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YOU MIGHT AS WELL LAUGH

EXPERIENCES OF HUMOUR IN DAY-TO-DAY LIVING

AN OCCUPATIONAL THERAPY

RESEARCH STUDY

HELEN MARIA HIRST

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Abstract Humour is a fascinating albeit complex topic that has received little recognition in

occupational therapy literature. Earlier research has established that humour can be beneficial

to health and wellbeing, but there has been insufficient exploration of the reality of what

people are experiencing, and too much focus on anecdotal evidence. The purpose of this

qualitative study was to explore meaning and provide a description of how adults experience

humour. To find out in what circumstances, and for what reasons they might create humour in

their day-to-day living.

20 adults were recruited for this study using the Internet. The participants were interviewed

about their views on humour in a series of open-ended questions via electronic mail, over a

period of one year. An advantage of collecting data via the Internet is that it makes people’s

interactions uniquely accessible, and it erases boundaries of time and distance. The

disadvantage of online interviews is the absence of non-verbal cues. However qualitative

Internet research and online data collection is the future for modern day communication.

The information generated by the email interviews was analysed using Interpretative

Phenomenological Analysis in order to enable the prevalent themes to be explored, and

provide a deepened understanding of the lived experiences. As the interviewer, I gave

particular attention to what the interviewees validated when their views were reflected back by

me. To be transparent I have included all of the e-interviews/raw data to show exactly what I

found out about the participants experience of humour. This will allow the reader to ultimately

make her/his own evaluation. What I concluded is that all of the participants in this study

found: humour positive; it counteracts stress; it helps to look on the funny side of life and

laugh at everyday situations; there are social bonding benefits, and a sense of wellbeing

because they felt better when they laughed. Overall whatever the setting, humour was

generally associated with feeling good, better performance, improved attitude and desirable

outcomes.

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Contents Page number

Abstract 1

Contents 2

Acknowledgements, Author’s note & Structure 4

Chapter 1: Introduction 5

Operational definitions 5

Interest in humour 5

Concern for occupational therapists 6

Research question 6

Defining humour and laughter 7

Inquiry-based literature search 10

Summary of research literature 11

My research study 16

Aims of my study 17

Summary of procedure and outcome 18

Participants’ e-interviews 19

Chapter 2: Background information 37

Theoretical underpinnings of humour 40

Domain of occupational science 45

Brief history of humour research 47

Chapter 3: Research literature 49

Physiology of humour 55

Humour as therapy 58

Positive psychology 58

Chapter 4: Methodology 60

My position and role as a researcher 60

Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis 66

Chapter 5: Procedure 69

Ethical considerations 70

Participants and Methods 72

Data analysis 80

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Interviewing 82

Raw data analysis 84

Stages of analysis 85

Chapter 6: Findings 90

Participant description 93

Telephone interview 96

Participant analysis 98

Demographic findings 102

Chapter 7: Discussion 105

Experience of humour 109

Dissemination 119

Suggestions for future research 120

Ideas for teaching humour 120

Chapter 8: Conclusion 123

Reflective comments 124

References 127

Bibliography 132

Appendix: Participant Case Study 134

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Acknowledgements I would like to thank all of the participants because without their participation, this study

would not have been possible. I thank Inge, Nina, Sandy, Sharon, Emma, Caroline and John

who helped me; Dr Marion Martin, University of Brighton for her support and Dr. Beat Suter

and Emerson Suter for all their encouragement and humour…

Author’s note Throughout this research study quotes from literature, the participants and the researcher’s/my

reflective writing are given in italics.

Structure of research study There are eight chapters in my research study structured in the following order:

Chapter 1 introduces the concept of humour, and explains why I have chosen it as a study

topic, my aims and outcome. At the end this chapter the participants’ e-interviews have been

placed for transparency and so the reader does not need to wait until chapter 6 / the findings.

Chapter 2 provides the background to my study, which includes the theoretical underpinnings.

Chapter 3 is an exploration and critical review of the existing relevant research literature.

In Chapter 4 I explain my methodological stance, justify my position and present an argument

in support of interpretive phenomenology for my study, including identified issues relating to

the rigour of qualitative research and collecting data on the Internet.

Chapter 5 is the procedure of this study, and in Chapter 6 I have presented my findings.

In Chapter 7 I have presented my discussion and this includes the development of my ideas,

the prevalent themes that emerged and were explored, and possible areas for future research.

Chapter 8 presents a brief conclusion for the whole study, and my reflective comments.

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Chapter 1: Introduction This is my humour research study thesis titled, You Might As Well Laugh: experiences of

humour in day-to-day living. It builds on my previous professional doctorate work in order to

bring together all the elements of a research study from onset to end product. The intention of

my thesis is to document what I learned about peoples’ views of humour. An important part of

this process was my reflective practice that allowed me to be critically aware and insightful in

particular with regard to my limitations and the difficultly of scientifically capturing

something felt intuitively.

This chapter begins with operational definitions followed by a justification for my choice of

humour as a topic to research. As an occupational therapist I explain why the lived experience

of humour matters to my profession; define the use of the concepts of humour and laughter,

and include a summary of the research literature. The Faculty of Research Ethics and

Governance Committee (FREGC) at Brighton University approved this research study.

Operational definitions

Humour: the quality of being funny or amusing; ability to perceive and enjoy this; state of

mind, a temporary mood; to appreciate or express that which is funny, amusing, incongruous,

ludicrous, humorous (Collins English Dictionary, 2009). Laughter: is the action of laughing or an audible expression or appearance of happiness that

may be a physiological reaction to jokes, tickling, and other stimuli (Wikipedia encyclopaedia,

2009; Collins English Dictionary, 2009).

Occupation: is any human activity that occupies/engages a person’s attention (Creek, 2008).

Everyday activities: are the usual activities that occur each day.

Interest in humour

Long before I was aware of any possible health benefits of humour and laughter it was my aim

to share a smile, chuckle or laugh with the individuals I interacted with on a daily basis. I

arrived at my research question because I started to use conversational laughter on an ad hoc

basis (funny stories or talking about a television comedy) when I was working in a day

resource centre for adults with mental health needs. Because my caseload was so large, I

wanted to avoid being overwhelmed by all the referrals I received, and provide the service

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users with a positive experience, and this meant I looked for the humorous and created

opportunities to laugh.

Humour was always important to me in my personal and professional life, but I wanted to

know if humour was as meaningful to others. This led to my decision to explore the lived

experience of humour to find out if and how it might affect individuals’ day-to-day living, as

intuitively adults seemed to think that humour and laughing is good for them (Funes, 2000).

The justification for my research was to understand if and how adults might deliberately do

things differently to create humour in their day-to-day living. Because the gained

understanding would fill a gap in the existing research, and contribute to the knowledge base

of occupational therapy.

Concern for occupational therapists

My concern for other occupational therapists originated in the issue of humour being

important to me and making my practice more effective. Because in my occupational therapy

practice, it appeared that humour mattered to my clients as it seemed to be a key motivational

factor in encouraging them to participate, and was related to the clients feeling better.

However, this was only based on my professional intuition, and a comparison of when I

created humorous situations and opportunities to laugh versus not creating humour in my

professional practice. For example, during the stress management courses I facilitated, I would

ask the group members to keep a record of what they found funny or made them laugh; I

asked them to describe the experience rather than evaluate it, and share it with others daily. I

found out that these people were able to tell funny (often positive) stories about what had

happened to them during their day-to-day living, and that they were more able to relax and

participate when humour was facilitated. For the above reasons, and because I had found no

other studies that have used interviews to ask participants their views about humour to find out

more about human actions, how people might alter their behaviour (do things differently) by

creating humour, and if this is related to a sense of wellbeing (does it make people feel

better?), I proposed and carried out this research study.

Research question

What are the lived experiences of people who create humour in their day-to-day living?

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Defining the concepts of humour and laughter

Humour and laughter have a cause and effect relationship. They are related but have different

concepts. Humour can be created in order to laugh or laughter in order to develop a sense of

humour. For the majority of people, humour tends to lead to laughter. People assume that for

something to be deemed humorous it must evoke laughter, whereas anything that causes a

smile, or elicits happiness is humour. Humour is any communication that leads to an

emotional experience of amusement, pleasure, and/or mirth that may result in smiling or

laughter or a positive feeling/mood or an experience that something was silly or absurd with or

without a smile or laughter (Southan and Schwartz, 2004).

Humour is personal and enigmatic and because humour is different according to the context

(persons, places, and times) it can be a difficult concept to define. Smiling and laughing come

from humour, and usually occur together but smiles are more likely to express feelings of

satisfaction, connected with a positive experience, while laughter tends to come from surprise

or recognition of an incongruity (Sultanoff, 1994).

Creating humour

Creating humour is about removing the aspect of seriousness from day-to-day living by

introducing playfulness. Creating humour by introducing something funny is different from

finding something funny that someone else has introduced, but passively enjoying a funny

television programme could be considered creating humour, as the person has chosen to watch

this particular programme. There are no known studies that distinguish between passive and

active humour or suggest that only active humour brings wellbeing, and only anecdotal

evidence about the importance of having a sense of humour in day-to-day living.

The relationship between humour and laughter

The relationship between humour and laughter is incredibly complex and an underrated topic:

there are people who smile and laugh inside, or who smile rather than laugh at something

funny; funny is not purely about humour, it is more social bond forming, and establishing

roles and boundaries, stresses Alice Hortop (2004; 2011) a senior occupational therapy

lecturer at the University of the West of England, and humour and laughter specialist. Humour

is not always connected to pleasure and to a cheerful mood, although not defined by laughter it

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will increase the chances of laughter. Contrastingly, a cheerful mood can be quickly ruined by

poor taste humour. A smile always begins and ends laughter, and although it has many other

functions, smiling increases the likelihood of laughter. Hortop (2011) is studying the

complexities and relationship of humour and laughter (often separated concepts) because she

is interested in their co-dependence, influence and relationship with each other. Hortop (2011)

believes that it is not just about humour, as humour cannot be separated from laughter because

humour also concerns how to make something laugh out loud funny. There is the need to learn

about what stimulates a person’s sense of humour and how to be able to laugh and play with

difficult situations, but it is key people smile and laugh out loud as much as possible as this is

where the major changes are seen in the brain chemistry (Hortop, 2011). There is a difference

between momentary experiences of pleasure and a cheerful mood and being happy. It seems

that the therapeutic use of humour and laughter is not as simple as people often try to make it

out to be (Hortop, 2011). We laugh massively in response to joy at seeing someone, ease

social anxiety or as a social lubricant, which is not necessarily about a humour stimulant.

Provine (2000) stated: only 15% of laughter is in response to a joke. It is not known if people

create humour in their day-to-day life in a deliberate way, unless they have been taught

specific techniques (which takes practice), but people do seek activities and stimulus that will

make them smile or laugh, and people often go for the humour stimulant because it is the most

well known and quickest (Hortop, 2011).

Humour is a physiological and may be a behavioural response, and when we experience

humour and laugh there is a health benefit, such as stress hormones decrease (Sultanoff,

1994). People may not laugh but smile or feel uplifted and experience a positive emotional

reaction and this is considered mirth. Or people may think something was silly or absurd and

this is considered wit: a wit reaction is connected to the way in which the individual views the

world. Therefore any benefits of humour are not related to one incidence of laughter, rather to

a person’s philosophy: her/his life style (Sultanoff, 1994). Creating humour in day-to-day

living might ensure a positive belief system and this has possible benefits. For instance

humour might replace emotional distress: depression, anger or anxiety because it is not

possible to experience these states when experiencing humour (Sultanoff, 1994). Clinical

psychologist and professor Steven Sultanoff’s received his doctorate from Berkley University,

California in 1982; he maintains his clinical practice, lectures and has written numerous

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innovative articles advancing the field of therapeutic humour. He defines therapeutic humour

as any intervention that promotes health and wellbeing by stimulating a playful discovery,

expression or appreciation of the absurdity or incongruity of life’s situations (Sultanoff, 1994).

Sultanoff (1994) is convinced that it will be discovered that humour matters and that the most

dramatic health benefits of humour are not in laughter, but in the cognitive and emotional

management that humorous experiences provide. It is the experience of humour that relieves

emotional distress and assists in changing negative thinking patterns.

Critically, Sultanoff, (1994) used observations and client case studies from over 20 years

experience of clinical practice specializing in therapeutic humour, to come to his conclusion

that it is humour (not laughter) that influences health, reduces stress, provides perspective,

improves communication, energizes, enhances relationships, and generally makes people feel

better. He suggests assessing an individual’s receptivity to humour by asking (1) what role

humour plays, and (2) the importance of humour in a person’s life (Sultanoff, 1994).

In comparison, Dunbar et al (2011) a group of international researchers and scientists who

have been conducting studies together at Oxford University for the last decade say that

although laughter forms an important part of human non-verbal communication, it has

received rather less attention than it deserves in both the experimental and the observational

literatures. Professor Robin Dunbar, an evolutionary psychologist anthropologist, with an

interest in the behavioural ecology of primates, believes that relaxed social laughter is

associated with feelings of wellbeing and heightened affect, and a proximate explanation for

this might be the release of endorphins (Dunbar et al. 2011). This hypothesis was tested in a

series of six experimental studies in both the laboratory (watching videos) and naturalistic

contexts (watching stage performances), using change in pain threshold as an assay for

endorphin release, and the results showed that pain thresholds are significantly higher after

laughter than in the control condition (Dunbar et al. 2011). Therefore, Dunbar and his

colleagues (2011) propose that laughter may play a crucial role in social bonding because the

pain-tolerance effect is due to laughter itself and not simply due to a change in positive affect.

This means that people are getting a euphoric feeling (possibly the sense of wellbeing felt by

the participants in my study) when laughing with others, because endorphins are being

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released in the brain, such as exertion during a physical activity like dancing, as it is the

physical act of laughing that is causing this effect.

Inquiry-based literature search

A search strategy was used following the literature search algorithm developed by

occupational therapists Smith and Bourner (2003).

Search profile topic: Humour

Research question: What are the lived experiences of people who create humour in their day-

to-day living?

Key words: occupational therapy and humour and occupational science

Initially the literature was searched using the above three key terms using “AND” between

each of the key words in order that articles contained all the key words using the

Boolean/Phrase search option but no results were found. Subsequently, humour was searched

for without the key word “occupational science” but including the search term “wellbeing” or

“health” to find more articles but as there were still no results. I searched for occupational

therapy and humour and found three articles in my journal search and four articles (three of

which were relevant) when I searched for humour and occupational science.

The inclusion criteria used included all articles and books published in English specific to the

UK, USA, Australia, New Zealand and Canada. The key journals searched were: British

Journal of Occupational Therapy, America Journal of Occupational Therapy (AJOT),

Canadian Journal of Occupational Therapy and Australian Journal of Occupational Therapy,

all dated between 1998 and 2010. However this needed to be revised when I found an AJOT

article published in 1990 on occupational therapy and humour.

An electronic search was conducted using the following databases: Medline, AMED (Allied

and Complementary Medicine Database), PsycINFO (American Psychology Information) and

Pub Med Central (PMC which is a very comprehensive resource). A total of 350 scientific

research papers on “humour” were found. I listed all the articles, books and authors that were

mentioned more than once and identified key people by considering what else had been

written by the author relevant to the topic of humour and by checking the authors’ reference

lists. At this point I realised that the same names were being generated and that the literature

was exhausted. My searches also verified that there is a paucity of published literature on

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occupational therapy and “humour” with only three articles on studies all conducted by the

same occupational therapist (Southam, 1990, 2003, and 2004). My literature search was

ingoing during my research study and it includes all subsequent relevant research articles

published in 2011.

Summary of research literature

An overview of the existing literature supports humour and laughter as being beneficial and

good for health (Cousins, 1979; Fry, 1971, 1988, 1992; Holden, 1993; Sultanoff, 1994; Miller

and Fry, 2009; Berk, 2012) but there has been insufficient exploration of the reality of what

people are experiencing to encourage this effect, and too much focus on anecdotal evidence.

Articles on humour and laughter are primarily found in the field of psychology and some in

nursing but there is a poverty of occupational therapy articles or studies. The main themes are:

humour and/or laughter matter because they are important for physiological health benefits

(decreasing stress hormones); therapeutic humour; and humour as an aid to enhance

motivation, memory, communication, relationships, and positive experiences. The majority of

the existing research has been experimental or quasi-experimental, using various measures to

establish links between physical and psychosocial wellbeing and humour, and it is suggested

that humour and/or laughter is associated with an improved physical and psychosocial

wellbeing (Berk, 1996, 2009, 2012; Fry, 1971, 1988, 1992).

Humour and laughter research became popular when the New England Journal of Medicine

published an article by Norman Cousins in the seventies and this article became the first

chapter of his book, Anatomy of an Illness (Cousins, 1979). In it, Cousins (1979) reasoned

that if negative thoughts and attitudes can result in illness, positive thoughts and attitudes

might have the opposite effect. Cousins (1979) is often quoted as being the first to say that

laughter is the best medicine (Fry, 1992; Holden, 1993) because he himself refused

conventional medicine but made a remarkable recovery from collagen vascular disease

through the use of humour (watching funny films and television programmes).

The different methods used to study humour and laughter, have mainly been experimental to

determine any physiological benefits, such as using humour (watching funny films) and

laughter (response to funny film) to handle stress (Berk, 1996, 2009). Surveys have been used

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to find out about occupational therapists’ attitudes to using humour to modulate pain: three

studies (Southam, 1990, 2003, 2004) using surveys and literature reviews are the only

occupational therapy studies found. Richard Holden (1993) collected his data from

questionnaires completed by the individuals who participated in his happiness workshops,

although he has published a book on happiness, there are no (found) published research

studies. Cousins (1979) used a case study, in which he studied himself and he measured his

progress according to the level of his pain (one 10-minute interlude of laughter gave him two

hours of painless sleep) before and after discharging himself from hospital and beginning his

own daily treatment of humour, which involved watching funny films and television

programmes in his hotel room. In terms of methodology and critiquing the evidence, Cousins

(1979) studied himself so it is unclear how his results could be generalised although his

experiences have a holistic appeal and have contributed to research on laughter and humour.

The effects of humour and laughter have primarily been studied by measuring the physical

response before and after watching a funny film, and laughter is notoriously difficult to evoke

in laboratory situations. Lee Berk (1996) a psycho-neuroimmunologist, conducted an

experimental study that measured interferon-gamma (IFN: an immunoregulator active in

fighting viruses) before (baseline), during (intervention: the video) and after (recovery) a small

sample of ten healthy male (college students) watched a funny 60-minute video. Berk’s (1996)

data suggests a connection between his participants’ emotional state and increased stress

tolerance. The result of watching the funny film was the group participants had higher levels

of IFN. More recently Berk (2009) presented the results of a study, to assess the health

benefits of laughter, in which he showed 14 volunteers 20-minute clips from humorous

television programmes, such as Saturday Night Life, measuring their blood pressure and

cholesterol levels before and afterwards. During the study both the systolic blood pressure and

cholesterol levels fell. Whereas, watching sombre scenes from the film, Saving Private Ryan

had no such effect. William Fry (1971, 1988, 1992) conducted his experimental studies in the

psychology department at Stanford University where he measured and compared different

physiological responses, such as blood pressure before, during and after participants watched

funny or sombre films. Critically, the older studies tend to be known for the enthusiasm of the

researchers than for their rigor, they were conducted in laboratories, and often the researcher

was also the subject.

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Occupational therapy and humour

Occupational therapy and humour research is quantitative in design, limited in quantity and

scope, and concentrates mainly on the effects of using humour to modulate pain; provide a

modality for therapists to help their clients, and to survey the attitudes of occupational

therapists who use humour in their practice (Southam, 1990, 2003, 2004). Dr. Marti Southam

(2003), an occupational therapist, surveyed 283 randomly selected occupational therapists

about their attitudes towards, and use of humour when working with adults with physical

disabilities, and the results supported the use of humour in occupational therapy practice in

four key areas: establishing relationships, coping, promoting physical health, and compliance.

Southam (2003) discovered that humour is useful and has a positive effect on individuals, in

particular in stressful situations, as it can be used as a defence or coping technique. Southam

and Schwartz (2004) explored the merits of humour as an educational tool by reviewing

literature on humour as a teaching strategy. They concluded that using appropriate humour,

educators could increase their own enjoyment of teaching as well as promote learning

outcomes for students. However, Southam (2003; 2004) surveyed occupational therapists for

their opinions, and reviewed literature, and did not ask other people their views about humour.

Positive psychology and humour

The aim of positive psychology is to catalyze a change in psychology, from a preoccupation

with repairing the worst things in life, to one that builds the best qualities in life (Sydner,

2002). Martin Seligman, the founder of positive psychology, suggests that psychological

research presents a positive shift away from the traditional method of only identifying and

looking to solve problems. The relationship between this proposed study and Seligman’s

(2003) ideas lies in the role of promoting positive life style changes, such as adding humour

into a person’s life style in order to develop a positive belief system. The significance of

Seligman’s (2003) work in relation to humour is the connection he makes between happiness,

wellbeing and what people do. Likewise, Brian Kaplan, a medical doctor is a pioneer in the

use of humour in medicine in the United Kingdom. He has been running workshops using

provocative therapy, which he describes as the specific use of humour in a psychotherapeutic

form: he suggests that provocative therapy is to medicine what theatre of the absurd is to

drama (Kaplan, 2001). It works by pointing up the absurd side of people’s problems because

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Kaplan (2001) believes that if you highlight the absurdity of people’s problems and start

siding with the weaknesses, people tend to move in the opposite direction (Kaplan, 2001).

New relevant research

Laughter is regularly promoted as a source of wellbeing and health, but it has been difficult to

determine exactly why laughing can feel so good. The answer, reports Robin Dunbar (et al.

2011), an evolutionary psychologist at Oxford, is not the intellectual pleasure of cerebral

humour, but the physical act of laughing. Dunbar’s (et al. 2011) study conducted at Oxford

University found that the simple muscular exertions involved in producing the familiar ha, ha,

ha, triggers an increase in endorphins, the brain chemicals known for their feel-good effect.

Dunbar’s (et al. 2011) results build on a long history of scientific attempts to understand a

deceptively simple and universal behaviour, and the findings fit well with a growing sense that

laughter contributes to group bonding and may have been important in the evolution of highly

social humans.

In five sets of studies in the laboratory and one field study at comedy performances, Dunbar

(et al. 2011) and colleagues tested resistance to pain both before and after bouts of social

laughter. The pain came from a freezing wine sleeve slipped over a forearm, a

tightening blood pressure cuff or an excruciating ski exercise (a strenuous exercise in which

participants had to hold themselves against a wall with their legs bent at a 90-degree angle, as

if sitting on a chair). The findings appear to eliminate the possibility that the pain resistance

measured was the result of a general sense of wellbeing rather than actual laughter. Robert

Provine, a neuroscientist at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, and the author of

Laughter: A Scientific Investigation, (2000) said he thought the study was a significant

contribution to a field of research that dates back 2,000 years or more. In relation to my study,

Dunbar (et al. 2011) was concerned with relaxed, contagious social laughter, (rather than

polite titter or awkward conversation) and he suggests that a classic example would be the

dinner at which everyone else speaks a different language and someone makes an apparently

hilarious but incomprehensible comment and everybody falls about laughing, and you look a

little puzzled for about three seconds, but really you just cannot help falling about laughing

yourself.

