Relationship between humor styles and alternative five factors of personality

The aim of this study is to investigate relations between humor styles and Alternative Five-Factor Model of personality traits and to explain relations between personality and humor style on the basis of the idea of individual differences in optimal cortical arousal. Participants (N = 253) completed Zuckerman-Kuhlman-Auja Personality Questionnaire-Short Form and the Humor Style Questionnaire. Sensation Seeking was identified as a principal personality variable that correlated significantly with each humor style. Affiliative (0.57) and self enhancing humor styles (0.47) both correlated strongly with Extraversion. A lower positive correlation was found between the aggressive humor style and Aggressiveness (0.22). Self-defeating humor style correlated positively with Neuroticism (0.33). Multiple regression analysis showed a good predictive power of alternative five personality traits for all humor styles. Factor analysis found both benign humor styles located in the Extraversion, self-defeating style in the Neuroticism and aggressive style in the Sensation Seeking factor. In general, the results suggest that cortical arousal might be an underlying variable common for each of the four humor styles. It can be concluded that the AFFM could be a useful framework for understanding the nature of humor styles.