Transcript Document

By Claire Fox1, Simon Hunter2, Lucy James1 and Hayley Gilman1
1Keele University, 2University of Strathclyde
Contact: [email protected]
Background
Results (cont.)
•
The child Humour Styles Questionnaire (child HSQ) was developed by Fox, Dean and
Lyford (2011) for children aged 11-16 years. Based on the adult HSQ (Martin et al., 2003)
it assumes that humour can be adaptive and maladaptive with four sub-scales measuring
different styles of humour: Affiliative, Aggressive, Self-enhancing and Self-defeating (see
Box 1).
• Much stronger correlations between humour and psychological adjustment have been
found when using the HSQ compared to previous research; this may be because prior
studies used measures that did not distinguish between adaptive and maladaptive forms
(Martin et al. 2003):
o Affiliative and self-enhancing humour are typically found to be negatively correlated
with anxiety and depression and positively correlated with self-esteem.
o In contrast, self-defeating humour is associated with high levels of anxiety and
depression and with low self-esteem (Kuiper et al. 2004; Martin et al. 2003).
o Studies have found that aggressive humour is not associated with psychological
adjustment but is strongly negatively correlated with social adjustment measures
(e.g. Kuiper et al. 2004; Yip & Martin 2006).
o However, longitudinal research is clearly needed to disentangle the causal
pathways.
• Klein and Kuiper (2006) theorised about the links between humour styles and children’s
peer relationships:
o Children who are bullied have much less opportunity to interact with their peers and
so are at a disadvantage with respect to the development of humour competence.
Thus, they may not be able to use either of the two adaptive humour styles very
effectively.
o Children may gravitate towards the use of self-defeating humour, perhaps as a way
of improving their relationships with others. Perhaps they internalise the comments
of the bullies, which are then reflected in their self-defeating humour? This reflects
an underlying neediness and low self-esteem which could put them at further risk of
being bullies.
• This research is a first step towards examining these relationships.
Peer victimisation and psychosocial adjustment
• The three types of peer victimisation were used in three regression models to predict depression,
then self-esteem and loneliness. Gender was entered first on step 1 as a control variable and the
three types of victimisation were then entered on step 2.
• The models for depression and self-esteem were not significant. For loneliness the only significant
predictor to emerge was verbal victimisation (R2 = .07, p < .05; R2 Δ = .06, p < .05; verbal β = .23, p
< .05).
Method
•
215 year 7 and year 8 children (mean age = 12.33, SD = .59) completed the measures on a whole
class basis (122 male and 93 female).
• Measures:
o Child HSQ: 24 items with 6 items per sub-scale. Children were asked to indicate on a 4 point
scale the level of their agreement (from SD to SA), e.g. If I am feeling sad I can cheer myself up
by thinking of funny things.
o The 10 item self-report Children’s Depression Inventory – short form (Kovacs & Beck, 1977).
o The four-item, self-report Loneliness and Social Satisfaction scale (Asher et al., 1984;
Rotenberg et al., 2005).
o Rosenberg’s (1965) 10-item, self-report self-esteem measure for adolescents and adults.
o As used in previous research (e.g. Björkqvist et al., 1992) children were asked to nominate
each classmate who ‘gets called nasty names by other children’ (verbal), ‘gets hit, kicked and
pushed around by other children’ (physical), ‘gets left out of the group by other children’ and
‘has nasty rumours spread about them’ (social). The same items were used to assess bullying
behaviour. For each child, percentage scores were calculated based on the percentage of
children who had nominated. This was to assess verbal, physical and relational/indirect
victimisation and bullying.
Results
Box 1: Humour Styles
Adaptive:
• Affiliative - making other people laugh. Reducing interpersonal tension. Enhancing social
relationships.
• Self-enhancing - used to enhance own moods and coping. Not detrimental to others
Maladaptive:
• Self-defeating - making others laugh at your own expense.
• Aggressive - at the expense of others. Thought to be beneficial in short term but
detrimental in the long term.
Aims/Hypotheses
To examine the links between children’s humour styles and different
types of peer victimisation:
 Peer victimisation will predict increases in self-defeating humour.
 Peer victimisation will predict decreases in affiliative and selfenhancing humour.
To examine the links between children’s humour styles and their
psychosocial adjustment.
 Self-defeating humour will predict increases in depression and
loneliness and lowered self-esteem.
 Affiliative and self-enhancing humour will predict decreases in
depression and loneliness and higher self-esteem.
Humour styles and psychosocial adjustment
• The four humour styles were then used to predict depression, then self-esteem and loneliness after
gender was controlled for on step 1.
• Affiliative, self-enhancing and self-defeating humour were found to predict self-esteem (R2 = .26, p <
.001; R2 Δ = .24, p < .001; Aff β = .23, p < .01; Self-en β = .15, p < .05; SD β = -.35, p < .001) and
depression (R2 = .22, p < .001; R2 Δ = .18, p < .001; Aff β = -.17, p < .05; Self-en β = -.17, p < .05;
SD β = .34, p < .001).
• Affiliative and self-defeating humour were also found to predict loneliness (R2 = .35, p < .001; R2 Δ =
.33, p < .001; Aff β = -.17, p < .05; SD β = .53, p < .001).
Peer victimisation and humour styles
• Table 1 shows that after gender is controlled for, verbal victimisation negatively predicts use of
aggressive humour.
• All three types of victimisation together negatively predict use of affiliative humour.
• Verbal victimisation predicts use of self-defeating humour.
Conclusions
• As predicted, links were identified between children’s humour styles
and different types of peer victimisation and between children’s
humour styles and psychosocial adjustment.
• This pilot study forms the basis of a larger longitudinal study funded
by the ESRC commencing shortly involving approximately 900 school
children.
• Longitudinal research is clearly needed to shed light on the issue of
cause and effect. We propose bi-directional relationships between
peer victimisation and children’s humour styles.
• Furthermore, we propose that certain humour styles may act as
mediators of the effects of peer victimisation on psychological
wellbeing, while others may moderate such effects.
Table 1
Summary of Hierarchical Regression Analyses for Three Types of Peer Victimisation Predicting each
Humour Style
R2
R2 Δ
β
Aggressive:
Step 1: Gender
Step 2:
Verbal
Physical
Social
Affiliative:
Step 1: Gender
Step 2:
Verbal
Physical
Social
Self-defeating:
Step 1: Gender
Step 2:
Verbal
Physical
Social
Self-enhancing:
Step 1: Gender
Step 2:
Verbal
Physical
Social
* p < .05, **p < .01, ***p < .001.
.08***
.12***
-.28***
.05*
-.30**
.10
.10
.00
.10**
.00
.10**
-.14
-.03
-.17
.00
.08*
.00
.08*
.30**
-.09
.01
.00
.01
.00
.01
.04
.01
-.12
Key References
•
•
•
Fox, C. L., Dean, S. Lyford, K. (re-submitted). Development of a humor styles questionnaire for
children and young people. Submitted to Humor.
Klein, D.N., & Kuiper, N.A. (2006). Humor styles, peer relationships, and bullying in middle
childhood. Humor: International Journal of Humor Research, 19(4), 383-404.
Martin, R.A., Phulik-Doris, P., Larsen G., Gray, J.,& Weir K. (2003). Individual differences in uses of
humour and their relation to psychological well-being: Development of the humor styles
questionnaire. Journal of Research in Personality, 37, 48-75.