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Dunbar (et al. 2011) tested the relationship of laughter to pain resistance by having over a

hundred participants watch excerpts of comedy videos, neutral videos or videos meant to

promote good feeling but not laughter. Among the comedy videos were excerpts from comedy

sitcoms: Mr Bean, The Simpsons, Friends and South Park, as well as from performances by

standup comedians such as, Eddie Izzard. The neutral videos included Barking Mad, a

documentary on pet training, and a golfing programme. The positive but unfunny videos

included excerpts from shows about nature: Jungles and an episode of Planet Earth. In the

laboratory experiments, the participants were tested before and after seeing different

combinations of videos by wearing a frozen wine sleeve or a blood pressure cuff or ski

exercise, and they were asked to say when the pain reached a point they could not stand. The

participants all wore recorders during the videos so that the time they spent laughing could be

established. One experiment was held at a comedy club (not in the laboratory) and the same

tests were administered before and after the participants watched performances of an

improvisational comedy group at The Edinburgh Fringe Festival. The results, when analyzed,

showed that laughing increased pain resistance, whereas simple good feeling in a group setting

did not. Pain resistance is used as an indicator of endorphin levels because their presence in

the brain is difficult to test; the molecules would not appear in blood samples because they are

among the brain chemicals that are prevented from entering circulating blood by the so-called

blood brain barrier (Dunbar et al., 2011).

Dunbar (et al. 2011) believes laughter may have been favoured by evolution because it helped bring human groups together, the way other activities like singing and dancing do, and these activities also produce endorphins, although the physical activity is an important component. Laughter is an early mechanism to bond social groups, states Dunbar, (et al. 2011). Primates are known to laugh and it is believed that panting is the sound of rough-and-tumble play, and in the course of human evolution, pant, pant becomes ha, ha (Provine, 2000). There are some similarities with Dunbar’s (et al. 2011) study finding that 15 minutes watching comedy can increase pain tolerance an average of ten percent, and that of Cousins’ (1979) case study of pain tolerance where he found that 10 minutes of watching comedy films reduced his pain for a period of two hours; and Berk (1996, 2009) conducted laboratory based experiments where the participants also watched comedy videos and the control group saw sombre videos. The significance of Dunbar’s (et al. 2011) study is that it provides new evidence to support the concept of laughter as the best medicine because it shows that it is the physical act of laughing

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that produces the wellbeing effect, and this is derived from research spanning a decade by an international renowned team based at Oxford University. In relation to my research, if we laugh properly, as opposed to producing a polite titter, the physical exertion leaves us exhausted and thereby triggers the release of protective endorphins. These endorphins, one of the complex neuropeptide chemicals produced in the brain, manage pain and promote feelings of wellbeing, and this is likely the good feeling that the participants in my study believe they experience when they have a good, belly laugh in social situations. The participants, in my study, also said that they have a feeling of wellbeing when they experienced humour and laughed: when they laughed out aloud with others they experienced an intensely happy, good, positive state (euphoria). According to Dunbar, (et al. 2011) it is the bonding effects of the endorphin rush that explains why laughter plays such an important role in our social lives, and this is relevant to my study, as very little research has been done into why people find things humorous and laugh and what role it plays within society, or the effect it has on human actions.

My research study

The rationale for my study began with believing in the following statement that intuitively

adults seemed to think that humour is good for them (Funes, 2000). Likewise, humour, wit,

and laughter appear to surround us, from everyday quips to the carefully contrived comedy of

literature, newspapers, and television we experience humour in many forms on a day-to-day

basis. Practicing occupational therapy in a day resource centre for adults with mental health

needs, I believed using conversational humour on an ad hoc basis (telling funny stories, jokes,

or referring to television comedy shows) might help in establishing rapport, have a positive

effect on individuals in stressful situations, and promote a more effective therapeutic

intervention. This led me, to want to explore, how and why other people might create humour

in their day-to-day living because this could potentially inform occupational therapists, so that

they could encourage their service users to create humour, which could empower service

users, rather than them depending upon the occupational therapist or anyone else in their lives

to be humorous.

The potential benefits of humour and having a good laugh could be considered a valuable

motivational tool for engagement in occupations but in order for occupational therapists to

seriously embrace the use of humour in their practice, I felt that stronger evidence was needed.

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The existing occupational therapy studies have looked at humour from the perspective of the

therapist rather than the consumer. In the current climate for provision of consumer led

services it seems only fitting that their perspectives require consideration and if healthcare

professionals are advocating the use of humour in their practice occupational therapists need to

know first hand what it means to consumers. The connection between wellbeing and the

concept of humour does not appear to be taken seriously within the scientific community;

rather a small body of healthcare professionals readily embraces it and advocates that others’

accept this idea. Humour and laughter are relevant to day-to-day living, albeit it is a complex

area that needs to be explored further in order to have a better understanding.

Aims of my study

To explore how a range of adults generally experience humour in their day-to-day living

To explore any relationship between the lived experiences of humour and wellbeing

To explore if and how people feel they create humour in their day-to-day living

To inform occupational therapy practice

To build upon knowledge within Occupational Science in the domain of occupational form,

function and meaning: how people might do things/activities differently

My exploratory research study aimed to generate an understanding of what it means when

people create humour in their day-to-day living. Creating humour is about removing the aspect

of seriousness in day-to-day living by: making something (more) enjoyable, being playful,

funny comments, asking absurd questions, humorous situations, looking for the humorous,

references to television shows and comedians, telling jokes or riddles, smiling, and laughing.

My study also aimed to explore any relationship between the lived experiences of humour and

a sense of wellbeing. The aim was to provide information as to how and why people create

humour in their day-to-day living; any relationship with wellbeing and highlight how

occupational therapists might use this knowledge within the profession of occupational

therapy to inform practice, and empower service users. Recruiting a range of ordinary adults

via the Internet I was able to carry out my study. 20 participants were interviewed via email

once their informed consent was obtained. The e-interview data was analysed to produce

themes that represented the individuals’ lived experience of humour. The initial findings

directed subsequent follow up interviews, and each participant was interviewed at least three

times over a period of six months to one year, including one telephone interview.

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Summary of procedure and outcome

I interviewed 20 people who were recruited via the Internet using a snowball sampling

approach. These participants represented a range of age groups from 18 to 65, with most aged

between 35 to 54 years old and not retired. There were 14 female participants and 6 male

participants from five different counties: America, Britain, Germany, Malawi, and New

Zealand. Each person was interviewed via email at least three times, some more, this gave me

the opportunity to ask follow-up questions and have the interviewees read my initial

interpretations, and change or add anything (member check). One person was also interviewed

via telephone because this allowed me to pinpoint the participant in real time, and get more

spontaneous responses. There was a long process of analysis following the stages of IPA

(Smith, 1996; Smith and Osborn, 2003) each interview was coded, described, interpreted and

re-interpreted. In addition I kept a reflective journal and discussed my emerging ideas with my

supervisors and others.

An interpretative phenomenological approach to analysis appealed to me because it is not a

prescriptive methodology. I used IPA because as the researcher I could adapt it to suit my own

style of working, as inevitably qualitative analysis is a personal process. During the process of

analysis and interpreting the responses to my study questions provided by the participants, it

became obvious that the majority of people who had chosen to participate in my study had

done so because they were humour aware and in some cases experts on humour. Further

interpretation showed that there were a number of emerging themes all connected with humour

and social bonding in particular within the participants’ work environments/occupations. It

also became clear that the majority of the participants shared the same sentiments and

prevailing theme that humour was responsible for countering stress and making a difficult,

adverse life more tolerable. What was evident was at some point in the participants’ life’s they

had made a deliberate decision to create humour or to, at a minimum, find humorous situations

in their day-to-day situations in order to enhance their lives and the sense of wellbeing they

felt. This was described as an over whelming sense of feeling good or better that came about

as a direct result of actively or passively experiencing humour. In at least two cases the

participants felt that if they had a laugh or watched a comedy TV programme before going to

bed it would help them to sleep. The participants who had experienced the most adverse,

difficult lives such as recovering from a brain tumour or having been homeless were

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convinced that without humour they would not have survived, including one participant who

stated that she would die if she could not laugh. For these and other reasons experiencing

humour was found to an extremely relevant and important part of day-to-day living.

For the majority of the 20 participants in this study humour means adopting a life style with a:

positive attitude; looking on the bright, funny side of life and being able to laugh at everyday

situations; being able to counteract stress; improve communication and social bonding; and a

sense of wellbeing because of their humorous interactions with others. Overall whatever the

setting, humour was generally associated with feeling good, better performance, improved

attitude and desirable outcomes.

Participants’ e-interviews I have presented the raw data from the e-interviews conducted with the 20 participants who

completed the study. In some cases I have shortened quotes in order to ease the burden of the

reader. Participants were given a pseudonym and the opportunity to use a different name to the

one I had chosen. One of the participants agreed to a telephone interview in addition to the e-

interviews and a summary of this interview is included in the findings (chapter 6). The

following is a sample of initial participant responses, including the first one that epitomises

this research study:

Sounds like a very interesting research project, something we all know a lot about but difficult to capture scientifically. Sure, sounds fine. Intriguing research topic! Anything that makes me think about laughing more will certainly brighten up the day! I would love to participate in your study. Laughter has been a tool for survival most of my insane life. So fire away…

I have provided excerpts of the email threads (numbered 1-20) with some of the content

shortened for the sake of the reader.

1) Maureen was the first participant to answer all of the research questions: Sent: April 5, 2010: A typical day for me (Mon - Fri) is 8 hrs of work in a construction dept for a Non-Profit organization. Today for example I laughed first thing this morning talking with co-workers about the weekend. I laugh often at work -- with my co-workers and others. Many times it will be about something one of us saw on TV or heard on the radio. Sometimes it will be something that happened to one of us over the weekend. It is essential (in my opinion) because I work in an industry that

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helps people in sad or frustrating positions (underprivileged or poverty stricken). It could be depressing if we didn't have a good laugh from time to time. I do laugh a lot. I try to find humour in all situations if possible; it has been a survival tool since life can be so difficult. I don't know exactly how much I've laughed in the past week exactly but I can easily say daily. I have many "characters" if you will in my life: family and friends. Today I had a good laugh with a friend that called me to tell me of her vacation with her family. She shared a story of one of her grandchildren and her imagination. She made up a song for her and performed it dancing and all. Laughter helps me in many ways - mostly to remind me of the happiness I have in my life. It keeps me focused on the positive, which helps to cope with the not so positive. Sent: April 12, 2010: I don't have much to add except I have been told on more than one occasion that it's impossible not to laugh when I do because of the sound of my laughter. I take that as a compliment and know that whatever effect it has on others it makes me feel alive and well. 2) Gaby was the first person to sign the consent form, and the second participant to answer: Sent: 12 April 2010: Sorry I didn't reply to the last question as I wasn't sure, but you having rephrased the question has helped me. I would have thought I laugh more than the average person. I will say I laugh at least a couple of times a day. I laugh mostly about something being said, something I read and misunderstand and just in general at home. I will be at home and something is said but it comes out wrong i.e.: words mixed up or the grammar is wrong so it gives a complete different meaning. At work when I have to type something from a written text which can come from just about anywhere in the world, sometime their spelling is terrible, they use incorrect words or their writing is so bad and the words you can make out is just laughable and nothing to do with the job. Laughing just makes me happier and sees life in a different light. If I'm happy it is easier for me to deal with my home life and daughter. I don't get so uptight. My daughter might ask for something and if I'm happy and have been laughing I find saying no is easier and she accepts it better than if I bite her head off. I am normally at work, sitting at home talking and we do a lot of play fighting the 2 or 3 of us and that gives us all the giggles when things seem funny. Occasionally when shopping but not that often. I would say in general I live in a happy household. Sent: April15, 2010:Hi Helen, I have been thinking about this since I sent you my answer and I do believe that I have included everything. Good luck with the study. 3) Roger was the first male participant to complete the research questions. He provided the following detailed answer. Sent: April 8, 2010: In reply to your question: I am a government employee working in Head Office for the Ministry of Social Development (the Ministry which pays benefits to pensioners, the unemployed etc). I work in a team of 5 people that manage the security and safety of all the Ministries frontline staff. We also complete background security checks on new staff members to the Ministry. A

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typical working day would start with opening mail and answering emails. The day would continue with speaking with suppliers and other Ministry employees developing systems and methods of working. The team I work in have worked together for a number of years and occasionally social together outside of work. We are all well educated (Degree level) and are aged from 42 to 60. What makes me laugh at work is the ongoing banter and ridicule of each other within the team. Example someone may mention what they got up to in the weekend. An opinionated discussion will then start on what we would have done, what we thought and discussion on past experiences. Our team also gets a laugh out of some of the correspondents we receive example identification photos, peoples names etc. After work I may watch TV and enjoy watching reality programs and programs showing video clips of people making fools of themselves, falling off things, tripping up etc. After reading this email I have just realized I enjoy ridiculing people and watching people ridicule themselves. I thought I was nicer that that! Hope this has helped Sent: April 13, 2010: Yes, I am a person who laughs a lot. I believe this is because I am a positive person and always try to see the humour and good in anything. It may also have something to do with having suffered pain and despair in the past. I was diagnosed with a non-cancerous brain tumour 12 years ago. The diagnosis was not good and I was given a 50/50 chance of surviving the operation to remove the tumour. If I did survive I was advised there was a 70% chance of having brain damage. I survived the operation, without brain damage and with only minor on-going mobility problems. Something like that happening to you at 40 makes you look at things a lot differently. Yes I would (say that my job influences how much I laugh). The job is sometimes stressful and having a laugh with my colleagues helps. I don't think it influences how much I laugh over all but certainly how much I laugh at work. Once again I think the amount I laugh is influenced by life experiences. Laughter has helped me make friends. Prior to starting this job I studied and prior to that I travelled the world on my own for over 10 years. Seeing the funny side of something and talking about it has enabled me to talk to strangers as it gives both parties something in common to talk about. Laughter on inappropriate occasions both at work and in my private life has got me in trouble in the past. I am sure this will continue in the future. As I mention earlier, life experiences have changed the way I look at others and myself. I would say I laugh more at home, on holiday etc than at work. I try as much as I can to look professional whilst at work so have to try and not laugh even though I may be inside. For me it is easier to see the funny side of something that become serious. I think this is just part of my nature. It is my way of deal with life whereas other look at thing differently. 4) Participant Nikaz provided a list of when she laughs. Sent: April 6, 2010: A typical weekday for me involves getting up and going to work and working for 8 hours per day. At work I often talk and laugh with colleagues during the course of the day. Then when I go home I watch TV and laugh during this time as well - at TV and with my family. I laugh when someone says something funny or tells a joke.

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Sent: April 13, 2010: I laugh when the lady I sit next to at work bursts into song I laugh when people at work tell jokes I laugh when we talk about the other members of our team in an amusing way I laugh when someone is on an amusing phone call I laugh when we are telling amusing anecdotes I laugh at home when I'm watching TV and someone says something funny I laugh at home with my family and they are telling funny stories I laugh when I'm with my friends and they are telling funny stories I laugh when other people fall over. I laugh quite a lot I'd say. I usually laugh at least once each half hour of the day. I also enjoy trying to make others laugh. When other people laugh it also makes me laugh as well. During the past week I have laughed a lot. I would say at least once each half hour during the week but less during the weekend, as I was not around people as much in the weekend. Today I was laughing because I was talking to another colleague about what happened last night on Jersey Shore (TV show - I also laughed watching this last night). Today we also laughed because we were making up nicknames for each other by adding Z to the end of our names. During the week I have laughed about a colleague who has trying to get a power issue fixed at her house and this has been going on for about 4 weeks and she keeps getting told to ring other people and they send her back to the original company and she's been in circles over this, which is funny because she gets distressed about it. I laughed when we waved to our colleague from out the window at work and she waved back and yelled to us. Laughter makes the workday more fun. If we are joking around and telling stories work is more fun. If I'm sad and someone makes me laugh I feel much better. If I haven't had the best day and I can laugh it cheers me up. Usually (I laugh) when talking with other people or watching TV. I don't laugh when I'm by myself. 5) Gloria sent the following long detailed answers: Sent: April 6, 2010: In a typical weekday I wake up early and go to the gym, I catch a ride to the gym with my mum and usually laugh with her about things she tells me about her work or our family etc. Once I get to work I usually laugh and joke with colleagues about various things and this usually continues throughout the day. When I get home from work I laugh at things that my partner says and joke with him. I will also usually watch TV at home and laugh when something funny is said or done. During the weekend I would usually hang out with my partner, friends or family and laugh and joke around with them. Sent: April 20, 2010: I laugh at imitations of people and things that my partner does, I laugh at stories my partner tells me about him taking jokes to far at his work and people getting annoyed at him, I laugh at how weird some of the things my partner says are, I laugh at ongoing jokes that me and my colleagues have i.e. laughing about the characters on Summer Heights High (which is a favourite show of ours), making up nicknames for each other, laughing when my workmate was on the phone to someone and said 'screen dump' (this is immature but me and my other workmate think it's really funny), I also laugh when my workmate leaves really awkward voice messages on peoples phones because she always gets really embarrassed by them...I laugh about things that happen on nights out with my friends

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i.e. people doing stupid things when they have been drinking, I laugh when people tell really lame jokes and they fail, I laugh when my mum tells me stories about stupid things my family have done or said. I love watching funny movies like Forgetting Sarah Marshall, The Hangover and I Love You Man and often quote lines from the movies with my friends and my partner, which always makes me laugh. I laugh at people trying to be something they're not or taking themselves too seriously, I laugh when someone falls over or walks into something and then gets up and pretends nothing happened. Yes I do laugh a lot. I have always been known amongst my friends and family as a person who will laugh at someone's joke even if no one else thinks it's funny, that's partly because I think it's funny when someone tells a joke and it fails...I also usually laugh longer than everyone else, like everyone has finished laughing about something but I'm still going...I don't really know why that is...I suppose I just think that lots of things are a lot funnier than other people do, and often replay the joke or situation that I found funny over in my head a couple of times which makes me laugh more. I laugh a lot, at least every 30 minutes each day if not more...I find all of the things I mentioned in question 1 really funny and I laugh heaps at all of them. There are also times when I laugh at things that I don't actually find funny, this is usually when someone is trying to be funny and I don't want them to feel bad so I laugh a little bit out of sympathy I suppose. Laughter affects my life in a really positive way as I find it's kind of like a stress release. Whenever I'm sad my partner always acts stupid and tries to make me laugh which makes me feel better. Laughing at work makes the day feel like it goes by faster and makes work more interesting and enjoyable. I think I would dread work a lot more if I didn't have people I could laugh with. I also find that laughing with my friends kind of brings us closer because it shows that we're similar and have similar senses of humour which is always a good thing. Having inside jokes that me and my friends always laugh about kind of brings us closer too, I think because it's kind of like we have a 'club' that no one else is a part of. It's also a confidence booster when people laugh at my own jokes...this doesn't always happen though so it can also back fire on me and make me feel like an idiot. (When I laugh) I'm usually either talking with my partner, friends, workmates or family or watching TV. This probably sounds nutty but I laugh by myself too sometimes when I think of something funny that happened, or a joke that someone told me, or if someone sends me a funny text or email, or when I'm reading a funny book or magazine. I think laughter is really important as it brings people closer together and can help make a bad situation a bit more positive. 6) Lydia’s response: Sent: April 29, 2010: I don't think I'm anything other than typical of most people when it comes to humour. I guess I tend to look at the funny side of things though. I wouldn't describe myself as a funny person I'm not quick witted enough, or particularly good at re-telling jokes. Sent: 4 May 2010: Mostly I laugh when talking to other people colleagues, friends, family etc who have said something that I think is funny. I also tend to laugh at funny things on TV - like the programme America's Funniest Home Videos. I think I'm about the same as most others,

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neither particularly giggly nor otherwise. I have a good relationship with my colleagues at work who sit near by, so we often share a joke or laugh about something that has happened throughout each day. Sometimes it's in bad taste so I won't share an example!

Laughter definitely lightens moments and makes you feel aligned/closer to those around you when you share something funny. At work it can be a stress relief when you share/make a joke about something negative that has happened. (When I laugh) usually (I’ve) either interacting with others face-to-face or on the phone or watching something funny on TV. I laugh about most things/topics, particularly comical things that happen to people I know.

7) George’s response: Sent: April 6, 2010: This may be a little difficult to answer; I do not believe I do anything in particular to laugh. What I mean to say is that I don't do anything to seek it out, laughter just sort of happens. I do tend to try to see some humour in most situations. I will try to answer by your questions. I will say that most often I laugh at quick, one line, and sometimes mildly inappropriate responses in normal conversation.

I tend to be a mostly serious person. I do tend to try to make others laugh to help them be more comfortable around me. I will have to pay a little more attention to this (how much I laugh) in the future. I would have to say that I laugh at something multiple times daily. It may be something someone is doing, or at a funny email, but most likely in an everyday conversation with co-workers, family or friends. Not quite sure I know the answer to this (how humour affects me). Again I would have to go back to how laughter affects personal relationships, whether that is with current acquaintances and friends or new people that I have just met. I find it helps even when dealing with needing assistance from a store clerk, bank teller or other people you have quick first time encounters with. I know that I have also found that some of the people that make me laugh the most are very intelligent. I would have to say (I laugh) mostly during light social conversation. But it could be most anytime, sometimes even at my own thoughts, like, how do I answer this question? Life in general is just funny, why people do what they do, or how they choose to do it. Sarcasm in particular makes me laugh, very stupid people I just have to laugh at, I wonder how they ever get through life. It is sometimes a sitcom on television, I find "Two and Half Men "to be extremely funny. Most often these days it is my 18-year-old son. He says the most inappropriate things at the most serious times and even though my mind says it is not right to laugh at that comment I find I just cannot help myself. He seems to have that same affect on most people. He made a comment just a few days ago to a conversation that was going on between myself, and his pregnant sister about her baby. We all could not stop laughing, and the comment was towards the fact that the baby will most likely be retarded because the father is not too bright. My daughter stated that she wanted to chase after him and slap him, but it was just so funny at that time that she couldn't help but laugh. I think mostly because It was the truth, the father is just not very smart and constantly gets into trouble because of it, just most people would never say it in front of her. The truth is most often the funniest thing; it is all in how one views it.

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8) Kikiki was the only participant to change the pseudonym I gave him. Sent: May 3, 2010: I am one of the people who laugh a lot so much so that many people identify me as such. Most of the times I find listening to interesting stories and jokes very funny. I like listening to people who tell stories. This is both face to face and via other media (phone, TV). Sometimes I laugh from jokes cracked in a movie. One time I was watching a movie from S. Africa, which made me laugh my lungs out.

Laughter gives me relief and some time I tend to forget my problems for sometime. It also helps me to cement my relationship with others as it shows that we can share happiness through it. Most of the times I find something funny when chatting with friends or listening to some people talk. At one time somebody was narrating a story about his childhood, and he mentioned how he ran away when he was about to be caught with a girl at a forest (about to have sex). I also like jokes from movies. 9) Jewel is a nurse and she provided a very detailed response: I am 22 years old and work in an Acute Nursing and Rehab Center, HCR Manorcare Heartland Crestview. I am currently working as a CNA - Certified Nurse Aide, but am working on getting my nursing license. I have worked in this field for almost 3 years. The question that you asked, "Does the experience of humour affect your daily occupation?” stuck out to me. After spending so much time in the environment with elderly, sick, injured, confused, and dying people, I completely think that laughter is a must. I have seen patients come in with broken hips, pelvises, legs, ankles, necks, you name it, and I have found that laughter is a tool of the trade.

