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A good (sense of) humor is among the most frequently desired qualities in potential short- and long-term partners, and numerous studies found humor to be an important characteristic that people seek in close others. This entry gives a short overview on why humor is considered to be among the most attractive traits and also on the role of sex differences, from a theoretical and an empirical view.
Theoretical Suggestions on Why Humor Is Perceived as an Attractive Trait
While humor can be described across several quantitative and qualitative characteristics, we will use the term in a broad sense in this entry and primarily differentiate between humor production and appreciation (in the sense of responding to a humorous stimulus); for an overview, see Martin and Ford (2018) and Ruch (2007, 2008). Numerous studies have shown that humor plays a role in social life across different social domains (e.g.,...
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References
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Brauer, K., Proyer, R.T. (2019). Sex Differences in Attractiveness of Humor. In: Shackelford, T., Weekes-Shackelford, V. (eds) Encyclopedia of Evolutionary Psychological Science. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-16999-6_3245-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-16999-6_3245-1
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