like, like a joke, from a stand-up routine, for example, that make a person laugh, and you put it, you know, you might read it on your own in text when there's no one else around, you might think, oh, that's funny, but you're a lot less likely to laugh. So that, that's repeating what you said. But I think the reason is that because humor serves these social functions. It helps show, like, look, we don't need to worry here, or, look, we're on the same page, we have the same understanding, we have the same goals, I'm friendly, I'm not threatened by you. So it has all these, I think, social signals.

• 12:05Mike Carruthers?

  And what about that phrase, you know, laughter is the best medicine? I've always felt that, that laughter has some benefit, that physiological benefit, that you just don't get from anything else.

• 12:19Speaker 02

  I don't think laughter, laughter is the best medicine in most situations.

• 12:23Mike Carruthers?

  Well, right. I mean, if you have heart disease, a few laughs isn't gonna help you much, but.

• 12:29Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 12:30Mike Carruthers?

  But there does, don't, you know what I mean, though, that like, when you have a, like, a really good laugh, there's something that just feels good even afterwards, that there's a lingering, the stressless, god, that was funny.

• 12:43Speaker 02

  Yes. I think there's two caveats to this laughter is the best medicine. The first one is, it really depends what you're trying to cure. And so if we're talking, I don't know, if you just had a heart attack, there are better cures to, you know, get someone's heart beating again.

• 13:02Mike Carruthers?

  Probably.

• 13:03Speaker 02

  But caveat two, is it depends on what you're laughing about. And so there are many different types of humor. When there's no victim in humor, when there's no target, when there's no butt of the joke, it's a lot more likely to benefit someone's health. The third caveat to this laughter is the best medicine, there is incredibly strong evidence that as people cope with loss, as they get over, say, the loss of a loved one, they laugh more often. The evidence for the causal direction is less clear. So it could just be that humor is more like a thermometer, meaning like, once you've already coped with something that's bad, you're able to laugh about it. Or it could be that laughing about something bad that's happened

• 13:48Speaker 02

  makes you feel better about it. It helps you cope with it. Most likely, the effect goes in both directions, but it's unclear which is stronger. And the evidence that humor absolutely helps even mental health, where I think the effects are strongest and most promising, is not airtight.

• 14:08Mike Carruthers?

  We're talking about what makes things funny. And my guest is Caleb Warren, Assistant Professor at the Eller College of Management at the University of Arizona. And he is lead author of a study called, What Makes Things Funny?

• 14:22Speaker 03

  Low energy, unfocused, foggy? You might be dehydrated. Gatorade Zero powders have been scientifically designed to help improve hydration balance in the body. With a clinically proven electrolyte blend and no artificial colors or flavors. Great tasting hydration, no matter where you're going. Shop now online or at retailers nationwide. Gatorade: Hydrates Better Than Water. Is it in you? Symptoms noted are signs of mild to moderate dehydration. Consult a healthcare professional if symptoms persist.

• 14:52Speaker 04

  Whenever fall comes back around, it always feels like a fresh start. This year, I've been layering in some styles from the new Lululemon Fall Drop, because the weather is shifting and I find I have to be ready for the entire day and not just one part of it. Lululemon's Fall line has some really versatile transitional pieces, so I can just wake up, throw on a matching set, add a jacket or a fleece, and head out, knowing that I'll feel comfortable enough to go wherever the day takes me. Check out the new fall arrivals in store and online now at lululemon.com.

• 15:22Mike Carruthers?

  So Caleb, when you think about the people you get along with, one of the things that bonds people to get them to get along is having a shared sense of humor. That, you know, if you just sit around and talk about war and disease, you know, it's hard to connect with somebody. But over something funny...

• 15:41Mike Carruthers?

  It's easier to connect.