I had a woman come in with a broken hip and she would cry all day and night, she was in so much agonizing pain. She was a sweet lady, but the minute you tried to move her, her eyes would flood with tears. One day, her 4-year-old grandson came in and I heard what sounded like sobbing coming from her room. When I entered the room, her grandson was dancing around in circles and she was laughing like I've never seen. There was something so easing to her that she could release some of that pain. After that day, each time I saw her, I would dance around in circles like her grandson did and she would laugh until she had tears streaming down her face. She started to call me the Dancing Queen. Yes, I felt silly and a bit immature, but it made her happy and I myself was laughing just as hard. The woman worked with our Rehab team and soon began to take steps with her walker, which soon turned into walking the hall with just a gait belt and a therapist, and then she was off on her own. The day she was discharging, I got a card from her thanking me for making her stay better. She told me that it holds true, "Laughter is the best medicine.”

Since then, I have spent my days doing goofy, crazy, somewhat immature, and interesting things to make sure that my patients can have something to hold on to. The craziest part, it's worked! I feel so happy about not only helping someone, but lifting their spirits too. Laughter is a part of my uniform. :)

Sent: April 25, 2010: I certainly think I am a person who laughs a lot. I work in a depressing atmosphere. Nursing Homes are not a place where many people find joy. If you are going to work somewhere like that, you need to have an attitude that presents happiness and joy to

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those around you. You are surrounded by people who can't get out of their beds, can't move entire half of their bodies, and some that are being admitted to stay there until they pass on. You have to give them something to smile about. Even if it is just a job to you, to them this is their life. Everyone deserves to be happy and if you can help him or her do that, then why not? I crack jokes all the time and do silly things like spinning in circles and singing, even if I feel my face turning red. Laughter takes that pain inside away, even if just for a brief moment.

This past week has been fun! I have a patient that is suffering from Broca's Aphasia. Broca's Aphasia affects the frontal regions of the left hemisphere of the brain. Patients can have difficulty forming complete sentences, trouble understanding sentences, and can make mistakes in following directions like left, right, under, and after. The patient shows all of there symptoms, the most severe being difficulty forming complete sentences. He is able to understand you relatively well, but when he answers, he will sometimes say something completely abstract. When I had asked him what my name was and he replied "Potatoes and Chives!" He started laughing immediately, which to me, made me think he knew what he said wasn't my name, and he was trying to be funny. He certainly had me laughing too! The patient has a stuffed hippo that he carries around with him and I like to hide the hippo so he can find it. The other day, I placed the hippo on my head and sat there. All he could do was look at me and laugh. It's so hard when his face lights up not to smile too. Later that day I came down the hallway and he was sitting with his hippo on his head. I immediately laughed when I saw him, which in turn set him off. I left that day thinking about how I spent the day goofing off with this patient and how much laughing I had done. It was back and forth all day long. Honestly, I laugh the most when I work. There are so many different people you come across. Like I said before, with what I do on a daily basis, you have to have fun and laugh. I did go to a concert last night with my fiancé. The lead singer was swinging the microphone around in circles by its cord and he wacked himself in the face. At first we were startled, thinking of the pain and if he had hurt himself seriously, but he was ok and was laughing at himself. The rest of the night we were cracking up thinking of it. He had been swinging the microphone all night long and we were waiting for it to happen. 10) Stuart provided a rich response. Sent: 29 April 2010: Hi Helen, see answers below. If you need some more fleshing out let me know... My typical day is to wake up, get ready and off for a quick coffee and then to work. I work as an IT Technology and support manager. This job puts me in contact with all areas of the NZ Fire Service. I lead a team of 8 IT professionals and we work in the usual stressful environment attributed to IT operations. I use humour in every opportunity to "lighten up" the team's mood and of course my mood. In this we are fortunate to work for an organisation with down to earth people, fire-fighters, who also have great sense of humour in general. I also inject humour with every opportunity at home and at my karate club (although some of my instructors find it annoying, I expect it of them as much as they can.) I try and find the funny side to everything (maybe too much sometimes I've been told!). It all started when I was a young boy in Greece. I used to read a magazine my mum often bought, much like the Woman's Weekly, called Romantzo. In there, every week was my favourite short

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story called "Life is a comedy". It must have influenced me so much that I have faced all aspects of life with a comedic view... Every day I try and find opportunities to have fun and laugh. When I was 15 my English language teacher in Greece told me that "life is not a comedy", to which I replied I think it is.... To date I haven't seen any supporting evidence for his position! Often my wife needs to remind me that something I laugh at is not funny only to follow up with her own little laugh... (During the week I laughed) quite a bit as always! Here are a few funny events... 1) our overweight can welcomed us home from our trip to Australia on Tuesday night, jumped and sat on my wife's lap and proceeded to rip her $50 stockings... 2) At my niece's wedding in Australia last Sunday, her name being Eva... Priest: "we are gathered here to witness the matrimony of Daniel and EVIL!!!" Mind you everybody found this funny and it took 3-4 minutes for the bride and groom to stop laughing!!! 3) My mother in Law was allowed to use the Business class toilet although we were flying cattle-class... When I took her there because she is almost 90, she was put off why a business class passenger was occupying the toilet! 4) I did a few "look no hands" while wheeling my mother in law around the airport on a wheelchair! My wife stopped me! (Humour) makes me feel good and gives me joy. I have had many misfortunes while I was young, e.g. my father abandoned my mum when I was born, my best friend died in a car crash when we were 10, my mum and I were seriously sick when I was 19, she died shortly thereafter and I was on medication for 2 years. These events re-enforced my belief that life is short so you need to enjoy every minute. And, besides the necessary and obligatory human activities, laughing is the only thing you have control over. I can choose to laugh or I can choose to ignore a source of laughter. I always choose to laugh. It is amazing how many people who don't know me, after spending a few minutes with me think I am a "good" guy. They still don't know me, however they usually go a way laughing taking a couple of funny stories with them. Seeing other people laugh makes me happy. My favourite shows on TV are comedies. Being Greek I think has also contributed to my sense of humour and tendency to laugh. Greeks do tend to see things from a funny perspective; I mean look at the current economic state of Greece! Nothing fazes them... Seriously though, half of the Greeks are "tragic" and the other half is "comedic". I believe belong to the "comedic" half. Email feedback from my research study advisor: What a wonderfully rich email from this Greek man! There's so much to analyse there, coming from a tragic background, yet finding life so funny! I would advise you to start analysing themes as you go along, and seeing how many are relatively common themes. In particular see if you can stick to 'occupational' type themes, such as doing things in a funny way (like free wheeling his mother in law). Other examples seem to be him seeing the funny side of things that other people/animas do (like his overweight 'cat?' ripping his wife's expensive stockings). Its also interesting that several times he mentions people who do not like his sense of humour, but alternatively there are others who seem to warm to him immediately. 11) Pat provided me with the following replies and she participated in a telephone interview. Sent: April 30, 2010: I am a Marketing and Communications Advisor for an emergency service. There is no actual typical day! My day can range from wall to wall meetings with no

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time to even download emails to sitting down and composing communications strategies for major organisational projects, writing press releases or organising corporate events. I am normally up by 0600 hours, leave for work around 0730, or 0800 hrs, dependent upon how I feel. I travel 38 miles out of the county to go to work then embark upon 7.24 hrs at least of my working day. I try to incorporate humour into most things I do, whether it is a Board Meeting or speaking to somebody on the checkout at Sainsbury's. Can't remember when I last laughed as I hope that I do this a lot of the time. I did visit some custody cells on Friday and remember laughing with some custody officers and staff. We laughed at the sometimes-challenging situations our organisation is in and how people often react with humour. One senior person made myself and two colleagues laugh for almost an hour and a half, at some absurdities and recounted his experiences in a very human way. It was his enthusiasm and energy in recounting some pretty grim or negative stories, which brought some of the absurdities to light. Working for one of the emergency services with all the financial and resource constraints in which we are forced to operate, sometime makes us more able to generate laughter as a response to some challenging situations. Sometimes, this may be what could be phrased as black humour. I hope that I am (a person who laughs a lot). In Britain particularly we laugh at people who take themselves terribly seriously, whereas other nations appreciate the Benny Hill and slipping on a banana skin humour more funny. We tend to laugh at ourselves and our own shortcomings, which many people can empathise with. In other cultures, they may laugh at other people's shortcomings rather than their own. I do hope that I laugh a lot. I will often try to raise a smile or a laugh at whatever level as this is important to me in building relationships with people. My closest friends are those who can make me laugh and whom I can make laugh. I like it when something I say or do can raise a smile, a laugh or a positive comment. As a northerner from the northwest, Merseyside, Liverpool, Cheshire area, repartee and banter is part of how we are. Having a craic during our daily lives when we shop or meet people in the street is part of what we are. Laughing at ourselves and at situations is part of everyday life. Living now in the southwest, I found it hard, at first to fit in. My comments and efforts to engage with those working in shops, 20 odd years ago were met with some strange looks!! But I have never given up. Treating people as individuals and trying to raise a smile and a laugh is very powerful to me. I feel that I have achieved something. I love people who can make me laugh whether it is Chris Moyles or Scott Mills on Radio One or some of my closest friends who can do impressions. Laughter can unite people. These can cross-organisational, local, regional, national and international borders. I laugh every morning when I listen to Radio One, Chris Moyles and when I am driving the 38 miles home with Scott Mills. I am not actually representative of the Radio One target audience! I am older! I laugh at absurdities at work but do not find the unfortunate falls and tumbles of the Candid Camera sort of TV programmes funny at all. What is so funny about people hurting themselves? Please see my comments above regarding black humour, which is often the panacea for a number of corporate ills. I would not be the same person if I were serious. I need some more precise questions to able

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to give you some decent data here! It is hard to be able to give an answer without having some focus on what data it is you are looking for. Free text answers are notorious to be able to classify into themes.... Just my experience............... Sent: May 8, 2010: I was brought up in the northwest, Merseyside, to be precise, so humour, laughter and repartee were part of daily life. I don't think that my "sense of humour" has come about as a result of my job. It was well developed way before that! As a child I remember watching Morecombe and Wise, Monty Python, the Comedians, Lenny Henry and Kenny Everett. These were funny programmes. I think that the way that I was brought up suggested that if you didn't have a sense of humour, that you were a bit strange! I always liked "funny" accents, impressions and things of this nature. Not unsurprisingly, I then went on to be a linguist! I like to look at other cultures and enjoy when different cultures can laugh together, not particularly AT people, but at shared experiences, characteristics, "types", which do transcend national borders. Laughter is universal. It can be the result of a "silly face", a funny walk or an exaggerated characteristic. Perhaps people's sense of humour can adapt as a result of their job, but people who take themselves seriously and who cannot raise a smile are not the type of people I want to be around! Sent: May 11, 2010: Life is too short. If you would like a one to one interview, I am fine with this as well! Laughter is important! We must share the love! Just thought of some other things vis a vis laughter. Part of what makes me laugh is the incongruity of certain things, eg the "posh Radio 4 lady" reading out some banal emails on the Scott Mills show on Radio 1 in the afternoon, taking the "micky" out of establishment idylls, making a quick response to a question using word play, using contemporary references and skewing their relevance, using bathos, belittling a "grand" gesture which politicians and people of that ilk like to make. May think some more on this, but am just using stream of consciousness at the moment! 12) Burt’s thoughtful and detailed replies: Sent: May 13, 2010: I kept your questions in mind last Friday as I went from meeting to meeting. When you consciously monitor when you laugh it is surprising how hard it is to laugh and only when you let your guard down do you actually do it. I had three meetings during the day, one at 9.00 with all the other senior managers on the current issues impacting the organisation, a meeting with the CFO from an external organisation and a general meeting with my staff. These were my observations: laughter is used to break the ice and get a conversation going. Laughter is used to make a serious subject lighter and easier to traverse the more important issues. Laughter is used to establish a relationship / connection. Laughter denotes nervousness. Most of the laughter came from a joke being told or light hearted jibe being made at someone's expense. The less you new the group you were dealing with the less laughter that occurred. In the meetings that I had that day the senior managers meeting laughter was generated through general banter between the people in the room. The better you know the people the more direct and personal the humour can become. The external meeting laughter came about at the start of the meeting where we were establishing a connection between each other. Getting to know the person at a personal level

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helped the meeting progress at a more professional level. The laughter was probably more forced than anything else and when you think about it you both just find opportunities to laugh rather than at anything specific. Finally with the staff, laughter establishes control and sets the tone for the meeting. It is usually me who establishes it and again tends to be forced by all those involved. I may find it funny but the staff feels obliged to join in. The really heart felt laughter tends to be with your more closest of friends and family and you can laugh at what truly you find funny, whether it is with a personal joke with your wife (usually backfires on me as I get it wrong) or everyone watching a funny film or laughing with the kids. Sent: May 18, 2010: I believe that as time has gone by and I have progressed in my career I have become more aware of the power laughter has in managing situations and staff. Obviously it is not appropriate all the time but that is a judgement call and comes with either maturity or trial and error. I remember once having a college show me a photo of him with some people and we were laughing about the situation surrounding the photo. Unfortunately I took it one further step and singled out a rather unfortunate looking women in the photo and said "my God who is that!" getting ready to comment on her features. His reply "that's my wife!!!" " Oh" I said thinking quickly on my feet "I thought it was I met her last year" How close we can come to allowing a situation get out of hand. Or I remember another occasion when I was at lunch with the Board members and one lady who happens to be a corgi dog fanatic was relaying the story how a friend of hers had inadvertently run over her corgi with a ride on motor mower. Unfortunately I found this extremely funny and laughed so much that I tears coming down my cheeks. Luckily the other Board members joined in more than likely laughing at me rather than the incident. It took awhile to restore the level of trust. By and large laughter makes you feel good but it is only on those few and very rare occasions that you have a very good uncontrollable laugh the rest of the time I am afraid are more than likely situational and to some extent forced. - Depressing really isn't it? You could just as easily grumble at everything rather than laugh if that is the situation. 13) Alicia’s long and detailed replies: Sent: 20 May 2010: I am a person who laughs a lot. I have always believed that laughter keeps you feeling young, prevents you from becoming precious about yourself and the work you do and helps to provide work balance. Our family always laughed a lot especially my mother; we all have a bit of gift for telling a story and see the funny side of things. I always look for the humour in a situation especially if it is painful either emotionally or physically as being able to laugh at it helps take away any pain. When I have been frightened or shocked about something I often laugh about it afterwards as it brings mental relief. I find having a really good laugh when I perhaps cry and get breathless makes me feel so good afterwards. Most days I find something to laugh about especially at work as sometimes members of the team I am in take themselves too seriously and finding something funny in a situation at work helps relieve the tensions they create for me. The following are situations in which I had a laugh: one team member in particular is a poseur and makes a habit of circumventing our manager and going direct to the General Manager which we are not supposed to do. She is in her 50's dresses like Milly Molly Mandy and when she is approaching the GM she does a

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strange little dance, makes faces uses a little girl voice etc if I didn't laugh at this I would likely feel anger. I am aware that I should not take notice of how she chooses to behave but laughing at her relieves my inner tension. Sandy and I take my 2 dogs walking every morning in the park; they often misbehave and go through a fence or something similar i.e. they go where they shouldn't go and after they get back we often have a laugh and it relieves the tension. I laughed last night at the theatre. We went to see Miss Saigon and I cried (silently) a lot of the time. At half time I had a laugh at myself and it relieved the way I was feeling. I laughed at a couple of jokes sent by email to me last week. I often laugh out loud at the jokes that are just plain funny not the usual old put down someone else kind of joke they can maybe make me grin but that is about all. I often laugh over passages I read in books, as I seem to have a good imagination and can visualise things well. If I get a fright for some reason a laugh at myself afterwards is good to relieve the negative feelings I've experienced. Laughter is cathartic for me it relieves tension. I agree with the Readers Digest column, which says Laugher is the best medicine. I enjoy my work more when I have some good laughs in a day. When I was a child I would often tell my mother about something that had made me laugh and then we would have a laugh together over it. I do the same now with my sister and my brother. It seems it is a characteristic shared in the family. We were a family who would find some aspect to laugh at in regard to unfortunately events. When I have had a significant other in my life I would do the same. A sense of humour and the ability to make me laugh is usually what attracts me to others male or female. A similar sense of humour is often the glue in a relationship. Friends often have said they like to be around me as I can make them laugh. I'm often just doing my work but remaining aware of what is going on around me. I often find passages in books very funny and I don't worry about being on the train and in a public place because I feel so good after I have had a good laugh. Black humour is often what gets us through the day when dealing with problems that arise in the work place that we have to advise managers on. I don't really remember a lot of it but this morning a friend and I laughed at the expense of another friend because the other friend was being the big pooh bar and organising where yet other friends were to sit on the train. I have just had a laugh with some colleagues at work who are a lot younger than me because I told another older colleague the young ones were bullying me. Sent: 23 May 2010: I did want to add, if my workplace became a place where was no laughter I would look at finding another role in another organisation. Laughter and fun at work is a key component of job satisfaction for me. If I have to work too closely with people who take themselves too seriously it diminishes my ability to enjoy my job. In order to work around this I actively seek out others who have a similar viewpoint to me. I am very lucky in my current role as both my manager and my manager’s manager have a good sense of humour. I have observed that people who don't have fun often have minimal resilience when things go wrong at work or in their personal lives. 14) Vince’s replies: Sent: May 20, 2010: To start with laughing is part of my character and I normally laugh in my chat. So in the scenario that I am about to narrate, I was the one who laughed a lot. My Mum and I were chatting and the story at hand was about the announcements that were made at

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church during the Sunday morning Mass. The reader made a number of mistakes in pronouncing the figure of last Sunday collection, so I laughed so much as my mum was emulating the way the reader said. (During the past week) I laughed many times. I have two sisters and currently the young one happens to be brighter than the elder one and when it comes to some school questions the elder who is also a school leaver, fails, so it make us funny. Laughing affects me in a positive way that I normally get relieved from other thoughts more especially bad ones. For example, when it happens that I am in bad mood, and I am in sad. When I am chatting (I find something funny). (I laugh) When I am sharing my own experience of something with someone or getting the experience of the one whom I am chatting with. I always find hard to be saying something about somebody who is not there. Sent: May 23, 2010: When was a baby up to 5 / 6 years old I used to laugh but when I was 7 years I didn’t may be because of my pride, I then realized that the habit of (laughing) was self centred and (being) proud would not take me anywhere and then I was 11years. Since then I find most of the things funny and have more friends. 15) Sadie’s response: Sent: May 21, 2010: My normal day consists of getting myself ready for work, making pack lunches, taking the children to school and then going to work. After work I come home do housework or other jobs that need doing and cook dinner. I then sit down to watch the television for the rest of the evening. I am aware that I don't laugh as much as I used to, and although I work trying to get money from stressed absent fathers I currently laugh more at work than at home. I can always have a laugh with my friends and family, I feel more relaxed and at ease around them. I don't laugh with my partner and I am aware that I used to. I am a person who laughs a lot, I feel this is because I am a happy kind of person and don't like feeling miserable, life is to short. If I am feeling low laughter always makes me feel better. I laugh at least 3 times a day and I find real life situations the funniest. I went to an Anne Summers party and we had to play silly games and make fools out of ourselves by putting on granny knickers to play a game carrying a coin between our knees and other games just a silly, but which made everyone laugh and I came away from their feeling really relaxed and happy. Another thing made me laugh was that we have just got a baby guinea pig and it kept peeing on my partner and not on anyone else. I watch Britain’s got more talent and what makes me laugh are the appalling acts which go on there and how they really think they are great. Laughter always makes me forget about my worries and what dreadful things that are happening in the world today. When I was going through my divorce people used to say it's one of the most stressful things to go through apart from bereavement and I have to agree. If it wasn't for my friends being there to have a laugh with I think I would have broken down. I laugh with my friends when we talk about bad situations and although I acknowledge that its bad the laughter seems to lesson the situation. Laughter has got me through a lot of bad things that has gone on in my life. 16) Claudia’s replies (and case study provided in the Appendix): Sent: June 14, 2010: Hi Helen, I'm really sorry that it's taken me a long time to reply to this- I understand why you have made the questions fairly specific, because I may not be alone in finding it really hard to remember exactly what made me laugh at a particular time.

