Funny but aversive: A large-scale survey of the emotional response to Covid-19 humor in the Italian population during the lockdown

Abstract

We often see an upsurge of humor inspired by tragic circumstances: this happened also during the Coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) outbreak. However, little is known about the emotional response to tragedy-triggered humor, let alone Covid-19 humor. With a largescale survey completed during the early stages of Italy's lockdown, we studied the appreciation (funniness and aversiveness) of different formats of Covid-19 humor shared on social media. Results of an analysis of the role of demographic, personality, and psychological distance factors with linear mixed models showed that Covid-19 humor lacks a "signature" of funniness, but displays a mark of aversiveness. Among demographics, age and gender were key factors: with increasing age and in women, Covid-19 humor was judged as more aversive. Individuals using humor to cope with uneasy circumstances judged Covid-19 humor as funnier and less aversive. Furthermore, the perceived risk of infection amplified Covid-19 humor aversiveness, while kilometrical distance from the first Italian contagion hotspot raised the amusement in global terms. These findings expand our knowledge about dark humor and should raise awareness of the great variation in the emotional impact of Covid-19 humor and of the need to ponder where and with whom to share the laugh about the pandemic.

Coronavirus Disease Stress Among Italian Healthcare Workers: The Role of Coping Humor

“…As indirect proof that this disposition is at work also in times of COVID-19, several jokes, humorous memes, and short videos targeting the impact of the pandemic on social, political, economic, and everyday life have been circulating on the Internet and social media (Facebook, Twitter, etc.) during the pandemic worldwide ( Bischetti et al, 2020 ; Jimenez-Sotomayor et al, 2020 ). In fact, even dark humor has been conceptualized as a coping strategy, at least in a healthcare context ( Plester, 2009 ).…”

“…Obviously, not all of them have the positive function of buffering difficulties and helping people cope ( Jimenez-Sotomayor et al, 2020 ). However, the ability to cope with difficulties via humor (assessed through CHS), associated with the personal disposition toward optimism, predicted ratings of funniness and aversiveness toward COVID-19 humorous stimuli in a large sample of Italian people ( N = 1,751; Bischetti et al, 2020 ). In particular, the more the participants reported using humor as a coping strategy, the more they rated COVID-19 humorous stimuli as funny.…”

“…Conversely, psychological distancing, though differently operationalized, had no relation with the use of coping humor in the sample we surveyed. In fact, in our study, we investigated HCWs’ exposure to COVID-19 by asking participants whether they had worked in wards dedicated to COVID-19, had come into contact with COVID-19 patients, or were infected with COVID-19; these items at least partially address the issue of psychological distancing, as investigated in the field of dark and disaster humor ( Kuipers, 2006 ; Morreall, 2009 ; McGraw et al, 2012 , 2013 ; Bischetti et al, 2020 ). Overall, these results suggest that appreciation of dark humor is affected by psychological distancing and coping humor, which work independent of each other; however, till date, their magnitude on humor appreciation remains unexplored but worth investigating.…”

COVID-19 memes going viral: On the multiple multimodal voices behind face masks

“…Thus, their desperate attempts at protecting themselves seemed preposterous and possibly funny when viewed from the safe outsider perspective (cf. Bischetti et al, 2020).…”

“…Since COVID-19 humour co-exists with daily reports on the death toll and infection numbers, it may be thought of as dark humour (Bischetti et al, 2020), that is humour about – or, at least, inspired by and produced in the context of – grave events and topics, notably, death and illnesses (see Dynel and Poppi, 2018 and references therein). Even though the appreciation, that is funniness versus aversiveness, of COVID-19 humour must rely on various factors, one of them being the distance from the epicentre (Bischetti et al, 2020) and the very nature of a given specimen (e.g. whether or not it addresses the topic of death or disease per se), the prevalence of this humour on social media indicates its social significance.…”