• 15:42Speaker 02

  Absolutely, but even, you know, the war and the pandemic can be sources of humor after some distance time. So distance, psychological distance, which can come from time, reduces threat. So using the language I talked about earlier, it can make these threats or violations seem more benign. And that's why a lot of times when we're talking about, you know, war stories is sort of the genre name, people are often laughing about them, like these terrible things that happened when you're recounting them years later, in part because the distance has helped cope. But to go back to another point you made, like, you know, when we're meeting with friends or people we connect with, there's, you know, we often laugh, we want to laugh. I think that's very true. And I think one reason, one reason

• 16:26Speaker 02

  humor is particularly effective, whether it's a sort of measure of that you've bonded or a tool for helping people bond, is it does signal you have similar beliefs and similar values. So if what we laugh at is something that we see as wrong, but also we're okay with, it sort of gives you double information about what this person's beliefs and values are in the world and what they think is okay and what they don't think is okay. So it can help you sort into these groups of people who share the same values, beliefs and goals.

• 16:58Mike Carruthers?

  Right. Because how many times have you been with someone who has said something that they think is funny and it's just not funny to you? It's inappropriate, or it's too soon, or something. And, man, you just, it's like a punch in the face that I wanna, I want nothing to do with this person.

• 17:18Speaker 02

  Absolutely. I mean, you start hearing someone tell jokes that they think is funny and, I mean, like, for me, they sound super racist or sexist. I'm like, ooh, I don't know that I want to, I don't know that I want to be friends with this person, or at least, I question their beliefs in this area. And humor, like, one of the downsides of it is it often provides cover for that. It can provide cover for really nasty behavior and someone can just say, oh, you know, I was joking.

• 17:50Speaker 02

  And maybe they were, but that is one of the, especially with this type of humor that's sometimes called aggressive humor or disparagement humor, it can be used as a form of of social control where, you know, you, like even the playground playground bullies, like they'll keep down weaker weaker kids by, you know, by laughing at them, by making fun of them. And it sort of helps keep that social structure in place where the dominant class of people can sort of, in some ways socially oppress others and say like, oh, it's not really oppression, it's just a joke. You know, we don't really mean it, but they do.

• 18:32Mike Carruthers?

  But there's also this, you can't say that culture that we live in today. People are so easily offended that it makes it hard to know, you know, what's funny, where's the line? And comedians complain that that they're being silenced to some degree.

• 18:48Speaker 02

  A lot of comedians, even even ones that I see as kind of benign, like Jerry Seinfeld, have been complaining like they won't perform on college campuses anymore because of, there's a lot of people who are not accepting this is just a joke.

• 19:03Mike Carruthers?

  Right.

• 19:03Speaker 02

  I think in many cases, it's it's a very good thing, but it's, it can also go too far where, and you know, who gets to decide where the line is, is one of the problems. But comedians who are joking about things that they see as innocent, or, you know, they're not, they're not punching down, others will see as, oh, you know, you're making fun of this community, or that's not okay to hold that belief. And it's, it's really difficult to say, it's impossible to say where that line is because everyone has a different, everyone has a different view of what's, what's okay and what's not. And that often comes out with humor. If you're laughing at something, there's somewhere there where you, you're signaling like, that's okay with me. And if you're not, and

• 19:45Speaker 02

  the violation's clear, as it is if there's sort of a joke making fun of somebody, laughter signals a bit about your beliefs about what's okay and what's not for that reason.

• 19:54Mike Carruthers?

  What is it about this topic that in your research, because you, you know, most people don't explore this as deeply or as seriously as you do, that you found or that you find or that people ask you about that is so surprising? Anything?

• 20:10Speaker 02

  One thing that has surprised me is how difficult it is to get people to be funny, like when you prompt them, like try to, try to create a funny advertisement, try to write a funny story, try to write a joke. Most people can't do it. And there's, and I mean, I should have, I mean, this is one where I could have internalized, like even, like I study humor, but if you ask me to be funny, I'm, I'm gonna fail. Comedians spend years honing their crafts and it's not like athletes where they peak in their young twenties or mid twenties. Like most comedians peak much later because it takes so much longer to both learn the skills, but even learn the material. Most comedians, they, they have sort of an empirical approach to building their sets.