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I have a friend who is very outspoken and un-PC. He will refer to someone as having 'a face like a bag of spanners' if he doesn't fancy them (the way I wrote that made me laugh). Sorry, but it doesn't really come across on paper. I suspect there is a 'nervous cackling' element to this as well as I fully expect him to get off with other women a lot of the time. But that is clearly another story. Today I suggested to one of my colleagues that she wear some different shoes to work. We are play workers and we carry heavy things about and do woodwork and suchlike with the children. I am meant to be supervising the sessions. She is a new member of staff and I have noticed that she normally wears a pair of flip-flop type sandals. When I said it might be safer to wear shoes with toes she looked a bit non-plussed and then started to laugh. That made me laugh as well, I think, because it's a bit ridiculous to tell a grown woman what to wear on her feet- (I think that her laugh itself was infectious as well). I think I thought I was making a serious point and then I felt silly. That was funny. Are you interested in things I find funny on telly? I think in this aspect I like humorous things that are quite dark. And my taste alters at different times, for example I swear a bought a DVD of a film called 'Fargo' because the film had made me laugh a lot but when I put on the copy I'd bought, it was so violent and suspenseful that I couldn't watch it at all. I know I was by myself on this second occasion and I can't remember whose company I was in, first time around but I think this matters in terms of whether I laugh or not- and in this case whether something is watchable at all. You have asked whether I think I am someone who laughs a lot. Generally I don't think I do, Although I do have a kind of despairing giggle that I use a bit when I feel like I muck things up, particularly socially. I know its not much use saying this without giving you an example. If I can think of a sensible one then I'll e-mail you again tomorrow. I'm giving up, for now. Sent: June 15, 2010: Hallo- see, the mildest encouragement, and I'm rockin! To be honest I remember myself as a very serious child. I am 2nd of 7 children, very responsible, always thinking about what I was 'meant' to be doing. Happy memories but not carefree. I remember finding things like nonsense rhymes awful and unfunny and it was embarrassing to dislike it- I remember a teacher who used to read from horrible collections of these as a treat at the end of the day and this would make me say the childish equivalent of fuckin 'ell under my breath. Having said that, as an adult I am very fond of Edward Lear (even though the limericks are crap) but I am very sure I wouldn't have liked his pictures or poems as a child, even though they may have been made with children in mind. I don't think I had any concept of 'the absurd' as separate from something run-of -the -mill. If I had come across the poem about the dong with a luminous nose, I would have thought 'Why are you telling me this?' but nowadays I like the language and the bittersweet feeling of it. Some of the times I laugh these days, it is when normal domestic goings on, even arguments, become funny when you tell someone else about it. I met a friend this evening and she told me about going out to the pictures with her 15-year-old daughter. My friend described to me what she was wearing- brown cords, brown shirt, brown jumper and she had asked her daughter whether she looked ok. Her daughter replied, 'it's only yourself that you're embarrassing!' This wasn't delivered as a joke but Kal and me burst out laughing when she told me about it. I can see a lot of reasons why we would laugh- The fact that her daughter has become a young woman with her own views, is a pleasure in itself but unfettered cattiness is a by-product and this is becomes funnier if you take the edge off the insecurity that its meant to cause, by sharing it with an ally. It was another 'fuckin 'ell', but in a good way. I just

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spotted that I'm using a watered down comedy trick (high-octane swearing) to try to keep you interested in what has become a rather lengthy e-mail. Sorry about that! Sent: June 16 2010: Hi, I'm almost glad you're waiting on some other bugger. I'm usually last to do anything! In the last event, it was a pleasure to feel like I contributed something. Good luck with it all. I hope your sense of humour holds out. 17) Stella provided the following answers to my questions. Sent: June 21, 2010: I'm sorry that I took so much time to answer. I hope my responses help you further. I always laughed a lot, since I was a child. The fact that I laugh so often is a quality that many people recognize me by. I would say that I laugh every day about something. When I am not at work then I always find something to laugh about. Concrete examples are difficult to provide as most of what I find funny happens in the moment. Last week my boyfriend impersonated a cat that needed to cough up a hairball. I had to laugh. Laughter for me has a lot to do with stress release, or release in general. For example: after something funny has happened at work, and my co-workers and I have laughed about it, we are able to return to work, often with more concentration. I guess laughter for me also means a certain amount of freedom that is made possible through lowering one‘s guard. Barriers between people are dropped. Also, when things in life reach a point where you think that you can‘t carry on, it is laughter that makes it possible to keep going and to see things perhaps as they are and not as you have built them up to be in your head. When I find myself laughing I could be doing anything. What I‘m doing is often separate from what I find myself laughing about. It isn‘t necessarily connected. That is, unless I drop something on the floor for the thousandth time. (I laugh about) everything, I laugh when something spontaneous happens. It can‘t be planned. What I love is when someone impersonates a moment or a person, animal, etc. When someone tells me a story. When someone indirectly irritates me or someone else. Of course, I have to always laugh when someone falls down, even though I know it is not supposed to be funny. 18) Selina wrote the following rich answer: Sent: 26 June, 2010: Here are my answers for the laughter research, I’m sorry that I was not that fast I wanted to be but I hope you can still need them. My English is not that brilliant any more, but if you don’t understand my answers just give me a sign and then I try to explain it in another way or ask about the right translation. On a typical day I get up at seven o’clock take a shower and have a coffee and a cigarette. Then I go to work on my bike, which takes about half an hour. I work from 8 o clock in the morning till seven o clock in the evening. I work in an architectural office where I do some designs and a lot of work in detailing a building. I correspond with the men at the construction side about how we can realize the building. At the evening I go to yoga lesson or meet some friends (normally talking about several things or make some games). At this normal day I laugh a lot. I try to explain in which situations and why: Under the shower I smile about the jokes they make on radio or about songs I hear because they remind me of something in the past either good or bad situations which I left behind. On my way to work I smile about the people I see, I don’t laugh at them but I smile about the way they behave and I’m lucky about that we are all so different, in clothes behaviour, and that amuses me. At work I laugh about

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the “mistakes” I made if they are not very significant, in these moments I think: okay I have to learn a lot more in my life. Normally I see those mistakes when I talk with the manual workers, they say some things like: oh Madame who did you imagine to do this detail it just doesn’t work because of...then we joke about this and say okay we try it another way. In the cases I described it’s more a “silent smile”, but there are also many situations I start crying because I laugh so much, for example if a work mate makes a joke or tells something funny that’s happened to him. In such moments I can also have tears in my eyes because of laughing so much. Yes I am a person who laughs a lot. I always try to see the good things in everything and laughing helps me a lot by doing this. And by trying to see the good things I don’t mean that I don’t take things seriously but I try to take out the “weight” of many situations or feelings. I feel better on a day I laugh a lot than on a day on which I reached a lot but with much effort and without laughing. So you can say I “love laughing” it makes my days much more easier and lighter. During the last week I laughed a lot, I (will) try to explain why: at the office I have very nice work mates and we laughed about many things for example when one work mates imitates a German foot ballplayer who gives funny interviews in a strange dialect or we giggle about our boss. I laughed very much in the evenings when I met a friend of mine and he told me some funny stories what happened to him the last days. Today I laughed with a female friend of mine because of her husband hurting by doing some sports (not in a bad way!). He demonstrated being a strong man and he couldn’t say shit that was painful and so we giggled about him and where very content that we are only women who can say in such a situation that this was painful. And I am also very self ironic and can giggle about me when I do something wrong or when I recognize too late that I gave a silly answer (by writing this I giggle about myself because my English is so bad in the moment and I recognize this by writing this). I am an optimistic person and I think my face is beaming with joy (I hope this expression is right, it’s from the dictionary) most of the moments in my life, this is no laughter in the common way, but I think it’s important to know. I have a great sense of humour and I can laugh about others as well as about myself. If I couldn’t laugh anymore I think I would die. Even in times when my mood is very bad or in depressive moments in total despair, despite of this all I find things to laugh about. Laughing gives me hope and I feel like burning a flame of hope inside me in the moment I start laughing. It relaxes something in my mind and in my body and makes me believe that the things will get better soon. So it is like I said in the first part it takes the weight of things and puts them in a realistic light so that I can handle different difficult situations. In general I think I can say that I laugh more about daily situations and behaviour of normal people than about funny films. I never laughed for example about Mr. Bean or about a clown in the circus. The moments I cry when I laugh and tears run from my eyes are always daily situations when someone says something that was meant in one way but everyone understands something different in this moment. And this “someone” can also be me. 19) Lara was the only occupational therapist participant and it is noted that I do not know her. Sent: 07 June 2010: I would say that I laugh quite a lot and I try to find the funny side / positive in things but I'm not someone who always laughs out loud, sometimes I'll find something funny but just smile about it. I would say in the past week that I have laughed on

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average about 5 times a day, I generally laugh when I am with other people such as my work colleagues, friends, family or if I see/hear something amusing on the TV, radio or in the street. This last weekend I spent time with my 10-month-old niece so I laughed and smiled most of the weekend because she was! Her fun was very infectious. If I don't laugh and smile I feel very down and low in mood. I think you always need to look at the funny side of things to feel positive about life. Some days I wake up in a mood or I'm stressed about things and I don't laugh or smile very much which then has a negative impact on me and those around me I think, on these days I need to be around someone who is fun and infectious to make me relax. Generally I'll laugh at funny comments by people around me, or silly situations. I'll laugh anywhere if I find something funny although I'm aware of social situations and don't generally laugh inappropriately. Although I can see the humour in lots of situations I generally laugh at silly things, I've not got a very quick sense of humour so complicated jokes sometimes pass me by. I don't generally like jokes that make fun of sensitive situations or are very close to the bone, I like going to see stand up comedy and I find Russell Howard very funny. 20) Sasha was the final completing participant and the only person with young children. Sent July 5 2010: I would say I am someone who laughs a lot yes; as I have two children (5 month old baby + 3 year old) I find there are many opportunities to laugh throughout the day! My three year old in particular is hilarious and says some very funny things every day, which never fail to make me laugh. Yesterday over lunch we were talking about how it is very important that he eats his salmon, as then he will grow up big and strong like daddy. He thought for a minute the said "Yes and THEN I will be able to reach the bananas!" These are the sorts of things I find funny! I think laughter is very important and its all too easy to take things too seriously, it is especially too easy to take yourself too seriously and I think a person who is comfortable with laughing at themselves is much more enjoyable to be around. We laughed a lot over the weekend when we took the kids to a farm and Charlie had the opportunity to feed the lambs and goats with a bottle, they were sucking so hard on the teat that he was in fits of giggles which made us laugh too. Apart from the kids, I laugh with my partner when he does something funny (like falling over! is this mean laughter?!!) and he always has lots of funny stories about the people he works with. At my wok there is always a lot of laughter, as I have always found with care/residential homes, which is one of the reasons I enjoy working there so much. Another way we laugh is when watching TV in the evening, we watch stand up comedy and our favourites are Dara o Brien and Billy Connelly, its nice to have a good laugh before bed! Laughter affects my life by giving me a sense of wellbeing. It’s a way to bond with other people and brings you closer to your friends and work mates. People who you can laugh with are the best people to be around.

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Chapter 2: Background When the passion for humour started I was creating humour on an ad hoc basis in my

professional occupational therapy practice based on intuition and the belief that humour would

serve to enhance therapeutic relationships with service users and the outcome of intervention.

However, what I learned as I began to search the literature for my research project, was that

although humour and laughter have been a natural part of human life in all cultures as far back

as recorded history can determine, the conscious use of humour, as a therapeutic technique or

aid to wellbeing and good health is comparatively recent (Tooper, 1984). Healthcare

professionals have mainly been slow to adopt the ideas of researchers in the field due to their

professional and cultural attitudes toward humour including a lack of seriousness that it

constitutes a worthwhile and scientific subject. As more information on the potentially

positive benefits of humour and laughter is being disseminated in books and workshops,

previous myths regarding humour are beginning to be dispelled and attitudes are changing

(Tooper, 1984). I have tried to take the concept of humour, which is extremely complex and

make it user friendly.

The purpose of the background information was to critique what is known about humour,

including providing an evaluation of the quality of previous evidence. Likewise, I have used it

to illustrate how my research project fitted with what is not known about humour. For

instance, there is no comprehensive theory of humour, although many philosophers and

psychologists have tried to explain it, the problem is humour is contextual and people laugh in

situations that are so diverse, the only thing in common is the laughing (Morreall, 1983). This

has led to the belief that rather than adopt one theory that could cover all humour and laughter,

it is more useful to examine the details of humorous situations and categorize it accordingly

(Morreall, 1983). John Morreall is a philosopher, and professor of religious studies at William

and Mary College, Virginia, USA, and he has been studying humour for more than 25 years.

Morreall has written a number of books on humour including: Taking Laughter Seriously

(1983), Humour Works (1997) and more recently: Comic Relief: A Comprehensive

Philosophy of Humour (2009).

There is not sufficient enough information known about humour and how it is responsible for

laughter, other than laughter is triggered by different sensations and thoughts, and that it

39

activates many parts of the body (Provine, 1996). However, although not a great deal is known

about what triggers laughter, it is believed that people who have a propensity toward humour

and laugh, tend to be less serious and more pragmatic in their worldview compared with

people who are not humour aware and do not laugh (Funes, 2000). Marion Funes (2000) is

considered an authority on laughter and her creditability is based on her extensive experience

running laughter workshops and providing life management consultancy. Funes (2000) is a

cognitive psychologist who researched laughter as partial fulfilment for a degree of Doctor of

Philosophy: she gathered information from the individuals who attended her laughter

workshops and life management courses on whether laughing matters. Funes (2000) presented

her theory, Laughing Matters in a self-help book for people who would like to learn how to

have more laughter in their lives, based on the opinion that when people laugh they feel better.

It is easy to embrace the concepts put forward in Funes’ (2000) book because she is

suggesting that individuals use laughter as a tool or strategy for coping with life. This is

certainly what I have found to be true of the individuals who took part in my study who

readily embrace humour and believe that laughing serves to relieve stressful aspects in their

day-to-day living. Likewise, in my professional occupational therapy practice in the area of

mental health, I found that one of the most persuasive things that hindered people from living

the lives they wanted to live was taking life too seriously. Critically Funes’ (2000) statement

that laughter is good for us was difficult to verify and I can only assume that she based this

upon the previous studies that she referred to in her book (Fry 1992, Provine 1996, Goodheart

1994, Morreall 1983, Cousins 1979), as well as the information she gained from all the people

who attended her professional practice and workshops. However, Dunbar’s (et al. 2011)

recently published study does support Funes (2000) theory that laughter matters, as it showed

that a hearty laugh produces endorphins that lead to the good-feel factor. It also makes people

rethink about their attitude toward humour and laughter as a fundamental human response.

In my professional occupational therapy clinical practice, I found that the mental health

service users that I interviewed often presented with problems stemming from the discrepancy

between how they thought their life was going to be and the actual reality. This is linked to

humour when humour is viewed as a life management skill: a way of dealing with what we

have little or no control over. I found that within my practice, such as Funes (2000) did, that

humour was a useful tool to help individuals learn to identify all those points in everyday life

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where childhood reality comes to the surface and has a diverse effect on their adult life. In

other words, create humour to lighten a person’s state of mind or mood and help to frame

her/his negative thinking into something more positive. Part of my motivation for this study

derived from a strong desire to find out exactly what role humour might play in our lives.

Morreall (1983) maintains that humour promotes create thinking, mental flexibility, the ability

to cope with change, and it helps people get along with each other. These notions fit well with

the perspective of occupational therapy and quality of life concerns. For example, how service

users balance their daily occupations, and how occupational therapists might advocate that

service users create humour in their day-to-day living.

Professor Gaynor Sadlo, an occupational therapist and authority on occupational science

writes that creativity is associated with the spirit, in that humans create meaning in their lives

through doing and living, and this concept is similar to what Morreall (1983) maintains.

Humans have the potential to express or interpret experiences as well as possess a creative

energy that demands to be expressed (Sadlo, 2004). And Wilcock (1998) the founder of

occupational science ascertained that humans have a creative nature and to stifle that innate

ability is a denial of our true being as human. Human beings as a creative species where the

focus is on human beings’ occupational nature and the effects human activities have on health

and wellbeing was studied (Cameron, 1994). In relation to spirituality, Berk (2012b) told me

that humour is related to body, mind and spirit and the experience of laughter benefits

creativity. Occupational science and the application of occupational science concepts to

promote sustainable ways of living daily life, and shifting from occupational therapy towards

sustainable practice, was introduced under the domain of occupational science section below.

In particular the idea of creating humour in relation to form and meaning and understanding

volitional/impetuous/explicit/implicit humour.

Morreall (2009) provides a comprehensive overview of how humour is used today, in his

book: Comic Relief: A Comprehensive Philosophy of Humour, and he theorises that humour

can be more realistically explained when looking at the playful enjoyment of cognitive

humour expressed in laughter rather than the conventional superiority, incongruity and relief

theories. In his book, Morreall (2009) explored the benefits of humour, and he claims it is the

emotional disengagement that promotes rationality and mental flexibility, compared with

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comedy, which fosters a more critical and creative approach. A creative attitude serves people

better in the modern world: it makes people sensitive to the complexity of life; it enhances our

ability to deal with novelty and disorder, to see our lives in perspective, as well as it

challenges elitism, and sexism, states, Morreall (2009). He also examines the notion of some

intellectual and moral virtues being promoted by humour because it facilitates: open-

mindedness, divergent thinking, critical thinking, self-transcendence, honesty with oneself,

patience, tolerance, graciousness, humility, perseverance, and courage (Morreall, 2009). In

Humour Works, Morreall (1997) provides dozens of examples and anecdotes to explore the

connections between humour and creativity, teamwork, risk-taking, and effective

communication. Critically, Morreall (2009) does make a compelling argument, and he has a

mass appeal, but how he has arrived at his conclusions, seems to be more of a result of

anecdotal evidence than scientific research, because there would be far too many variables to

be able to correlate humour independently to so many attributes. However, Morreall’s (1983,

1987, 1997, 2009) extensive knowledge on humour makes his contribution very compelling.

There was not a great deal of background for occupational therapy and humour or laughter,

although I suspect that some occupational therapists are choosing to use humour within their

professional practice but on an ad hoc basis. The potential benefits of humour and having a

good laugh may be considered a valuable motivational tool for engagement in occupations but

in order for occupational therapists to embrace the idea of creating humour in their practice,

stronger evidence was needed. The occupational therapy studies have looked at humour from

the perspective of the therapist rather than the consumer (patient/client/service user, depending

on the healthcare setting). In the current climate of consumer led healthcare services it seems

only fitting that their perspective is considered, and if healthcare professionals are to advocate

humour they need to know first hand what it means to the consumers. Occupational therapy

and humour is not only an interestingly topic, it is valid and important; it is also a complex

area that according to the background needed to be studied further. This occupational therapy

and humour research study provides a meaningful understanding of what individuals feel

about humour and how they experience purposeful humour.

Theoretical underpinnings

A good chronological account of the traditional philosophical theories of humour and laughter

beginning with Plato (427-348 B.C.) and ending with Sigmund Freud (1856-1939) are

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presented in John Morreall’s (1987) book on the philosophy of laughter and humour, in which

Morreall presents his theories on the subject. I have provided an overview of the theoretical

underpinnings of humour and laughter according to the relevance to this study and the three

traditional theories: the superiority theory, incongruity theory and the relief theory. The

philosophical literature originated with Plato and laughing at others’ misfortune; these

misfortunes assert the person’s superiority on the background of the shortcomings of others

(Morreall, 1987, Provine, 2000). Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679) built upon Plato’s, and

Aristotle’s (384-322 B.C.) notion that humour is associated with superiority over others, and a

form of educated insolence (Morreall, 1987; Fumes, 2000; Provine, 2000). Naturally, as the

social norm for everyday human behaviour has slowly evolved, it is probably true to say that

today socially people adhere to a standard of (appropriate) humour, and that this differs

culturally. Because social pressure for humans to be kind, understanding and emphatic to

fellow human beings conflicts with the idea of the pleasure humour provides derived from

ridicule and degradation. Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860) a German who adopted a similar

cognitive stance to Immanuel Kant (1724-1804), which he further developed, was the idea that

humour rises out of inappropriateness. Laughing at the misfortunes or infirmities of others,

and at our own follies may not account for an important element in humour: incongruity.

Humour, according to the incongruity theories, emerges from finding the inappropriate within

the appropriate: the sudden mixing of contrasting attitudes that causes laughter (Morreall,

1987, Funes, 2000). Incongruity is often identified with frustrated expectation, a concept

developed by Kant, who proposed that laughter arises from the sudden transformation of a

strained expectation into nothing, suggesting laughter is a result of more than surprise but

rather emerges from the violent dissolution of an emotional attitude (Funes, 2000). Whereas,

Søren Kierkegaard (1813-1855) a Danish philosopher presented another version of the

incongruity theory of humour and analysed humour in terms of the comical, holding that the

primary element of something that is comical (in every stage of life) is contradiction and in

this respect he was interested in irony (Morreall, 1987). Kierkegaard saw a strong connection

between having a religious view of life and having a sense of humour and he wrote that the

humorous is present in Christianity and Christianity is a most humorous view of life (Morreall,

1987 p.83). Significantly, Kierkegaard’s psychological work explores the emotions and

feelings of individuals when faced with life choices and issues of how a person lives as a

single individual. Herbert Spencer (1820-1903) was an English philosopher, biologist and

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sociologist best known for the phrase, survival of the fittest, and he believed in the relief

theory. Because people’s bodies build up nervous energy and this requires releasing through

muscular movement, and laughter is the channel of release, Freud further developed the relief

theory, and it has influenced many contemporary psychologists (Morreall, 1987). Today,

while many humour and laughter experts and researchers believe that the superiority theory

explains much humour and laughter they resist the notion that it can explain all humour and

laughter. This has led to the belief that rather than adopt one theory that could cover all

humour and laughter, it is more useful to examine the details of humorous situations and

categorize it accordingly (Morreall, 1987).

What was actually learnt from the philosophers was that even intellectual-scholarly inquiry is

limited in scope because they did not tell us much about the behaviour of humour or laughter.

Early investigations did not find out how we find things humorous and what makes us laugh

or what it means to us mainly because there were few precedents about how to study humour

or laughter in everyday life. In order to understand humour it was necessary to start by asking

the laughing people questions, as they are the ultimate experts. Although, this can be

misleading because it was found that most laughter does not follow anything resembling a

joke, story telling, or other formal attempt at humour, and only 10 to 20 percent of pre-

laughter comments were estimated to be funny, (Provine, 2000). Although comments do not

necessary have to be funny for people to laugh; it usually takes one person to laugh and others

follow. People laugh more at humorous situations they can relate to (slapstick comedy where

they are not the person tripping over) and common, innocuous statements, such as: I try to

lead a normal life, or a typical (suggestive, ambiguous) question: Do you want one of mine?

Did you just fart? Or a humorous statement: You smell like you have had a good workout, and

a humorous (suggestive, and ambiguous meaning) question: Was that before or after I took my

clothes off?

The role of humour in psychotherapy

The role of humour in psychotherapy causes a great deal of discussion, not least because there

is not much empirical research. But the main concern or caution appears to be that humour

could be detrimental to some people’s treatment, such as person who is depressed, and

humour would not be appropriate. Some psychotherapists believe, and many other humour

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critics share this belief that treating a person with humour is simply not safe, valuable or a

necessary aid. However, advocates of humour in psychotherapy stress that humour can be a

means to address sensitive subjects, help provide insight, help defuse anger, and relate to the

client in a more intimate manner, and this enhances the therapeutic relationship and

intervention. Alessandra Lemma (2000) a psychotherapist challenges therapists to be more

courageous about introducing comic elements to the process of healing in her book: Humour

on the Couch: Exploring Humour in Psychotherapy and in Everyday Life. The primary aim of

Lemma’s book was to highlight humour’s communicative, relational and innovative value in

everyday life, and in the privileged space that is psychotherapy. Simply put, the experience of

psychotherapy is all too often a process tragically empty of comic relief and Lemma (2000)

explains why this may be and the way forward for a more optimistic future. It presents the

idea that a person’s basic instinct for humour in therapy can be validated and there may be

become a time when the psychology of humour is included in all psychological training.

However, although there is not a great amount of critical research about humour in

psychotherapy, the negative emotions of anger, fear and anxiety have been studied and it is

known that the quality of voice expression can change the mood of both the speaker and

listener in positive ways (Siegman and Snow, 1997). Humour could possibly be implicated in

the role of vocal expression, as Siegman and Snow (1997) demonstrated the psychological and

physiological effects of how people say something: their research targeted people with

cardiovascular risk factors, and they found that talking in a loud, rapid voice like an angry

person, increases the blood pressure, heart rate, and feelings of anger in the speaker, in

particular when emotional matters are being discussed. Whereas, when a person recalls anger-

provoking past events in a soft and slow voice this reduces his/her blood pressure, heart rate,

and feelings of anger; therefore if a person speaks softly and slowly s/he can modulate her/his

blood pressure, heart rate and anger in emotional situations (Siegman and Snow, 1997). The

relevance of a psychoanalytic theory is that it provides an understanding of human

development and behaviour, which underpins most other theories of counselling and therapy,

excluding behavioural therapy. Freud was the first person to explore systemically the

unconscious and his belief was that the unconscious realm (that which is readily available to

an individual’s awareness) is only the tip of the iceberg. The unconscious is considered the

system that stores all the memories, experiences and repressed material including needs,

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desires and feelings. Because needs, memories, experiences and feelings are not available to

the conscious mind they are therefore out of the individual’s control and yet they account for a

major part of human functioning. The unconscious is only available in symbolic form through

dreams, free association and unintended comments (Freudian slips of the tongue), and

psychoanalysis aims to increase control and choice by making the unconscious conscious

(Münsterberg, 2010). Hugo Münsterberg (1863-1916) was a German-American psychologist

and one of the pioneers in applied psychology; his book titled, Psychotherapy was first

published in 1923.

Humour, jokes and dreams

An interest in dreams and post-graduate Jungian training to become an Analytical

Psychologist meant learning about the psychology of dreams, and the discovery that Freud

likened jokes to dreams. He provides a sustained account of humour in his book Jokes and

Their Relation to the Unconscious, which was originally published in 1905 (Freud, 1963).

Essentially Freud (1963) maintained that laughter is an expression of inhibitions about

thoughts and feelings, and like dreams, jokes arise voluntarily and tend to be easily forgotten,

sharing a common origin in the unconscious. The critical difference is that jokes need to be

understood in order to be funny whereas dreams remain elusive. Although jokes are more than

they seem because even though a cigar is only ever a cigar, a joke is never only a joke (Freud,

1963). This statement is related to humour appreciation, which is unique to each individual

depending upon one’s age, culture, intellect and the circumstances (Silberman, 1987). It is also

related to a person’s philosophy: her/his view of the world, state of mind, superego, and

according to the moment. Likewise, not needing to be directly conscious of our own

superiority, it need not be a person who is derided it may be an idea, a political institution, or

anything that makes a claim to dignity or respect. Because according to superiority theories,

laughter originates from always looking down on something, so that it is judged inferior by

some standard (Funes, 2000). Freud (1963) viewed laughter, as a way in which to relieve an

accumulation of nervous energy (the relief theory), and he maintained that finding something

humorous is always pleasurable. Because jokes like dreams, have hidden benefits and both

permit us to access our unconscious source of pleasure (Provine, 2000). Theories of humour

were likewise, influenced by Henri Bergson (1859-1941), a twentieth century French

philosopher who did not take himself too seriously and wrote a very unfunny account of the

46

meaning of laughter (Bergson, 1924). Freud (1963) is central reading when it comes to

understanding jokes, and Bergson (1924) contributed the significant insight that all laughter is

inherently social because it looses its meaning and disappears outside the context of the group,

although critically he was overly optimistic and depended on anecdotal evidence. Morreall

(1983, 1987, 1997, 2009) challenged Bergson’s (1924) idea that all humour and laughter has a

social basis by noting that: if a person found a bowling ball in her/his refrigerator, the person

might find this incongruous situation funny, even though the ball is not a person. However, the

response to this notion is the person might be laughing at whoever (person) had put the ball in

the refrigerator rather than at the ball (object), and it is an example of incongruous humour.

Domain of occupational science

My study goes some way in discovering more about occupational form (what people do and

how they do it) and meaning (why they do it that way) of doing everyday occupations. It also

helps understanding about how people feel that humour affects their wellbeing, which

supports the existing literature on the physiological benefits of laughter, as a result of humour.

The concept of occupation and its application in occupational therapy is in understanding the

relationship between engagement in occupation and health (Yerxa et al., 1990). Occupational

scientists propose that humans are by nature occupational beings, and that if deprived of

opportunities to fulfil this need they will suffer from ill health, and unhappiness. Occupational

science is viewed as the systematic study of any aspect of the human as an occupational being

(Farnworth, 1998). By exploring in detail the ordinariness of people’s everyday experiences as

they engage in their daily life, answers can be found about the occupational nature of humans.

This is because the individual’s ability to interact (adapt and function) with her/his

environment, achieve a workable balance and take control of her/his own life can be used as

an indicator of wellness (Clark, 1979). This implies that through engagement in occupations, a

person becomes healthy, and wellness can be viewed as a set of conditions that enable a

person to achieve what s/he needs to achieve (Engelhardt, 1977). However, occupation alone

might not be therapeutic, (for example if people dislike what they are doing, or feel stressed

by having too much to do) therefore creating humour in day-to-day living, according to the

individuals participating in this study, make occupations more enjoyable, purposeful and

meaningful.

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Occupation can be viewed as the relationship between two things: occupational form and

occupational performance: the form is what people do, and how they do it; the function is the

effect it has on health and wellbeing; and the meaning given is the values and purpose of the

occupation (Nelson, 1988). Occupation includes all purposeful, everyday human activity, and

to engage in occupation is to take control (Wilcock, 2006). Daily pursuits are self-initiated,

goal-directed (purposeful), and socially constructed, humans do not instinctively move

through a predetermined itinerary of daily occupations (Yerxa et al., 1990). Rather,

individuals make conscious decisions about what they will and will not do. To fully

understand why people might create humour in their day-to-day activities, it was necessary to

comprehend the experience of engagement in it, the occupational function, which is the effect

of occupation, the function it has on wellbeing. However, occupation is a complex

phenomenon that is highly individualised, and the study of the person as the author of her/his

daily life was required (Yerxa et al., 1990).

Both Yerxa et al., (1990) and Wilcox, (2006) are renowned and trustworthy occupational

science sources. Knowledge of occupation must be augmented with understanding of

occupation drawn from research in occupational therapy and occupational science: the study

of how and why we do things, which is related to meaning, and therefore occupational

function is the effect on health (Crepeau et al., 2009). Especially, with regard to the value

occupational therapists have placed on the importance of engagement in occupation for the

maintenance of health (Wilcock, 2006). Being healthy is considered an outcome of

participation in occupations, and people are thought to be resourceful at structuring their

occupations to enhance their wellbeing, over a life span (Crepeau et al., 2009). This idea was

shared by most of the individuals who participated in my study who clearly articulated that

they structure their day to include humour, and without opportunities for humour they would

not feel good/well/have positive outcomes. Crepeau et al., (2009) have a chapter in Willard

and Spackman’s renowned Occupational Therapy textbook. Hocking (2000) developed a

framework of needed occupation research, which was published in the peer reviewed Journal

of Occupational Science, and advocated that the relationship of occupation to other

phenomena, such as humour, is studied.

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Brief history of humour research

Much of the literature about humour and laughter is still mired in its prescientific phase where

logic and anecdotes, not empirical data reign (Provine, 2000). Critical examination of

scientific research has left me slightly sceptical, in particular with regard to good science built

on rigor. However, Dunbar’s (et al., 2011) study represents good science: it is valid, and the

results can be generalised. Whereas, earlier literature on humour provides a lot of anecdotal

evidence or evidence with potentially salubrious outcomes, and the number of scientific

studies that have reliably shown that humour or laughter has a direct physiological and

psychology effect on the human body is small. Because the literature consists mainly of

theorizing rather than empirical data, this is quite likely the flaw that has impeded progress

(Provine, 2000). And according to Provine (2000) in contrast to the long tradition of

philosophical analysis, the history of empirically based humour and laughter science is not

more than 100 years old. In fact, humour and laughter research has occurred at irregular

intervals, and seems to have some connection with the emergence of experimental psychology

in the late nineteenth century. Provine (2000) asserts that when scientific method was applied

to studying mental life, incidental empirical reports were made, and these only served to

substantiate the already popular literature about humour and laughter.

During the 1970s and 1980s humour and laughter research increased and was undertaken

mainly by psychologists, but also anthropologists, philosophers, physiologists and nurses. The

International Society for Humour Studies (ISHS) was formed in 1970 as a scholarly and

professional organisation dedicated to the advancement of humour research. They are

interested in the role of humour in all facets of life, including health care and how humour

varies according to culture, age, gender, purpose, and context. ISHS publish a quarterly

journal: Humour: International Journal of Humour Research, and hold annual conferences.

John Morreall the founder of ISHS has some segments of his seminars posted on YouTube,

and he often starts with telling the audience: sometimes when I tell people that I do seminars

on humour in the workplace, they look as if I had said that I manufacture square wheels

(Morreall, 1997).

Research on humour and or laughter appears to have gained popularity in the 21st Century for

a number of factors, one being that historically humour research is cyclical. Another reason

49

being related to economics because in times of austerity, people tend to adapt their behaviour

and may adopt humour as a coping mechanism. The National Health Service (NHS) in the UK

has a large deficit and continues to make budgets cuts, which effect healthcare service

provision. Therefore, if service users can benefit from a short course or weekend workshop on

creating humour and/or laughter therapy compared with an 8-week stress management course

or psychotherapy sessions spanning over a two year period (or longer), the NHS will advocate

the most cost effective intervention, even though there is no practice based evidence or

research studies evaluating long term intervention outcomes. It is important to point out that most humour and laughter research neglects its occurrence in

everyday life, and studies have failed because they are too far removed from the phenomenal

world they seek to explain (Provine, 2000). In this respect, I found reviewing the literature

difficult because besides the difference in terminology used by each professional discipline,

the literature presented conflicting opinions: with researchers and healthcare professionals

maintaining on the one side that it is humour that matters versus the over side that laughter

matters or laughter is the best medicine. Whereas I am not entirely convinced that these two

different concepts can be separated; that any health benefits can be considered only as a result

of humour or laughter as presumably you need humour to produce laughter. Provine (2000)

aptly stated that the laughterless study of humour continues to the present day.

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Chapter 3: Research literature

Extensive research on humour and laughter apparently began when the New England Journal

of Medicine published an article by Norman Cousins in the seventies and this article became

the first chapter of his book, Anatomy of an Illness (Cousins, 1979). In it, Cousins (1979)

reasoned that if negative thoughts and attitudes can result in illness, positive thoughts and

attitudes might have the opposite effect. Cousins (1979) is often quoted as being the first to

say that laughter is the best medicine (Fry, 1992; Holden, 1993) because he himself refused

conventional medicine but made a remarkable recovery from collagen vascular disease. In

terms of methodology and critiquing the evidence, Cousins (1979) studied himself so it is

unclear how his results could be generalised although his experiences have a holistic appeal

and have contributed to research on humour and laughter. Likewise, there is a prevailing

conviction among the scientific community that most studies on the benefits of humour and

laughter could not be said to constitute compelling medical evidence, although a whole

industry has grown up around the notion that laughter is not only enjoyable but also actively

good for you (Carr and Greeves, 2007). To be more specific, older studies tend to be known

for the enthusiasm of the researchers than for their rigor, they were conducted in laboratories,

often the researcher was the subject, and they did not seek to answer: who, what, when and

where as suggested by the laughing people. However, a recent study (Dunbar, 2011) that is

discussed below and in the literature summary (chapter 1) appears to reveal that laughter is the

best medicine because people feel less pain after a good laugh, as the physical act of laughing

may cause the body to release chemicals that act as a natural painkiller.

There have been various methods used to study laughter: Cousins (1979) used a case study, in

which he studied himself and he measured his progress according to the level of his pain (one

10-minute interlude of laughter gave him two hours of painless sleep) before and after

discharging himself from hospital and beginning his own daily treatment of laughter, which

involved watching funny films and television programmes in his hotel room; Fry (1971, 1988,

1992) conducted his quantitative research in the psychology department at Stanford University

where he measured and compared different physiological responses, such as blood pressure

before, during and after participants watched funny or sombre films, and Holden (1993)

collected his data from questionnaires completed by the individuals who participated in his

happiness workshops. More recently, Dunbar (2011) conduced experimental laboratory and

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one field based experiment in which volunteers were divided into two groups and one group

watched comedy videos and the control group watched videos with material deemed boring,

such as golfing programmes, and the level of pain threshold was measured before and after for

the two groups.

A number of researchers from different disciplines have explored the role that laughter plays

in the wellbeing of our body and mind (Fry, 1971; Cousins, 1979; Berk, 1996, 2012; Holden,

1993; Seligman, 2003). However, because the effects of laughter have primarily been studied

by measuring the physical response before and after watching a funny film and laughter is

notoriously difficult to evoke in laboratory situations. For example, Lee Berk a psycho-

neuroimmunologist, at Loma Linda University, California conducted an experimental study

that measured interferon-gamma (IFN: an immunoregulator active in fighting viruses) before

(baseline), during (intervention: the video) and after (recovery) a small sample of ten healthy

male (college students) watched a funny 60-minute video. Berk’s (1996) data suggests a

connection between his participants’ emotional state and stress tolerance. The connection or

result of watching the funny film was the group participants had higher levels of IFN after

compared with before. More recently Berk (2009) presented the results of a similar study, to

assess the health benefits of humour and laughter, in which he showed 14 volunteers 20-

minute clips from humorous television programmes, such as Saturday Night Life, measuring

their blood pressure and cholesterol levels before and afterwards. During the study both the

systolic blood pressure and cholesterol levels fell. Whereas, watching sombre scenes from the

film, Saving Private Ryan had so such effect.

Berk (2009) uses the phrase “laughtercise” because he believes that the physiological benefits

of 20-minutes of laughter are equivalent to a moderate 20-minute workout. Limitations of

these studies (Berk, 1996, 2009) include the difficulty of attempting to isolate and study one

positive emotional response, because the results highlight more unresolved issues, and the

need to understand, further the complex bio-behavioural relationship between different types

of laughter and clinical significance. In other words, the headline: laughter reduces blood

pressure, is more appealing compared to: the onset of laughter has been found to have a

significant impact on blood pressure, however the cessation of laughter is followed by a brief

decrease in pressure to varying levels slightly below the pre-laughter baseline (Miller and Fry,

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2009). Berk (2012a) maintains that what happens when you laugh causes changes to the body

similar to what happens when we exercise, and he explained to me that he first noticed this

when he was working with cancer patients who were bed ridden and could not physically

exercise, and he found that providing them with opportunities to laugh, at least 15 minutes

daily provided benefits very similar to physical exercise. Berk (2012) also found that

“humour/laughter can modify your perception” and give a person hope, for example the

cancer patients who practiced laughter exercises developed hope before the cancer treatment

and this was because they had expectations that they would survive and anticipation that they

would benefit from intervention being provided. There are psychological and cognitive

benefits from humour/laughter and these have been found to include: increasing the ability to

cope with stress, the relationship with creativity, improved memory and problem solving

(Berk, 2012a). “Humour and the resultant laughter is more than a cognitive process” (Berk,

2012b). He (Berk, 2012a) stresses that we look at the science because laughter is beneficial for

our health; he advocates passionately that laughter is good medicine; two direct quotes from

his lecture: “laugh for the health of it” and people need to “utilize laughter, it is free and the

benefits are real”. In meeting with Dr. Lee Berk (2012b) I was able to able to validate some of

the information that he has obtained through his research studies at Loma Linda University

that are not published, in particular that a person is not able to experience sadness, be

depressed in the moment of experiencing humour: laughing or smiling because the two states

cannot coexist as (simply) the signal between brain and body and good stress (eustress) is

related to humans innate ability to laugh: “being born to laugh, and born to create laugh

because babies are programmed to laugh and can laugh before speaking”. He (Berk, 2012b)

emphasizes that human beings are taught to be serious and that this begins often when children

begin school and receive messages that life is serious and not to be silly or clown around.

Laughing reduces cortisol and cortisol is known as the stress hormone (“good stress”) because

it activates cortisol secretion, which is released during stress (“negative stress hormones”);

more specifically it is a glucocorticoid, produced by the adrenal gland. Laughter is contagious

and can be understood in relation to “mirror imaging”: when we laugh, “endorphins are

released and this is likened to an emotional switchboard”. “Laughter is good medicine; we are

ready made to laugh, and nature provides us with humour to use” states, Berk (2012a).

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In comparison, Robert Provine, a professor of psychology and neuroscience, has conducted

observational studies that have produced insights into the phenomenon of laughter and have

led to several theories (or view points) on laughter developed directly from field research in a

number of different social situations (Provine, 1996). Provine (2000) stated that he conducted

his research in the spirit of an anthropological field study because he studied laughter as it

occurred. For example, observing everyday laughter in natural settings (shopping malls,

classrooms, sidewalks, offices and cocktail parties) has provided an opportunity to appreciate

the social nature of laughter, the relationship between laughter and speech, gender differences,

and the contagious aspect of laughter (Provine, 1996). A salient concept is that laughter is

viewed as being universally used by people as a preverbal means of communication; and even

the most seemingly trivial (laughing) matters can mask profound truths; this includes the

exploration of instances in which people appear to laugh their way into and out of social

situations (Provine, 2000). It may be the case that laughter is a universal language, although it

is complex and the findings from Provine’s (1996) studies, may say more about his

interpretation of its use, in particular in social situations. I am being overly critical because

although it is significant that Provine (1996) conducted an observational study, over a long

period of time, with many people being observed, it could have been beneficial to have

approached a number of the observed individuals and to have asked them if they would like to

participate in a follow-up study in which they could have been interview about why they find

things humorous or doing things deliberately to make themselves or others laugh. This could

have been a mixed quantitative and/or qualitative study (questionnaire and/or interviews)

asking the participants directly about their social (laughter) behaviour. However, I would

ascertain that Robert Provine, a neuroscientist studying behaviour is the world’s most credible

scientific expert on laughter. His approach to laughter was inspired by ethological studies,

whether the focus is on laughter instead of its correlates, applications, or theoretical

implications (Provine, 2000). He readily accepts that good science is simplification: who,

what, when, and where suggested by laughing people (Provine, 2000).

Provine’s study (1996) is significant because it was carried out over a ten-year period and it

document over 2,000 cases of naturally occurring laughter, in which Provine and several of his

undergraduate students went to local malls and city sidewalks and recorded what happened

just before people laughed, to find out when and why people laugh. Provine (1996) then

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decided that laughter is not about humour; it is about relationships between people because

most laughter does not follow jokes; rather people laugh after a variety of statements they

unconsciously find funny. Provine (1996) also noted that laughter seldom interrupts the

sentence structure of speech. Instead he felt that laughter punctuates speech because the

people he observed only laughed during pauses when they could have coughed or breathed.

He also concluded from these studies that people tend not to laugh when they are alone;

therefore laughter is social and contagious because we laugh at the sound of laughter, and

when we laugh, we send a message to other people (Provine, 1996). However what I know

from my own behaviour and have found out from two of the women who participated in my

study is that some people do laugh out a loud when they are alone. Individuals can find things

humorous when alone, for example watching television sitcoms or comedy programmes/films,

listening to the radio when driving the car or when reading a book while travelling on public

transport. Arguable this could be construed as social constructed laughter, although this area

needs to be explored more deeply because just as the reasons for laughter have evolved so has

the ability of human beings to find things funny without social bonding benefits been adapted

from surviving in groups to a more solitary life. And although, these studies were

observational and conducted in the spirit of a anthropological field study (not experimental or

conducted in laboratory situations), Provine (1996) did not ask the people directly what they

thought about their experience of humour or laughter, he interpreted why he thought they

laughed by observing laughter where it occurred.

Another salient point is that there are thousands of languages and hundreds of thousands of

dialects, but Provine (1996) would argue that everyone speaks laughter in pretty much the

same way. I have to trust that Provine (1996) is correct when he states that all language groups

laugh ‘ha-ha-ha’ because there is a pattern generator in our brain that produces this sound:

each ‘ha’ is about one-fifteenth of a second, repeated every one-fifth of a second. Likewise, he

believes that everyone has the ability to laugh; babies (in an observational study) have the

ability to laugh before they speak, and children who are born blind and deaf have the ability to

laugh. Provine (1996) argues that laughter is a primitive, unconscious vocalization; and if you

laugh more than others it is probably genetic because his research indicates that some aspects

of readiness to laugh and even preference in humour are inherited. His research (Provine,

2000) observing various primates (humans, gorillas, orang-utans) noted the similarity in forms

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of laughter, and suggested that laughter derives from a common origin among primate species,

which has subsequently evolved in each species. Provine (1996, 2000) was the only person I

had found who had studied and written about the evolutionary nature of laughter.

Until, Panksepp, a psychology professor at the University of Ohio and Burgdorf, a biomedical

engineering professor at Northwestern University in Illinois studied rats that laughed when

they tickled them (2010). Panksepp and Burgdorf (2010) made a very controversial and

provocative claim that rats laugh. Laughter is deeply social, a joy; it is positive engagement

with life, is the conclusion from experiments with rats, which were video-taped to show how

the rats kept returning to the hands of the researcher again and again to be tickled (Panksepp

and Burgdorf, 2010). The researchers tickled rats during the most playful juvenile period of

their development (older rats sometimes resisted tickling), then studied the ultrasonic chirping

the rats produced in response. When analyzed, these vocalizations, occurring during playful

rough-and-tumble bouts, suggested analogies to human laughter. The similar positive

emotional response evident in humans and rats suggests a shared brain anatomy and similar

neurochemistry, which, in turn, suggests new ways to investigate the ancient origin of human

laughter. The study that was published in the peer reviewed American Journal of Play found

that laughter or a positive emotional response (the phrase used on their research grant

application in order to get funding) in rats produces an insulin-like growth-factor chemical that

acts as an antidepressant and anxiety reducer, and they think the same chemical production

probably occurs in humans (Panksepp and Burgdorf, 2010). I believe that it is beyond my

remit as an occupational therapist and researcher to be able to say how creditable this study is,

although it may have changed the way some researchers and scholars consider animal

feelings, human nature, and the field of play, unfortunately it personifies the problem that

laughter research is not taken seriously. For example, Cousins (1979) late in his life modulated

his laugh-you-way-to-health statement by noting that humour should be considered a

metaphor for the entire range of natural state (positive) emotions. What I mean specifically by:

research is not taken seriously I have explained in the following paragraph regarding

physiology laughter studies.

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The physiology of humour and laughter

The most effective tactic for convincing individuals that humour and/or laughter matters is

when they are provided with an overview of the physical benefits of humour and laughing

(Berk, 1996, 2009; Miller and Fry, 2009; Davidson et al. 2010). This statement is often

presented today as a convincing argument that humour and laughter are important for our

health but the reality is, not all experts agree about the health benefits of humour and laughter,

and at best remain sceptical of the scientific evidence presented. Why? Because when

critiquing the methodology of past experimental studies (Fry 1971; Fry and Savin, 1988;

Salameh et al., 2001) for the health benefits of humour and of laughter I found that they were

all conducted in the laboratory, often only with an opportunistic sample of healthy college

students that were usually male not female (although this has changed over the years as the

numbers of females attending college and university has increased and more females will

participate in health related studies), and that any significance found was too small to be

significant. The researchers appeared to be biased: going into the study wanting to prove that

laughter has benefits, whereas, the problem with humour and with laughter research is, it is

very hard to distinguish cause and effect.

For example, Fry’s (1988) quantitative research (an experimental study that hypothesized that

there would be a significant correlation between positive emotions (laughter) and released

chemicals) conducted in a laboratory setting suggests (and only suggests) that laughter

improves our immunity, reduces hormones and chemicals (cortisol and adrenaline) produced

by stress, and releases dopamine and endorphins, our feel good chemicals. Blood and urine

were tested for a hormone called cortisol, which is secreted by the adrenal gland during times

of stress to sharpen the mind and body. Engagement in activities can dissipate the developing

tension that leads to stress. It is suggested that laughter lowers blood pressure and 30 minutes

of laughter per day reduces the risk of a second heart attack (Fry, 1992). Fry’s experiments

showed that there was a significant decrease in pressure after laughing for 10 minutes for the

individuals who participated in this study. The following older studies that I have quoted tend

to be known, but none-the-less presented as scientific evidence in articles today on the benefits

of laughter, more for the enthusiasm of the researchers than for their rigor. Laughter is

reported as being responsible for burning calories, as it is a workout for the diaphragm, back

and tummy, and 50 laughs are meant to be equivalent to 15 minutes riding a bicycle or 10

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minutes on a rowing machine (Salameh et al., 2001). This study was similar to the series of

experimental studies initiated and conducted by William Fry where he used himself as the

subject. Laughter is meant to improve your sleep, increase concentration, memory,

confidence, and motivation when compared with results before and after experiencing laughter

(Fry, 1971). I would add that these findings are highly subjective and therefore not reliable

because laughter can also have the opposite affect. Adults are reported to laugh or smile 17

times a day on average, compared with four-year-olds who are meant to laugh or smile

approximately 400 times a day (Fry, 1992). This may well be true, but it is worth pointing out

that much of the research has involved adult participants/students attending University. It has

been recommended that people laugh 50 times a day to stay healthy (Fry, 1971). Because I

could not find all of the original studies, I have used secondary citations; in particular Fry and

Miller’s (2009) study, which includes a review of Fry’s earlier studies (1971, 1988, 1992) and

acknowledges that whereas there may be a potential link between laughter and physiological

health benefits, at this time, even after decades of research there are more questions than

answers, and further research is needed.