• 20:55Speaker 02

  Like they, they try something out and if people laugh, they keep going with it. And if they don't, they scrap it and come up with a new idea. So one of, I guess one of the surprising findings to me is that there's this idea that if we can create more laughter and comedy and amusement in the world, the world will be a better place. And I don't disagree with that, but I think it's very hard to do. And it takes a lot more than just encouraging people to be funnier. And one of the places where I think this idea is most dangerous is the workplace. So there's, you know, consultants and some scholars peddling this idea like, oh, we need to encourage people to use more humor, more comedy in the workplace. And I'm very skeptical of this idea. Although workplaces where people laugh tend to be happier

• 21:38Speaker 02

  and workers and managers who make others laugh tend to be better managers. I don't think, I don't think that this is the answer because encouraging people to try to be funny, if they're not already funny, is more likely to fail. And when people try to be funny but aren't, there can be huge consequences. My go-to example is a woman named Justine Sacco, who wrote this tweet trying to be funny about before she got on a plane to Africa. And by the time she landed, the tweet had blown up. Going to Africa, hope I don't get AIDS, just kidding, I'm white, was the tweet. And it was her attempt at a joke and... We don't know how many people found it funny, but even if it was only like 10% who

• 22:23Speaker 02

  didn't find it funny, they blew up Twitter and people were like, "This is so racist, you know, how could you say such a things?" And she was fired from her job by the time she landed. And this sort of thing, I think, happens fairly regularly, even if half of the people appreciate your joke, half might be offended. And the costs of trying to be funny and failing are huge. And it's really difficult to try to be funny. And even the people who are funny, who are successful in the workplace, it's probably not because they're trying to be funny more. It's probably because they have higher intelligence, higher creativity, a better understanding of the culture. They have these other skills that in addition to making them be funny are also making them good managers. They're not good managers because they're funny.

• 23:04Mike Carruthers?

  One thing I'd like quickly to have you talk about is humor in advertising because it's used a lot. And we hear stories that it fails a lot. It may be funny, but it didn't really sell the product. So can you talk about that?

• 23:18Speaker 02

  There are all sorts of caveats. One, people laugh at the funny thing, but they're less likely to pay attention to everything else in the same environment. So if you have an ad where you're like, you do a joke and then say, "Oh, by the way, buy my product." People will remember the joke, they won't remember your product. That's problem one. Problem two is most attempts to be funny fail. Now advertisers will hire agencies who are very good at creating humor. But even then, a lot of them, even if they're funny to some of the audience, it's likely to upset other people. Because in order to create humor, you need this violation. And not everyone's going to see it as benign or funny. And when that happens, and even when people think it's funny, they can dislike the brand or

• 23:59Speaker 02

  the advertiser as a result. So in one of our studies, Volkswagen has these very dated old ads where they show this crunched car and everyone's okay. And the message is, it's a safe car, but the way they deliver it is they say sooner or later, your wife's going to drive this home. The implication is drawing on this sexist stereotype that women can't drive. And presumably, men found that funny. And we did an updated version of this only with men as an audience. And men do think it's funny. And they look at the ad and they find it funny, but they're less likely to like the brand that uses this sort of sexist advertising, even when they think the sexist advertising is funny. And I think this is also true socially. If you're using sort of put down or aggressive humor...

• 24:43Speaker 02

  Or even self-defeating humor. People might be laughing, but they're not going to like you anymore. And that's also true in advertising.

• 24:49Mike Carruthers?

  Well, I don't think I've ever taken such a serious look at something so light as humor, but it's fun to do it. Caleb Warren has been my guest. He's an assistant professor at the Eller College of Management at the University of Arizona, and he's the lead author of a study called "What Makes Things Funny." And in the show notes for this episode, there's a link to that study. Thanks for being here, Caleb. This was fun.

• 25:14Speaker 02

  Thanks so much for having me on and for taking this topic seriously.

• 25:18Mike Carruthers?

  You bet. I'm Mike Carruthers. Thank you for listening to this SYSK trending episode of Something You Should Know.