Interestingly, the latest study to be published on the topic of laughter as good medicine

appears to lend credibility to the previous studies that I have critiqued because it comes from a

group of international researchers at the University of Oxford. They believe, as Provine (1996,

2000) has already stated, that the ability to belly laugh was unique to early humans as it

enabled our ancestors to form much larger tribal groupings than the ape-like species that lived

alongside them. The Oxford University researchers’ first tested the pain thresholds of

volunteers. They were then split into two groups, with one being shown 15 minutes of comedy

videos, while the other was shown material the researchers deemed boring such as golfing

programmes. The researchers found that those subjects that had recently experienced belly

laughs were able to withstand up to 10% more pain than they had done before watching the

videos. To their surprise, the scientists also found that the other group was less able to bear

pain after watching 15 minutes of the boring programmes (Dunbar, 2011).

The type of laughter was also important. Tittering and giggling did not elicit any physiological

effect; only a good guffaw did the job. Professor Robin Dunbar of Oxford University, who led

the research, believes that uncontrollable laughter releases chemicals called endorphins into

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the body which, as well as generating mild euphoria, also dull pain. Other apes can laugh, but

only humans can guffaw, as it is the emptying of the lungs that causes this effect, and Dunbar

(2011) reported, that it is exactly what happens when we say: I laughed until it hurt.

However, not all comedy programmes are able to produce the same results: slapstick humour

(such as Mr Bean) and situation comedies like Friends were particularly successful and scored

highly compared with clever stand-up comedy routines, though found to be enjoyable, had no

effect on raising pain thresholds, and it is pain that produces the endorphin effect (Dunbar,

2011). The endorphin levels were not measured directly because that would have involved

extracting fluid from the participants’ spines using a long needle, a process that would likely

influence the results, instead, the researchers took what they referred to as a proxy

measurement, which tested the pain threshold for each volunteer (Dunbar, 2011). This

involved, for example, placing a bag of ice on their arms to see how long they could withstand

it. The greater the increase in pain threshold, the greater the amount of endorphins produced.

The aim of Dunbar's (2011) study was not to develop a new treatment but to explore the role

of laughter in the establishment of human societies two million years ago. All apes are capable

of laughter, but it is only humans that are able to belly laugh and so release endorphins, and

Dunbar's (2011) theory is that as well as dulling pain; endorphins also make people more

susceptible to developing bonds. Dunbar (2011) was interested in learning more about

laughter because he felt that there must be a reason why people spent such a great deal of their

time in conversations trying to elicit laughter and laughing themselves, and his study shows

that this is in part because people get endorphin activation.

Dunbar plans to continue with his research and in the next stage explore whether laughing

really allows groups to bond together and work as a group better and act more generously

towards each other. And this is exactly what the participants in my study have said, that they

believe creating humour or deliberately doing things differently with humour helps them bond

better with their work colleagues and get better outcomes. Dunbar (2011) believes that this

may explain why some two million years ago, the first humans were able to form large tribal

communities of up to 100 people, whereas other apes and ape-like creatures that existed at the

time were only able to form communities of up to about 50. This theory creates the scenario of

our ancestors sharing laughter around the fire, possibly the emergence of the first comedians

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or clowns, clubbing each other for comic effect, which relates to slapstick humour and people

finding it funny when others’ trip and fall over (humour at the expense of others).

Humour and laughter as therapy

The best-known exponent of humour and laughter therapy is undoubtedly Dr Patch Adams,

who established the Gesundheit Institute in Washington, D.C., with the aim of “bringing fun,

friendship, and the joy of service back into health care” (Adams and Mylander, 1998). If

anyone could be described as Adams’ alter ego in the United Kingdom (UK) it is Robert

Holden who heads up the Oxford-based Happiness Project (Holden, 2007). Holden, a British

trained psychologist and psychotherapist, launched the UK’s first laughter clinics in 1991 with

funding from the National Health Service (NHS). When demand began to outstrip supply he

set up the Happiness Project in 1995. The Happiness Project pioneered a model of self-

development using the synthesis of positive psychology. It is delivered in workshops that

appear to target people who are motivated to achieve greater happiness and success in their

life, work and relationships, and have the means to pay for the happiness project seminars.

Holden is considered Britain’s foremost expert on happiness, and is well known for his work

in the field of positive psychology and wellbeing.

Positive psychology

Psychology traditionally focuses on the study of illness and neurotic behaviour and it reflects a

tendency in our society to concentrate on negatives. In fact, if a person is problem free,

psychologists tend to conclude that their symptoms are very well suppressed, rather than that

they are happy (Holden, 2007). It was Holden’s concern that a large body of thought within

the psychology profession believed that happiness is a dysfunctional behaviour, as it is an

avoidance of real issues, a selfish coping strategy, or a superficial form of escape (Holden,

2007 p.10), that led him to study happiness. Holden (2007) has been able to collect data from

a large sample of the population including clients and health care professionals through the

happiness workshops he developed. However, he acknowledges that fellow psychologists

believe that happiness cannot be studied directly because it cannot be measured as easily as

fear and pain (Holden, 2007). It is unclear exactly why laughter cannot be measured as easily

as fear and pain, but this sentiment may refer more to the poverty of measurements of

laughter. There are non-standardised measurements of laughter, for example a 5-point

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happiness scale used by researchers funded by the National Institutes of Health in America.

The researchers followed more than 1,700 women and men for ten years and rated their

happiness levels on this 5-point scale they had developed for the purpose of the study. They

found that happier people are significantly less likely to develop heart problems because on

the happiness measurement scale every extra point of happiness correlated with a 22% lower

chance of heart problems (Davidson et al., 2010). Overall this study (Davidson et al., 2010) is

important because it illustrates that happiness can be measured relatively objectively in studies

of emotions. Although the link between happiness and heart disease and the actual effect

demonstrated in this study (Davidson et al., 2010) was quite small, compared with traditional

risk factors, such as smoking, blood pressure and bad cholesterol.

Similar to Holden’s (1993, 2007) theories of the positive aspect of the use of laughter, Dr

Annette Goodheart, a psychotherapist, is considered a pioneer in the reality and healing

dimension of laughter, because she claims to help people realise the benefits by coaching them

to laugh when there really is not anything to laugh about (Goodheart, 1994). Goodheart (1994)

explains that her goal is to empower individuals to become “laughter independent” because

laughter is a skill that can be learned. She uses case studies (arising from her professional

health care experience with clients) to make a convincing argument for dispelling three myths:

(1) that people need a reason to laugh; (2) that people laugh because they are not happy; and

(3) that a sense of humour is the same thing as laughter. She has written a self-help book that

explains how laughter can be misunderstood, as well as often discouraged socially due to

cultural norms and prejudices, and to provide guidance that enables people to use laughter

daily to maintain and improve health and happiness (Goodheart, 1994). Importantly (or not)

Goodheart’s (1994) theory is based on the premise that people do not need to wait to be happy

in order to laugh because even when there is seemingly nothing to laugh about, we should

laugh anyhow and there will be a noticeable positive effect. In conclusion, it was my aim to

embark on an open-minded enquiry because I questioned some of the existing research

evidence on humour and laughter, and I believed that it was necessary to simply ask people

what the lived experience of humour means to them.

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Chapter 4: Methodology My position and role as a researcher

This is discussed in relation to my theoretical stance, and my role as a researcher within the

research setting, the resulting potential effects on the research process, and any ethical and

practical issues arising as a result of this. For example, I collected my information using

interviews by electronic mail (email) therefore my discussion also concerns using the Internet,

and what that means in relation to my research and my role as a researcher.

My ontology and position with relation to my research question lies within the interpretivist

paradigm because I believe that we create our own realities through interpreting our

experience, and that knowledge is therefore subjective. The meaning that other individuals

give to events and behaviour fascinates me, and this is what motivated me to research peoples’

experience of humour. My reasoning is inductive, from the particular to the general, although

my understanding of any topic requires both inductive and deductive reasoning in order to

complement the different stages of my knowledge development. And in this way, I

acknowledge that there are contradictions and biases in my reasoning.

Professionally, as an occupational therapist I have a person-centred philosophy and I value

human occupation believing that an individual’s occupational performance is integral to health

and quality of life (Yerxa, 1990). Viewing people as individuals is central to the philosophy of

occupational therapy (Wilcock, 2006). My expertise lies in the ability to listen and to ask

individuals the right questions to effectively problem solve. Therefore, by finding out what has

happened, what is happening, and what needs to happen I can best support the individual. My

role in relation to my research question is about making sense of the lived experience of

others. By asking people how and why they might create humour in their day-to-day living, I

could interpret their responses to see if they deliberately do things differently, and if they

believe that it enhances their sense of wellbeing. In this way I could find out if and how

humour has influenced human actions. I was also interested in how people define themselves

in respect to humour and the world around them, but this was too big a question and beyond

the remit of this study.

As a researcher, I situate myself with qualitative perspectives, which include constructivism,

feminism and interpretivism. Constructivism suggests that each individual constructs her or

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his own reality or perception (Lincoln and Guba, 1985). I believe that the truth only exists in

the eye of the beholder, and people generate knowledge and meaning from their experiences.

Through my clinical practice and academic education I have become aware that I may uncover

the underlying assumptions guiding my work and adapt my practice accordingly but my

interpretations profoundly influence my understanding of the truths and values that underlie

my perceptions. Also I believe it is essential not to underestimate the importance of

continually evaluating ones’ knowledge base, and this involves creative, lateral thinking where

the capacity to generate original thought or at least the ability to integrate new knowledge,

feelings or attitudes with previous knowledge is key. My aim was to seek individuals’

experiences about humour through a logical process by breaking this process down into a

series of steps, such as an occupational therapist might analyse an activity and break into

down into a series of small achievable steps.

I would argue that although it is possible to set biases aside, I do need to acknowledge that

bias can equate to pre-understanding and pre-knowledge. For example, I brought selected

knowledge about humour to my research from my awareness and use of humour personally

and in my professional practice, as well as the information I have since learned from

researching the literature and existing evidence. I undertook a qualitative study; therefore I

had a substantial role in the research process, as I was personally involved in every step taken.

Qualitative studies assume that the researcher is an integral part of the research process. That

was why it was necessary for me to consider and provide an overview of my personal and

professional assumptions prior to collecting the data. For example, I came to this research for

a reason because I am enthusiastic about humour, and I was aware that I was likely biased

towards a favourable outcome. Therefore, I needed to be extremely cautious about not asking

leading questions and to ensure that I took account only of the answers given. This also

included being careful not to make exaggerated statements when interpreting the data, such as

when I wrote that one participant’s response was incredibly powerful, and this is hyperbole

and not suitable for a research paper.

Likewise, I documented my decisions and actions as a researcher from initiation through to

study completion. I have used my research (reflective) journal to document decisions and

choices, and this provides a record of the research process and serves as an audit trail. This

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means that the systematic process of my study can be evaluated. I aimed to provide accounts

that were as close as possible to what the respondents said (in their email interviews), and

being able to read as much detail as possible at a later date served to help the process. This

was of particular importance, where the context of the respondent’s email reply lay outside my

own personal and professional clinical experience. In this way, my role and position as a

researcher emerged and developed as I have gained more knowledge: firstly with completing

the collection of data via a series of e-interviews, secondly when I began the process of

analysing the data, and thirdly the writing of my doctorate thesis.

Ethical and practical issues

I collected my data from interviews conducted by email and partly because of this I decided to

pilot my study. A pilot study is always a good idea regardless of which research method is

used. It may seem that the pilot study is a time-consuming step but I believed in the long term,

it would expedite the actual implementation phase of the research study. I understood that

pilot studies are not considered necessary for a qualitative study. However because I was

conducting the interviews via email I decided that a pilot study would ensure that I could work

through any practical management issues, such as the time needed for participants to write

email replies and the clarity of the research questions presented within the emails, as well as

the ease of opening Word documents and filling in the consent form. Therefore I would use

the pilot study to address the needs with regard to collecting information from the emails, and

acknowledged that pilot studies are not advocated for qualitative research because the

researcher self-monitors and refines data collection throughout the process (Smith, 1996).

Likewise, that I am an experienced healthcare professional with years of experience

interviewing service users, so I felt confident in using a non-directive approach, similar to the

principles of interpretative phenomenology. However, because I had decided upon collecting

my data via emails as an e-project I wanted to be sure that I was confident in using this

approach. For example, one of the two known individuals who participated in my pilot study,

works as a graphics designer and has expertise with Internet Technology. She was able to

make practical suggestions regarding the downloading of the documents (Participation

information letter and Consent form) and saving files that allowed the process to be easier for

the participants. I also learned during the pilot study that it was not easy to answer my main

research question without providing example/prompt questions that I developed as the result

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of this. As a health care/occupational therapy researcher, email provided me with an exciting

and relatively new method for collecting data but it also raised a number of moral and ethical

issues, which I could address during the pilot study. Participant confidentiality is paramount

and a variety of complex issues can arise during email research that can make the application

of traditional ethical standards, such as consent, identity and confidentiality, difficult.

I needed to be computer literate and make Internet Technology (IT) expertise an integral part

of my researcher role. Maximising my technical knowledge of computing meant that the

process was as secure as possible. Using email enabled me to conduct my research with

people over an extended period and at a time and pace that suited the participants, irrespective

of geography. In this respect, it also enabled me to include people who otherwise would not

have been able to participate.

My role as a researcher included making sure that people who considered taking part were

very clear about what this would entail because confidentiality can be a particular issue for

those using computers outside the home, where mail may be automatically scanned. I would,

however, add that the majority of people, who use email regularly, are aware of the risks and

now view those risks as part of everyday computer life and recognise that it is up to them to

use it morally and responsibly. The people I studied do not belong to any particular group, so I

did not need to identify participants of a specific kind, but I did need to be able to have a

degree of trust in what they told me. I had decided that in my role as an email-based

researcher, and using an interpretative phenomenology method that I applied to the data

(Kralik, 2005), I would accept what I was told, especially as I believed that it was unlikely that

people will be untruthful when talking about the subject of humour. Critically, through life

experience, and reflection in my professional practice I have come to believe that there is only

one kind of narrative where the accuracy of what has been described cannot be questioned,

and that is fiction. And what I mean by this statement is, all narrative is fiction because it is

subjective. I acknowledged at the start, as a researcher using email to collect my data, that I

was on a learning curve, and that it was my responsibility to keep updated and informed about

techniques and any advances in Internet technology.

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The methodology needed to answer the questions and the method needed to fit the

methodology. I was looking at a social phenomenon, and my ontological position, as

described above is my worldview, and epistemological position is in relation to my research

question. Methodology is the study of methods and the methods are the tools that need to

relate to how I believe I can use them and how I believe knowledge exists.

The research question is key to the research design. Having selected my research question, I

knew that I wanted my research to describe, interpret and help explain the phenomenon of

humour by exploring it. This is because there has been little research into the subject, and very

little from the perspective of health care, and this led me to decide on an appropriate

methodology or overall research strategy that takes into account my theoretical perspective. I

believe that my chosen method arose from a combination of my research question and my

theoretical perspective/worldview because I am not convinced that it is really possible to

separate the two. My research question concerns experience and this fits with a

phenomenological approach, however I did consider using a mixed methodology in order to

compare two different interventions. I felt that a mixed methodology research approach might

be politically motivated because it could provide the National Health Service with numbers

about which intervention was more effective, measured by the length of time it took to see a

result, but this did not sit comfortably with my professional perspective as an occupational

therapist, and client-centred practitioner. This is not because a comparison between two

interventions cannot sit with client-centredness, rather that it may mean that service users no

longer have a choice of interventions because one is deemed more cost effective than the

other.

Deciding on a phenomenological method

Conducting semi-structured interviews was an appropriate method for answering my research

question and involved a collaborative relationship, where the study participant was viewed as

the expert with the opportunity to make decisions and choices that could determine the

direction and outcome of the research. The interviews enabled individuals’ to tell their

experience of humour and this provided a rich source of data that accounted for both their

troubles and their good fortunes. Although I was very mindful that an interview produces a

particular moment-in-time of an individual’s experience but by analysing individual

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experiences I have discovered new aspects of the topic of humour and peoples’ relationship

with it, including that which goes beyond my preconceptions.

A methodology for occupational therapy research

Clarke (2009) presents a valid opinion on the usefulness of Interpretative Phenomenology

Analysis (IPA) as a methodology for occupational therapy research that helps the therapist

develop understanding. She makes a convincing argument for using IPA because the approach

makes it possible for occupational therapists to develop a deeper understanding of the

experience of service users that in turn may facilitate reflection on current practice and lead to

changes that enhance service provision (Clarke, 2009). Situated within the interpretivist

paradigm, IPA enabled me to gather information not readily available in the more positivist

approaches, and this fitted with my occupational therapy values and seeing the uniqueness of

individuals and what their experiences can offer collectively.

Justification for a qualitative research methodology

From a pragmatic position, a research methodology based on interpreting experiences and

designed to help inform research practice comfortably fitted because if people want to

improve their quality of life they need a way in which to make sense of their lives (Silverman,

2006). Pragmatism is the philosophy of considering practical consequences, and the term

comes from the Greek word for action from which the English words practice and practical are

derived (James, 1988). I refer to pragmatism because realities or everyday instances influence

our actions and that influence determines how we apply meaning to what we think, and do.

The whole function of my research was to find out what (if any) difference humour has made

to individuals at definite instances in their lives, and in this sense it is a pragmatic position.

There is a school of thought that holds that pragmatism can be used as a philosophical

framework for occupational therapy practice and knowledge because the core assumptions,

principles, and values of occupational therapy are conceptually consistent with the philosophy

of pragmatism (Nkiugu, 2004). For example, beliefs are made true by verification, with the

emphasis on the value of experience.

The strength of a qualitative research methodology was its ability to access directly what

happens in the world, for example to examine what people actually do in their lives

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(Silverman, 2006). Qualitative research allowed for a connection between my researcher

thinking and the concerns and experiences of the people who participated. Qualitative

interviewing was useful for accessing an individual’s attitudes and values that cannot

necessarily be accommodated in a questionnaire, and seemed to have provided a better access

to views, understandings, experiences and opinions, including achieving a level of depth and

complexity not available to alternative approaches (Silverman, 2006).

My approach was practical rather than theoretical, as there was the potential to help people

discover how to act to change things positively in their lives (Snyder, 2002). In this way,

humour is a concern for occupational therapists because it is relevant to society as a whole,

and an interpretative approach using depth versus breadth, which focuses on the detail,

brought me closer to everyday situations to explore how something occurs in social life. This

was based on the assumption that a lived experience can move us or cause us to think

differently about a phenomenon, for example what it is like and what does it mean when

people experience humour in their day-to-day living.

Interpretative Phenomenological Approach

I decided to use an interpretative phenomenological approach to analyse my findings because

it can provide a credible and transparent method for summarising and interpreting the data

(Lincoln and Guba, 1985). Interpretative Phenomenology Analysis (IPA) has emerged from

health psychology as a methodology appropriate for exploring in-depth individual experience

in order to ascribe meaning to a specific phenomenon (Smith, 1996). Phenomenology is an

inductive, descriptive methodology developed from phenomenological philosophy for the

purpose of describing experiences as they are lived by individuals (Silverman, 2006).

In support of my decision to use the IPA method, I reviewed a number of relevant articles, in

particular an article exploring the meanings of occupation for women with chronic illness that

compared two approaches to analysing qualitative data: the template approach and the IPA

(Reynolds, 2003). The research project examined the two approaches in order to gain a better

understanding of the phenomenology of occupation and illness, and to help inform

professional practice. Both approaches are fundamentally associated with a particular

epistemology or theory of knowledge, and the interpretative style of analysis fits a

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constructionist philosophy because the researcher approaches the interview data from the

perspective that both interviewee and interviewer construct it together (Reynolds, 2003). The

relevance of Reynolds’ (2003) research is that it presents clearly how to choose an approach

best suited to gaining the information the study is seeking to understand. The IPA is

considered to be responsive to the participant’s view of the world, and to adopt, as reasonably

as possible, an insider’s perspective (Smith et al., 2009), and this approach fitted with my

philosophical stance.

Rigour of qualitative research

Reynolds (2003) wanted to succeed in uncovering and interpreting meaning in a robust and

systematic way for the individuals who volunteered to be interviewed in his study, in

particular because he was a novice to qualitative work having previously conducted only

quantitative research. The researcher needs to make a decision about whether the words of the

respondents should be interpreted as conveying an enduring personal reality, or whether they

are better regarded as constructed in the moment-by-moment occasion (of being interviewed)

to create a particular identity or desired image for the researcher (Crossley, 2000). Also the

researcher needs to consider whether to regard the text as an authentic representation of the

person’s subjective state of mind or as objectively factual (Reynolds, 2003). From my client-

centred perspective I regarded the participants’ accounts as a genuine attempt to convey what

they have experienced. I acknowledged that my beliefs would have been projected onto the

participants’ meanings, as when I analysed the interview data it would have been influenced

by my biography (academic background, life experience and personal values), so I needed to

be mindful of this. I therefore, decided to validate the participants’ accounts by a criterion of

usefulness, plausibility and acceptability (for example, Reissman, 2008). The IPA accepts that

as a researcher I brought my philosophy to the process of analysis but the end result reflects

both the participant and researcher’s point of view (Smith, 1996).

Summary of my selected methodology

Qualitative research aims to induce information about the individual’s experience by

interpreting and describing her/his reality in order to understand the phenomenon from

multiple perspectives (Creswell, 1998). Qualitative research assumes a constructionist view,

where there is no absolute reality but a series of individual realities that aim to provide insight

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into unique subjective perspectives of the world (Reissman, 2008). Because it adopts a post-

modernist stance where information is analysed using a global view with a basic set of beliefs

to guide the researcher, I found it appealing and a fit to my philosophy and research question.

When I reflected on using IPA, after data analysis was completed for all of the 20 participants,

I found that it was completely purposeful for my research project in exploring lived

experiences. IPA was employed to explore a social phenomenon in order to attach meaning to

what the participants said about their experience of humour in day-to-day living. The aim was

to make sense of how humour appears to the participants.

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Chapter 5: Procedure My research study was managed using an interpretative phenomenological design (Finlay,

1999; Smith, 1999; Smith and Osborn, 2003) to explore the experience of humour. I carried

out semi-structured, email interviews (e-interviews), using open-ended questions, as this

provided the best way for each participant to describe her/his experience of humour. I was

completely clear about what I wanted to ask because I: (1) answered the research questions

first, using reflective practice: and (2) piloted the questions with two participants that i)

ensured that the questions were effective in determining what they aimed to find out, and ii)

ascertained the time that it would take to answer the questions in e-interviews and this

included working through any technical computer issues, such as ease of downloading files.

Research question: What are the lived experiences of humour in day-to-day living?

Research title: Experiences of humour in day-to-day living

My research study title morphed from my original working title: Do adults incorporate

laughter into their everyday lives and what they do, and is this important to them? I was

concerned that this title was more a consequence of my methodology, and I changed it to: The

lived experience of laughter and everyday activities, then I contemplated: The role of laughter

in everyday lives. However I realised during my ongoing literature search and while gaining

my Research Plan Approval that humour and laughter, albeit two different concepts have a

cause and effect relationship and that I wanted to explore humour because some people do not

laugh but do find things humorous. Consequently, I developed a title compatible with my

research and interview questions: Experiences of humour in day-to-day living.

Details of the research methods

This research describes, interprets and helps explain the lived experience of humour in day-to-

day living. A qualitative, phenomenological study of the lived experiences of humour fitted

well with a constructivist stance that knowledge is gained by constructing meaning

collaboratively to make sense of individual experience (Reid et al. 2005). Because

Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) has an idiographic focus, it is an appropriate

methodology for occupational therapy research. A number of critiqued articles found that

using IPA is considered suitable for occupational therapists to develop a deeper understanding

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of the experience of individuals that in turn may facilitate reflection on current practice and

lead to changes that enhance service provision (Clarke, 2009). In this study, IPA was able to

provide participant insights, and help develop understanding of their experience of humour.

Situated within the interpretive paradigm, IPA enabled the researcher (me) to gather

information not readily available in the more positivist approaches, and it was compatible with

occupational therapy values and seeing the uniqueness of individuals and what their

experiences can offer collectively.

Ethical considerations

The ethics of conducting this study were carefully considered before collecting any data.

Because the Internet was used to recruit the participants and e-interviews to collect the

research data, the ethical considerations were developed using an email-based researcher

checklist provided in an email-based health study for this purpose (Kralik, 2005). The

proposed method of data collection is considered relatively safe for the interviewee and

interviewer (Mann & Stewart, 2000). The participants were offered the opportunity to set up a

new email account and contact the researcher through a pseudonym. However, each

participant’s email was cut and pasted into a Word document without her/his name or email

address on it, and a reference number was ascribed.

My Research Plan Approval (RPA) was (1) written, submitted and approved by the thesis

panel of the Clinical Research Centre for Health Professions, University of Brighton

(Appendix 5). (2) The Faculty of Research Ethics and Governance Committee (FREGC),

University of Brighton granted ethical approval for my written and submitted ethics approval

application. The following considerations applied during data collection:

• Participants were informed, through a Participant Information Sheet, about the nature

of the study before they agreed to take part. They were required to sign a Consent

Form before the interviews began. They confirmed on the Consent Form that they

were over 18 years of age.

• There were no risk factors because the participants were being interviewed by email,

and the researcher ensured that the questions were not of a sensitive nature.

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• The vulnerability of the participants was considered, and the researcher was aware of

any adverse issues for the participants that might have arisen during the email

interviews, and she was prepared to ask them if they wished to continue in such an

eventuality. This was achieved by the researcher discussing any concerns with her

supervisors, and being advised about what to do; including suggesting to participants

that if distressed they could seek support, for example from their General Practitioner

or therapist.

• Participants had the right to withdraw from the study at any time without giving a

reason.

• If participants withdraw but their data had been analysed, the researcher disaggregated

the data, as each participant’s data was numbered and kept in an own Word document

file.

• The identity of participants was not disclosed in the recording of any of the

information. Pseudonyms were used.

• A summary of the findings was made available to each participant and sent as an email

attachment. There were no group email/block of email addresses used. Emails were

sent individually to each participant to ensure privacy and anonymity of all the

participants.

• All interview emails were deleted and the transcripts kept by the researcher on one

computer in a Word document file that was password protected, and to which only the

author had access. On completion of the study this file was deleted/destroyed.

Reflexivity made explicit

To ensure transparency of the research process the researcher kept an ongoing research log

and a reflexive journal. These document all the stages of the research process, including the

researcher’s reflections. In particular, awareness of the researcher’s contribution to the

construction of meanings throughout the research process, and acknowledgement of the

researcher’s assumptions and beliefs prior to the data being collected, and how this has

influenced and informed the research has been explored and documented fully. This was to

ensure trustworthiness of the process and the data.

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Participants and Methods

Access and sample

The targeted sample were adults who had access to (and knew how to use) the Internet and

had an electronic mail (email) address. The inclusion/exclusion criteria was female and male

adults, who were 18 years of age and older, had Internet access and an email address, were not

known to the researcher, and had the ability to write in comprehensive English.

Email as a method of data collection

In the age of mass media and global interactive communication, electronic mail is an

acceptable form of communication commonly used privately, professionally, and in academia.

Email has elements of both oral language and written language (Ong, 2002). The justification

for using email as a method of data collection in my study included the following: (1) it is

global and offers the potential to provide a global understanding of humour, (2) it is (textually)

innovative, (3) it is an acceptable qualitative research approach, (4) it is appropriate for the

topic of this research, (5) it can provide access to a larger sample than a more conventional

method, (6) it has an advantage because collecting data via email provides participants with

anonymity and accessibility of on-line communication, which is in keeping with the (busy)

lives of everyday people, and (7) it can reach a broader population culturally and

geographically (Jones 1999; Mann and Stewart 2000). Using email enabled the research to be

conducted over an extended period, and at a time and pace suited to the participants,

irrespective of geography. In this respect, this study was able to include people who otherwise

would not have been able to participate.

Participants and recruitment

The participants were 14 female and 6 male adults recruited from the Internet. They were all

recruited using a snowball sampling approach whereby an email was sent to 40 email

addresses (known to the researcher but excluded family members and any one under 18 years

of age) because 40 was a deemed the number that statistically could provide a sample suitable

for this study (Schonlau, 1998; Cronin-Davis et al., 2009). The original data source was from

the researcher’s private email directory. The original recipient could forward the email to any

adult they liked. Their choice was not guided by the researcher, however it was clearly stated

in the instruction email to the original recipient/known group that they could only forward to

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people 18 years of age and older. The recipients were asked to forward the researcher’s email

to approximately one to five people who were not known to the researcher in order to create a

snowball sampling effect (Jones, 1999). A range of people was sought; they did not need to be

people who worked in a particular field. The rationale was to ensure a wide range of common

people had the opportunity to participate. It is usual to use this type of sampling in qualitative

research where a (snowball) sample self selects by responding (to the forwarded email), and it

was originally devised for conducting research surveys via email (Schonlau, 1998).

Sample email to known group

Hello, I/Helen am forwarding this email to you because I would like to conduct research on humour and I am looking for adult (18 years of age and older) participants. I am studying for a Professional Doctorate in Occupational Therapy, and the Research Ethics & Governance Committee at Brighton University has approved my research proposal. The purpose of my research is to find out about the lived experience of humour. I will be asking questions by email interviews and I anticipate that there will be 2-4 emails in total and that each email will not need to take longer than 30 minutes to answer/write. If you think you are interested in learning more about my research on humour, please email

me at: @yahoo.com and I will send you a Participant Information Sheet.

Sample of an email forwarded from known person Hello, Helen a colleague of my sister is doing her doctorate and her research thesis is on humour. I have been asked to forward her email on to some of my colleagues. If you are interested in participating let me know and if so I will pass on your email address to Helen.

If I don't hear from you I will assume you are not interested.

Thanks, Alicia (pseudonym)

The method of sampling selection:

It was anticipated that 15 to 25 individuals would respond to the research email, and all of

those (1-25) who responded and met the inclusion criteria would be invited to participate in

the proposed research study. The respondents (1) received the Participation Information Letter

(Appendix 1) as a Portable Document Format (PDF) email attachment. When the researcher

received a reply email to say they would like to participate, the participants’ (2) received the

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Consent Form (Appendix 2) as a Word Document email attachment. The participants’

downloaded the Consent Form and added their name and email address (instead of signature),

and returned it to the researcher by email as a PDF document that could not be altered.

Target number for recruitment

The target number of the first one to twenty-five respondents to give participant consent was

to ensure sufficient depth and breadth of data for analysis. A study that had reviewed the

number of participants used in previous IPA studies, determined that IPA study sample sizes

vary from, 15 to 42 (Cronin-Davis et al., 2009). Therefore the decision was made that when 25

people had consented to participate in this study the researcher will stop recruiting, and this

was based on the following list of reasons. This number was realistic in terms of: 1) the

number generated using a snowball sampling approach (emails sent to 40 known people who

forwarded the email to unknown persons), 2) being representative of a sample size suitable for

an IPA study, 3) some participants did consent but did not complete the research questions,

and were withdrawn from the study, and 4) the time scale for completing the key stages of the

professional doctorate in occupational therapy was reflected in the number of e-interviews that

could be reasonably conducted within the time frame, including accounting for the time

required to transcribe and analysis the data. The final number of participants who completed

this research study was 20.

The number of emails sent and responses

The researcher sent 40 emails to known people and this generated 29 email addresses for

people not known to the researcher but interested in participating in the study. Out of the 40

emails sent to known people, it was 6 known people who provided access to the 20

participants who completed the study. The group of 6 known people live in five different

countries, on four different continents: United Kingdom, and Germany, Europe; USA, North

America; Malawi, Africa; and New Zealand, Australia/Oceania. The Participant Information

Sheet was sent as a Word document email attachment to all of the 29 unknown potential

participants as individual (no block email addresses) emails. A total of 19 respondents

completed consent forms (signed with their email address) and these were received within a

one-month period of recruitment. Follow-up emails were sent to 6 people (out of the original

29 respondents) who had stated emphatically that they would like to participate in the study,

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and 2 further people came as a result of one of the participants forwarding the research study

email to his colleagues. At the two-month period of recruitment I had a total of 26 signed

consent forms, and this included 2 consent forms from the pilot participants. 15 participants

completed the series of e-interviews responding to each email within a two-week period. 9 of

the consented 26 participants received a reminder email after two weeks, and another email

after 4 weeks from the initial email, after which time if they had not contacted me, their

consent forms and email addresses were deleted and no further contact was made. It took 12

months to collect all of the data because I collected further data during follow-up e-interviews.

3 participants out of the 20 did not respond to the follow-up questions however their initial

data has been included in this study because they completed all of the research questions.

The first participant to consent to participant was not the first person to answer the initial

research question because she revealed (during follow-up questions when asked if she would

like to add anything) that she had found the initial research question too difficult to answer.

Because of this and that the first person to answer the initial research question did not provide

much detail, all initial emails included a list of five guide questions and asked for as much

detail as they would like to share. This helped in the subsequent responses and generated more

detailed answers. A total of 20 participants (not including the 2 pilot participants) completed

the study of which 14 were female and 6 were male. These 20 participants were recruited as a

result of 6 people known to the researcher.

The following shows the occupations of the 6 known people and where they recruited people

from: (1) Occupational Therapy Assistant: 7 from New Zealand; (2) Occupational Therapist: 3

from the UK; (3) Assistant Special Needs Teacher: 1 from the UK; (4) Primary School Speech

and Language Assistant: 2 from the UK and 3 from USA; (5) Assistant Accountant: 2 from

Malawi; and (6) Graphic and Web Designer: 2 from Germany.

Pilot study

Because the data was collected from interviews carried out by email, this study was piloted to

work through any issues (such as the practical management of time spent writing emails, and

the research questions being presented within an email interview format) that need to be

addressed with regard to collecting information from the Internet. Pilot studies are not usually

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advocated as necessary for qualitative research because the researcher self-monitors and

refines data collection throughout the process (Smith, 1996). In this study, the researcher is an

experienced healthcare professional with years of experience interviewing service users,

therefore she felt confident in using a semi-structured interview approach, but because the data

was to be collected via emails, a pilot study was used. Two individuals participated in the pilot

study and they provided very practical suggestions that have helped to make the proposed

study user friendly. (1) That older Word document 1994-2004 version was used for people to

be able to easily download and save the documents (Participation Information Letter and

Consent Form), and (2) it facilitated the inclusion of sample questions with the initial research

question to make it easier for the participants to answer the research questions presented in the

e-interviews. The initial research questions were the same for all of the participants and started

with some general questions about humour before they were asked if they deliberately try to

bring humour into their lives.

Sample participant research questions:

Do you consider yourself to have a good sense of humour? Would you say that you appreciate

humour?

Would you say that you were a person who likes to bring humour into your life? Please can

you explain?

Would you say that you were a person who likes to create humour? Please can you explain?

Please can you tell me how you might create humour in your day? Please can you give some

examples?

What were the circumstances when you created humour in your day or found something

humorous?

Would you say that creating humour in your day is helpful? Please can you explain?

What were you doing at the time you created humour? Please can you give examples?

How does it make you feel when you create humour in your day? Please can you explain?

Is there anything else that you would like to add about humour that I have not asked?

The pilot study addressed a number of issues raised by the method of collecting data via email.

Participant confidentiality was paramount and a variety of issues can arise during email

research that can make the application of traditional ethical standards, such as consent, identity

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and confidentiality, difficult, and these issues were addressed within the ethical

considerations. Computer literacy and making Internet Technology (IT) expertise an integral

part of the researcher role was a necessity, and I maximised my IT knowledge, to make the

data collection and storing of data as secure as possible.

Data collection

This study addressed the issue of authenticity of replies and of online research conversations

and how identities around humour are experienced and expressed by validating the replies at

each stage. After the first e-interview reply the researcher validated the information provided

by the participant with the participant, and so forth. When the interview process was complete,

all of the participant’s e-interview responses were put together in Word documents and

validated separately with each participant before the data was analysed collectively. This was

achieved by (1) reading through each e-interview as they were received and responding

accordingly: (i) asking further, follow-up questions, and (ii) clarifying this information, and

(2) providing each participant with a summary of what they had said for clarification. A

degree of trust was required and established for the participants’ responses; email-based

research, and using IPA meant that the statements were validated (member checked); and

when the research was written up, verbatim extracts from the e-interviews were provided.

Therefore, the interview descriptions have been shared with the individuals who provided

them to make sure that they were comfortable with what I wrote. Although, in some cases I

have shorted the quotes from the e-interviews in order to ease the burden of the reader but not

loose the insider perspective.

Demographic data

The decision to obtain demographic participant data was carefully considered. Demographic

factors such as age, gender, profession, educational background, and geographic location may

play a part or influence how and why individuals experience humour. Demographic data

meant that it was possible to recognize the importance and significance of occupations for the

individual seen in perspectives of age, gender, society and culture. It was also advantageous to

have demographic data because it has substantiated this research study. Similar to collecting

demographic data in an occupational therapy initial interview, each participant was asked to

provide: age, gender, profession or former profession and educational background, and

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approximate location (South of England or Holland). However, participants were made aware

that they did not need to provide answers to any or all of the demographic data questions as a

criterion of being able to participate in this study.

Sample of demographic data email sent to participants

Hello, Please can you provide me with some additional information about you?

Please colour highlight or mark in Bold the group or answer that best fits you:

1. Age group: 18-24, 25-34, 35-44, 45-54, 55-64, 65+

2. Gender: female or male

3.Race/Ethnicity: Asian, Hispanic or Latino/a, White or Caucasian, Black or African

American, Other; please describe:

4. What is your highest level of education? High School, Associates/2-year degree, College/4-

year/Bachelor’s degree, Master's, PhD/Professional Degree

5.What is your geographical (County/State & Country) location?

Please be reassured that you do not need to answer any of these questions to be able to

participant in my research study.

The following is a table of the participants’ demographic data generated by the questions.

Pseudonym Age group Gender Race Education Location

Maureen 45-54 Female White High School USA

Gaby 45-54 Female White High School UK

Roger 45-54 Male European 4 year Degree New Zealand

Nikaz 18-24 Female White BA Degree New Zealand

Gloria 18-24 Female White/Maori 2 year Associate’s New Zealand

Lydia 35-44 Female White 4year Degree New Zealand

George Not known Male Not known Not known USA

Kikiki 25-34 Male Black 2 year Associate’s Malawi

Jewel 18-24 Female White High School USA

Stuart 45-54 Male White 2 year Associate’s New Zealand

Pat 45-54 Female White Master’s degree UK

Burt 45-54 Male White BA Degree New Zealand

Alicia 35-44 Female White 4 year Degree New Zealand

Vince 25-34 Male Black African 2 year Associate’s Malawi

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Sadie 35-44 Female White High School UK

Claudia 45-54 Female White 2 year Associate’s UK

Stella 35-44 Female White/German Prof. Degree Germany

Selina 35-44 Female White Master’s degree Germany

Lara 25-34 Female White Master’s degree UK

Sasha 18-24 Female White BSc Degree UK

Table 1: Demographic data of participants

Follow-up participant interviews

The decision to use follow-up interviews to gain more data was carefully considered, and it

was decided that it would be advantageous to gather additional data for this research study. (1)

Using emails as a method of data collection allowed the chance of asking similar or the same

questions a second time to clarify answers, and to establish if the participants had more to add

by returning to the research questions, and asking further questions as a consequent of the

original responses. In this way, e-interviews are interactive and provided an opportunity to

gather more information than in a face-to-face interview because as time passed the

participants’ reflected, and added to their original answers in their email thread. (2) Follow-up

interviews proved useful in gaining more data (after the initial data had been collected and

interpreted) and one of the consenting participants (who creates humour in her day-to-day

living and finds it very helpful) asked if she could be further interviewed by telephone, as she

believed that she could add more to my study.

Computer mediated communication (CMC) interview techniques (e-mail and

Skype/telephone) have become common to use within the field of qualitative research.

Information is electronically transferred from sender to recipient, both in synchronous (real

time) and in asynchronous (independent from time and place). The rationale for conducting a

follow-up telephone interview in addition to the e-interviews was that it could enable the

researcher to revisit and re-interview the participant over the course of one year from her

initial e-interviews. The telephone interview allowed (me) the researcher to pinpoint the

participant in real time and the participant’s response was more spontaneous, without an

extended reflection, as there was no significant time delay between question and answer.

Whereas the e-interviews are characterized as asynchronous communication in time and place,

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both techniques share common principles, and proved equally useful for carrying out

interviews in this qualitative research, including complimenting each other.

Data Analysis

The results were analysed using the guidelines for Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis

(IPA) a qualitative research method (Smith, 1996). Participant e-interviews were read a

number of times to find the recurrent themes in the narrative accounts, and particular attention

was given to the interviewees’ views before the themes were grouped into broader

interpretative themes (Smith et al., 2009). In this way the IPA was able to uncover recurring,

prevalent themes also themes that were not transparent, and this meant that I could account for

a diversity of themes (Finlay, 1999). The justifications for using IPA was that it is responsive

to the participant’s view of the world, it accepts that the participants are their own experts, and

it provided a credible method for interpreting the data. In the process of shaping the e-

interviews, drafts were sent to the respective interviewees for member checking and anything

that they did not wish to see in print, including suggestions on how the contents could be

altered (added to or changed), was respected.

Then the e-interview texts were sifted through systematically following the IPA stages (listed

below), exploring, identifying, coding (colours were initially used to highlight commonly used

words, for example all wellbeing related words in red: wellbeing) and the subthemes and main

themes were clustered together. From an occupational therapist perspective, this meant

interpretations associated with occupational therapy practice and knowledge, and occupational

science concepts. Mindful of the assumptions that influence interpretations, my thinking was

articulated in a research log and reflexive journal during the transformation of the e-interview

texts, in order to document the decisions and choices that were made, and provide a record of

the research process that could serve as an audit trail (Riesmann, 2008). When writing up the

research, the generated themes were written as, (1) individual descriptions, and (2) collectively

to provide an overall content description to demonstrate the analysis, the interpretation and

provide verbatim examples from the participants' e-interview responses. The use of verbatim

extracts is a key component of IPA, leaving the analysis open to evaluation and validation by

readers (Smith and Osborn, 2003).

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Summary of IPA Stages

1) In the initial stage the e-interview texts were read and reread; observations and further

questions regarding clarification were noted, and reflection was written in order to become

very familiar with the texts.

2) In stage 2 I began identifying and labelling of the themes that characterised the e-interview

responses.

3) The analysis was structured by: listing the themes identified in stage 2, and considering the

relationships between them. The information was then clustered and the objective during this

stage was to clarify overall themes.

4) A summary table was produced and used to refer back and forth to the initial raw data to

check the themes identified and clustered in stage 3. The most prevalent themes were chosen.

5) Finally with the themes chosen, writing up the analysis began: (i) a content description for

each participant was written, and (ii) each individual description was compared collectively

and an overall description of the data, including verbatim examples from the e-interview texts,

was written.

Relationship between data collection and data analysis

From the standpoint of an occupational therapist, there needed to be a commitment to an

occupational perspective of individuals, and in order for this commitment to be taken seriously

the relationship between humour, occupation and wellbeing had to be explored. Therefore, it

was important to find a research methodology consistent with the values and underpinnings of

occupational therapy. IPA data collection is congruent with occupational therapy because it

enables research participants to tell their own stories and allows that the professional capacity

of interpretation can determine the choice of methodology (Cronin-Davis et al., 2009). Equally

important is a methodology that acknowledges the researcher's influence within the research

process and that has a similar philosophy to the person-centred nature of occupational therapy

(Clarke, 2009). The IPA was consistent with the values and principles of occupational therapy

and it proved an appropriate approach to answer the research question, as it allowed me to

ascribe meaning to the exploration about individual experience.

As suggested by Smith and Osborn (2003) collecting data by semi-structured interviews is

considered one of the best methods of data collection. To explain the relationship between the

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data collection and data analysis is to understand that fundamental to IPA is the dynamic

(active and ongoing) process, and the analytical role of the researcher (Smith and Osborn,

2003). This means the researcher needs to collaborate with the participants in order to identify

and interpret relevant meaning in an attempt to make sense of their view of humour. This

collaboration between researcher and participant mirrors a fundamental concept of

occupational therapy practice (Clarke, 2009). Paramount is that the researcher: an

occupational therapist can use her own theoretical underpinnings: occupational science (that

adopts a broad conceptualization of occupation that incorporates everything people do to

contribute socially and economically to their communities, look after themselves, and enjoy

life), to make interpretations: using knowledge from occupational science to analyse the

concept of occupational form and changing form to do things differently that is to do with

humour.

The decision when to stop data collection

The decision when to stop data collection needed to be a result of the collaborative data

collection and data analysis process between researcher and participants. In order for the

research to reach a definitive point, the data collection (research interviews) needed to be

rigorous (validated at each step and made explicitly clear), and come close to the aims of the

study as the number of iterations increases. This included asking the participants if they have

anything to add, and meticulously following the IPA stages. The advantage of using a

qualitative method such as IPA was that it facilitated in-depth exploration that led to rich data.

Although, there were some limitations: it reduced the ability to generalise the outcomes; the

small number of participants may not be representative of the wider population; and larger

sample sizes would have involved time-consuming analysis limited by the key time lines for

this piece of research. IPA was iterative, was suitable for occupational therapy research, and

the study came to a valid conclusion, as the study aims were achieved and the research

question answered.

Interviewing

In order to write my interview schedule I considered the overall area to be covered in the

interviews:

(1) What were my main and broad ranges of concern?

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(2) In what sequence the topics should be listed with regard to the most logical order?

(3) What were the most appropriate questions in relation to each area, including possible

probes and prompts?

My questions aimed to encourage as much ‘talk’ in the e-interviews as possible, with the least

amount of prompting. The questions were neutral, devoid of jargon or professional language. I

informed the participant of my interest in humour and that I was interested to hear what s/he

had to say. I took care not to ask closed questions, those requiring a yes or no answer.

The collection of my research data was guided by the interview schedule. I carried out my e-

interviews via a series of three-to-five electronic mails (emails). This meant each participant

answered questions in three-to-five emails. The number of emails depended on the answers

and detail provided by the respondents and any further questions that were generated as a

result of the initial question/s. An advantage of collecting data via email interviews is

anonymity and accessibility of on-line communication. A disadvantage of an email data

collection method is the absence of the non-verbal cues present in face-to-face interviews,

although there is an increasing acceptance in qualitative data collection via the Internet (Jones,

1999; Mann and Stewart, 2000; Kralik, 2005). Likewise, I acknowledged that this form of

interviewing by email or email-based research reduced some of my control over the process.

To reiterate, I addressed the issues of authenticity of replies, and how the interviewees’

expressed their experience of humour, by validating the email replies at each stage. For

example, after the first email interview reply I validated the information provided by the

participant with the participant, and so forth. When the interview process was complete, all of

the participant’s interview responses were put together into one document, and I validated this

with each participant before the interview data was analysed collectively. I acknowledged at

the outset that I could not guarantee authenticity of replies, but that this would be the same for

face-to-face interviews.

My rationale for using interviews was it is a particularly useful tool to understand individual

experiences (of humour) and it enabled me the opportunity to explore the participant’s

viewpoint. The end result of the interviews is a repository of narratives that was produced

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from the interviewees’ accounts (Silverman, 2006). As in my own professional practice, as

soon as I had completed my first interview it was essential that I did not wait long before I

interpreted it in terms of my topic and analytical framework. I also reflected (which is good

professional practice) on the process and noted any details considered important, for example

the time it took for the participant to reply to the email conducted interview; the length of the

reply, and a brief overview of the content. My reflection and interview notes served as a good

starting point when I began to analyse the data.

Raw data analysis

The raw data, (e-interviews provided at the end of chapter 1) were analysed using the

guidelines for the Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) a qualitative research

method (Smith et al., 2009). Participant e-interviews were read more than five times to find

the recurrent themes in the narrative accounts, giving particular attention to the interviewees’

views before the themes were coded and grouped into broader interpretative themes (Smith et

al., 2009). I became thoroughly familiar with the e-interviews by reading and rereading. In this

way, the IPA provided me with a framework in which to uncover the emerging, recurring and

the main prevalent themes (Finlay, 1999). I started by listing the emergent themes

chronologically and then put all similar themes into sub-headings that I cross checked with the

original e-interview texts to validate my connections.

My justifications for using IPA were firstly that it is a client-centred approach and it was

responsive to the participant’s view of the world and it did provide me with a credible method

for interpreting the e-interview texts (raw data). Interpretation is the key concept of IPA and I

attempted to enter the life world of the participants by attaching meaning to their e-interview

text responses through the interpretation process. I acknowledged that the participants were

considered the experts. (1) I read and reread the written email interviews, and noted any

observations, comments and any further questions I had about the participant’s response. I

summarized the e-interview text and sent this to the participant for clarification (member

checking) and anything that they did not wish to see in print, including suggestions on how the

contents could be altered, were respected. (2) I sifted systematically through the e-interview

material, extract-by-extract identifying and labelling the emerging themes. I was very mindful

of the assumptions that influenced my interpretations in particular because I was concerned of

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my bias in believing humour could enhance wellbeing. (3) I began by structuring the analysis

using my list of themes and considering the relationships between them. I clustered the themes

to clarify the overall themes, returning to the e-interview texts to check that the themes are

associated. (4) Once the themes were clustered, I produced a summary table with the heading

of the cluster and themes underneath, with examples and references (page numbers) in order

that I could refer back to the e-interview texts. During this stage I was able to identify the most

prevalent themes, and not use the non-clustering themes. (5) Arriving at a master list of

themes I wrote up the analysis: content and description for (i) individually for each participant

and (ii) collectively to make sense of the overall research data. Throughout the stages of

analysis I continued to refer back to the raw data (original e-interview texts), and I articulated

my thinking (by writing my reflective research journal) and this helped my process of

transforming the e-interview accounts into coherent narratives. After my initial analysis

described above, I discussion the emergent themes with my supervisors and I returned to the

literature to support my findings and complete my analysis. This was a long process

undertaken in many small stages. Critically it is important to stress that I was not able to use

IPA entirely as it is intended, although I followed the stages I could not achieve an in-depth

enough analysis of the research data. This may have been for a number of reasons including

my ability to use IPA effectively and the amount of data that I chose to analyse. In my

defence, the process of IPA can go on indefinitely and ultimately that was not an option.

Stages of analysis

During my first analysis I intended to use qualitative software because it would be good for a

microanalysis of the e-interviews. I explored the idea of using a software content text analysis

programme compatible with IPA, as in addition to my reading and rereading of the texts, the

software would count, categorize, and analyse the word frequency of the information (data)

generated by the e-interviews. Word frequency analysis provides a list of all the words that

occur in a text and the number of times they occur by splitting the text into subparts and

creating frequency lists for each part (Hill, 2008). In this way I would be able to see if there

were more occurrences of particular words in one part than in another, and compare the

different individual interviewees’ answers to the same question on the basis of the sorts of

words they used. Category counts allow a slightly more sophisticated analysis because a set of

words that represent the concept can be recovered from the text and used to decode other texts

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(Hill, 2008). I found Wordle user friendly and it shows quickly and clearly the most used

words by a hierarchy of size: the largest word being the most used word and so forth. Wordle

was used to provide a visual presentation of participant answers to my research questions and

illustrate the words that were used the most within a text e-interview answer, one question at a

time (there are a total of 10 e-interview questions).

Figure 1: An example of a Wordle to show participant Pat’s initial answer

What I learned about the process of analysis using a qualitative data analysis software

programme was the need to think critically at the outset about representing my research

because using software for analysis is still contentious. However, I decided that I could make

the transition and use software for the initial analysis but combine it with a traditional method.

This meant I could think about my research as an e-project or a container with which to hold

and organise my research project; that included my e-interviews, and also my notes, research

journal, ideas and memos. In this way, I had everything I needed in one place (an archive) to

start writing my research thesis; an archive that I could continually delve into for further

analysis and/or to revisit my ideas and key issues, including reflect on my interpretations, as

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an ongoing process. But it was important for me to realise that the software does not analyse,

rather that it has many tools to support the iterative process.

What happened was, as I was already using an innovative approach (collecting my data via e-

interviews) it was more beneficial not to rely on NVivo even for the initial analysis. Because I

was not working with a large number of participants it would rather, be best to use IPA

throughout and begin by reading each e-interview several times and making notes as I

received them. This meant that I did read through the e-interviews again, and then again in

order to draw diagrams to identify major, over all themes. At this point I sought advice from

my advisors and made a collective decision to follow up further on participants e-interview

answers. Because although I verified what they had said sufficiently at the time of the first

series of e-interviews, I wanted to ask them specifically about if they deliberately created

humour in their day-to-day living. During this process it appeared that for 3 of the participants,

I had simply exhausted their replies because they did not respond to any further emails after

completing the series of research question e-interviews. This same 3 were included in a total

of 8 participants who did not respond to the final verification (member checking) emails. This

means that 12 of the participants were able to provide additional, follow-up information over a

course of 12 months from the initial questions to the final questions.

Considering qualitative research on the Internet

As issues arose, such as participants deciding not to respond to further e-interview questions, I

returned to the literature on qualitative research on the Internet for support. The Internet is

undoubtedly the most comprehensive electronic archive of written material representing our

world and peoples’ opinions, concerns, and desires, and it can be a rich source for researchers,

such as me, interested in understanding the experiences and views of people, including service

users (clients, patients, consumers) (Eysenbach and Till, 2001). I agree that qualitative

analysis of material published and communicated on the Internet can serve to systematise and

codify needs, values, concerns, and preferences of consumers and professionals relevant to

health and health care. But while the Internet makes people’s interactions uniquely accessible

for researchers and erases boundaries of time and distance, such research raises new issues in

research ethics, particularly concerning informed consent and privacy of the research

participants, as the borders between public and private spaces are sometimes blurred

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(Eysenbach and Till, 2001). I was able to address the ethical issues raised, however in

ensuring the participants’ privacy, after I had sent three emails at different intervals, for

example at two weeks, four weeks and six weeks, and there was no email reply, I needed to

delete the person’s email and email address. Obviously, as a researcher or otherwise I cannot

make someone reply to an email, and ethically I could not continue to contact any of the

participants who did not wish to respond anymore for whatever reason, although this could be

true of more traditional methods of data collection.

However, qualitative research on the Internet seeks to acknowledge the existence of and study

the interplay of multiple views and voices, including determining information needs and

preferences of consumers or to investigate how health related information can best be

converted into knowledge and disseminated widely. And this means that I can also use the

Internet to present my research study results to multiple people regardless of borders, albeit

limited to those who understand English. Different types of Internet based research methods

have been distinguished and I carried out Internet based research as a researcher who

identified herself as such, and used the Internet for 1) recruiting the participants, and 2) for

gathering information in the form of online semi-structured interviews.

Summary of stages of analysis followed:

1. Classified the material into themes: gathered all related material to my topic.

2. Captured ideas and linked the material using annotations and memos in order to link the

research material (e-interviews) to identify the relationships.

3. Explored further and visualised the information in charts, and diagrams to capture my ideas

visually for others to easily view.

4. Refined and checked the process; going back over the e-interviews, validating statements

and reviewing the research literature with regard to the main themes that had arisen.

5. Provided detail of how I used the Internet to recruit participants in order to illustrate how I

made the journey from the e-interviews (data collection) to the analysis concurrent.

Further considerations

I considered how I would input summaries of the e-interviews and any related articles into my

thesis in order to make sense of what I had discovered and show how I had immersed myself

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in the e-interviews, in particular engaging with it reflectively. I returned to the IPA literature

to make sure of the process I was using to identify the prevalent themes, and find the patterns,

commonalities and any exceptions across the e-interviews. I also wanted to be ensure that I

illustrated exactly how I had created and reflected on the themes and sub-themes from the e-

interviews including the phrases used in the e-interviews. This included demonstrating the

relationships between the different themes: how they interrelated, the structure and the

hierarchy, taking into consideration that individual themes needed to be checked for internal

consistency. I was well aware that I could create vignettes using quotations from the e-

interviews to exemplify interpretation and or support assertion.

In approaching writing up my findings in the next chapter (6), I provided a general description

that draws together the patterns and connections across the e-interviews (data set)

demonstrating how key interpretations in individual interviews are supported and enriched by

the evidence. I considered linking themes to participant characteristics, however decided to

provide a synoptic narrative commenting on the most relatively common occurring themes,

and this gave me an idea of how strong the pattern was collectively within the e-interviews.

Writing up the analysis meant the themes needed to be explained, illustrated and nuanced. I

attempted to distinguish clearly between what the respondent said, and my analyst’s

interpretative account before extending my analytic commentary (Smith and Osborn, 2003).

The findings include the emergent thematic analysis and the separate discussion that links the

analysis to the extant literature, and in some cases I discuss the links to literature as each super

ordinate in a single result. Exploring lived experience is a key commitment of interpretative

phenomenology analysis (IPA) and my interpretation has been developed around substantial

verbatim excerpts from the e-interviews (raw data). The number of extracts and the number of

participants represented in my findings and discussion was to illustrate the importance of the

participant’s voice within the IPA research. It also helped to develop the insider’s perspective

along side of my (the researcher’s) interpretative account of what it means for these

participants. Therefore attempting to ensure a balance of emic and etic positions: 1) the

phenomenological insider position, which prioritizes their worldview, and 2) later the

interpretative, outsider position to make sense of the participants’ experiences and to

illuminate them in a way that answers my research question.

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Chapter 6: Findings The first stage of IPA is a description of each participant; this initial description is my

interpretation as nothing can be completely objective. Because I made a lot of initial

interpretations, I tried not to make exaggerated statements or come to any conclusions too

early in the analytical process. I looked out for exceptions, and examples that do not fit my

preconceptions as well as those statements that fitted with my research aims. This was

intended to be a scientific process. But I ask the reader to ultimately make her/his own

evaluation given that the raw data is provided. The identified themes and sample of

descriptions are presented in this chapter and analysis is in chapter 7.

My findings came from the belief that my research analysis needed to be a natural, intuitive

process and appropriate for normal everyday interpretation of life events and phenomenon

(Schatzman and Strauss, 1972). I kept it as systematic, concise and basically as simple as

possible, keeping in mind that my analysis needed to keep true to IPA (Smith 1999). However

there is no exact formula. A participant (Claudia) case study has been provided in the

Appendix to transparently show the stages from raw data to final analysis.

Themes

The outcome of my analytic IPA process was a set of themes that were structured into a

hierarchy of the most prevalent. These prevalent themes provided the topic and focus for the

analytic commentary. They represent commonalities across the participants’ responses but

also accommodate the variations within their experiences (data set). I initially arrived at ten

prevailing themes, and from these decided to report on the most salient themes, not as an

analytical constraint but as a focus, and as a function of the limitations of space available for

published work. This is in keeping with other qualitative researchers who break down their

projects into smaller components.

Initial identified themes:

1. Stress relief/coping mechanism

2. Sense of wellbeing (feeling good fast, feeling better/happy)

3. Self-preservation (survival value of humour)

4. Not taking life or yourself too seriously

5. Making work /occupation more fun, easier, faster, better

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6. Social bonding (improved communication)

7. Positive attitude/optimistic perspective/worldview (humour aware)

8. Role/identity

9. A rewarding behaviour (benefits self and others, contagious effect)

10. Associated with intelligence.

Looking at the raw data (e-interviews) I found further themes: the importance of laughter to

me, how frequently I laugh. Another one, which seemed to occur quite frequently: how

humour and laughter makes time go faster. Also: laughing in response to others’ jokes, trying

to make others feel better, and humour not always being appropriate. I gave each theme a

short description, based on what the person said (their view of the world), and at least one

quotation which illustrates this, as proof. Quotations needed, where possible only to relate to

the theme, so some of the e-interview excerpts had to be shortened. I used Mind maps (sample

below) to compile the prevailing major and sub redefined themes for each participant.

Figure 2: Mind map to show the master prevailing themes for Burt

I have demonstrated how I applied each of the IPA Stages (1-5) to the analysis in order to

clarify the analytical process and make my findings transparent. Firstly I was aiming to obtain

a good representation from the participant of their interpretation of an experience of humour;

secondly, I interpreted this interpretation. Of course, the fact that both the participant and I are

attempting to verbalise something complex, that can be quite fleeting and ethereal, means that

both interpretations could be incomplete, vague in part and possibly mistaken.

Stage 1: Very open stage of analysis. Read and re-read transcripts. Noted down observations

about data including themes, summaries, questions, use of words and metaphors etcetera.

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Stage 2: Identified and labelled themes that characterised research aims / question, including

using psychological terms related to internal states

Stage 3: is an attempt to structure the analysis. I listed the themes from Stage 2 and considered

the relationships between them. Categorising the themes to clarify into overall themes.

I categorised the themes identified in stage 2 to present the items actually mentioned by the

participant and the other items were extrapolated by me as possible forms of humour (in an

analogous way) in order that I could (as a social researcher) also make predictions. Categorised

Themes

Reasons for

creating humour

Implications for

self-concept

How humour makes

me feel (emotions)

How humour is

created

Not taking yourself

too seriously

Sense of belonging Sense of wellbeing

Feeling better

Deliberately doing

things differently

Life is short Role/identity Good humoured Actively/purposefully

being creative

Coping mechanism

Comic relief

Self-preservation Happy Passively creating

humour

Social bonding Self-

rewarding/gratifying

Less stressed Attitude

Humour awareness

Improved

communication

Being funny, jokes,

irony, sarcasm

Empathy Laughter contagious

effect

Work quicker,

distraction

Table of categorised themes

Stage 4: Once the themes were categorised, I produced a summary table (see sample in the

Appendix). Transcripts were referred back to check themes are the most prevalent and less

important/non-categorised themes were dropped. The process could be infinite but it was

important to stop at some point, even if it was an arbitrary point such as, to meet a deadline.

Stage 5: Analysis was written up as a single case with some comparison with other cases once

the table of themes was completed.

Master list of prevailing themes:

Experiences of humour

1. Reasons for creating humour

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2. How humour is created

3. How humour makes me feel

Participant description of the experience of humour

I found that the 20 adults who participated in this study all found humour an important part of

their day-to-day living. I completed descriptions for all of the participants. Initially I wrote

each description without any themes and then I rewrote the descriptions with the prevailing

themes added. All of the e-interview descriptions have been shared with the individual

involved making sure she or he was comfortable with what I wrote before I published it. The

following is my description, with major and sub-themes for Maureen.

Maureen Gender: Female Age group: 45-54 Education: High School Race: White Geographic location: Mississippi, USA 1. Reasons for creating humour (major theme) 1.1 Self-preservation (sub-theme) Maureen provided several in depth replies in which the prevalent theme was self-preservation: in Maureen’s words: survival. In order to make the difference apparent between the two separate categories: 1) Self-preservation and 2) Wellbeing, I have started each one with a short explanation. Self-preservation is the protection of oneself from harm or destruction, the instinct for individual preservation; the innate desire to stay alive. What is of particular relevance with regard to Maureen’s story was her ability to survive: to endure the difficult conditions and adapt to her environment because survival meant: while there is life there is hope. Hope is the feeling that things will turn out for the best, a particular instance of feeling that there is the hope of survival: in this case, humour provides hope and hope provides something to look forward to or believe in. Maureen showed that she created humour as a strategy or tool for survival of an insane life: “Laughter has been a tool for survival most of my insane life”. 1.2 Wellbeing Compared with self-preservation/survival, wellbeing is considered a contented state of being happy and healthy and prosperous. Maureen explained that she does things differently to make sure that she adds humour, lightens things up in her daily life and enhances not only her wellbeing but also that of the people she encounters in her day-to-day living. Maureen was doing things differently in order to survive but it seems as if this evolved when she realised that creating humour was more than self-preservation, which was very relevant to Maureen and coping with life’s difficulties because it gave her hope. However when she was more settled in her life, humour was more about a state of mind: thinking positively and not taking life or yourself too seriously. Maureen’s response contributes to the argument that

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fundamentally, creating humour, the ability to laugh at yourself and prevent yourself from becoming depressed about life situations means being able to cope with what life presents to you. This sounds like and is an aspect of survival but Maureen’s point in recalling what had happened to her, was in order to validate her reasons for creating humour in the first place (survival), and why she continues to create humour for her wellbeing. Maureen likewise stresses that she has found something that works (humour and laughter) and therefore she will hold on to it. “Humour has carried me through many situations and when you find something that works you hold on to it - anyone who knows me would agree.” 2. How she creates humour 2.1 Doing things deliberately Maureen said that she does things deliberately to create humour and she has developed her sense of humour because of the adversity she has experienced in her troubled life, and this began when she was a homeless teenager. Maureen expressed that she has no doubts that without a sense of humour and the ability to laugh in the face of despair, she would never have survived. This is Maureen’s answer to my question: Would you say that you do things deliberately to make sure that you create humour? “Without a doubt. I have had a troubled life. I've been homeless as a teenager in the streets of Detroit, was in an abusive marriage that I walked away from at 25yrs old with three young boys that I raised by myself. I was on the coast of Mississippi during Hurricane Katrina and lost everything, including my income. Without a sense of humour and the ability to laugh in the face of despair I would have never survived.” In reflection and to help with building a description of Maureen, this direct quote has relevance when comparing how others’ might have behaved given similar circumstances, and the likely outcomes. And it is a link with the potential benefits of humour and a desirable outcome; it is about survival and also related to wellbeing. 3. The importance humour plays in her life 3.1 Not taking life too seriously: levity Maureen explained how she adds humour to her day-to-day by looking at things from a lighter point of view: by sending comical emails to family and friends, and having funny stories to tell her co-workers. She believes that it is important not to take life too seriously. “I do add humour to my day to day - I like to look at things from a lighter point of view. I send comical e-mails to family and friends and have funny stories to tell my co-workers. I think it's important not to take life too seriously - need to smile and enjoy the levity in everything”.

Levity is defined as: lightness of mind, sense of amusement and lack of appropriate seriousness. 4. Where humour occurs 4.1 Work Maureen often laughs at work with her co-workers and others and many times this will be about something commonly experienced such as a television show or something heard on the radio, or it could be something that has happened to one of them over the weekend when they

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are not at work, and they share this with humour or find the humour in these situations that they relate to each other. The prevalent feeling is that it could be depressing at work if she and her co-workers did not have a laugh from time to time through out the day. Maureen described her typical workday: “A typical day for me (Mon - Fri) is 8 hours of work in a construction department for a Non-Profit organization. Today for example I laughed first thing this morning talking with co-workers about the weekend. I laugh often at work, with my co-workers and others. Many times it will be about something one of us saw on TV or heard on the radio. Sometimes it will be something that happened to one of us over the weekend. It is essential in my opinion because I work in an industry that helps people in sad or frustrating positions (underprivileged or poverty stricken). It could be depressing if we didn't have a good laugh from time to time.”

4.2 Family and friends It appears that Maureen’s family and friends have humour in common; they share humorous situations for a good laugh. “ I have many "characters", if you will, in my life: family and friends. Today I had a good laugh with a friend that called me to tell me of her vacation with her family. She shared a story of one of her grandchildren and her imagination. She made up a song for her and performed it dancing and all.” 5. How humour makes you feel Maureen was able to explain how humour makes her feel, both physically and emotionally. 5.1 Happy, focused on positive This quote illustrates how laughter helps to keep Maureen positive and focused and that it reminds her of the happiness she has in her life. “Laughter helps me in many ways - mostly to remind me of the happiness I have in my life. It keeps me focused on the positive, which helps (me) to cope with the not so positive.”

Maureen actively creates humour by attempting to find humour in as many situations as possible, and she believes that humour helps her in many ways but mostly to remind her of the happiness she has in her life. It keeps her focused on the positive, which helps her to cope with the not so positive. 6. The importance of laughter 6.1 Contagious effect Maureen also described the contagious effect of laughter in connection to how laughing makes her feel, and how the sound of her laughter effects others. This is Maureen’s response to being asked if there was anything she would like to add. “I don't have much to add except I have been told on more than one occasion that it's impossible not to laugh when I do because of the sound of my laughter.” This quote from Maureen supports the thread that runs through her experience of humour and the ability to laugh at adversity and share this laughter with others because of the benefits to self and the effect that Maureen feels this has on others. 7. How frequently she laughs This quote relates to how frequently she laughs and how she tries to find humour in all situations.

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“I do laugh a lot. I try to find humour in all situations if possible; it has been a survival tool since life can be so difficult. I don't know exactly how much I've laughed in the past week but I can easily say daily.”

Participant description summary: Maureen’s responses enabled me to find out about why she uses humour, although I was not able to find out a lot more about how she uses it, other than she does consciously go to work looking for humour, and she is the one to initiate the humour. She described having a troubled life and how humour helped her survive bad experiences. She described herself as the humorous person that others seek out and that she does not rely on anyone for humour; in this respect she presents as independent in humour. Participant telephone interview: experience of humour

In order to follow up on the answers participant, Pat provided in her e-interview I conducted a

telephone interview with her. This was held on October 18, 2011 and it lasted for 50 minutes.

Pat sounded very at ease sharing her experience of humour with me. She took the phone call at

her home and began by describing the view out of her kitchen window of an olive and a plum

tree. Pat told me that her garden has quite a Mediterranean feel compared to her recent holiday

in Turkey where it was pouring with rain all the time. The interview conversation flowed well

from one question into the next and Pat was very open to answering my 3 follow-up questions.

1. To follow-up on Pat’s point that she could answer questions more honestly in real time

during a telephone call, I asked her why?

“Probably as there is more analysis when you reply in an email and see what you have written in an email and it is more likely to be an honest (genuine) reply when the reply is off the top of your head – spontaneous. I edited my email research answers for content not for any grammatical or spelling mistakes. I could have done better with more specific research questions. The e-interviews could have consisted of closed questions (rather than open) and have been structured (rather than semi-structured) like a Likert scale survey with a 1-10 rated scale and a, b or c type questions. This would have helped me in answering the questions because I would have known what you were looking for, as I was not sure if my answers fitted your questions”. 2. To follow-up on the relationship between humour and a sense of feeling better that Pat described in her e-interview answers: “I went to Turkey for its warm climate, we were four friends taking a holiday together away from our horrid jobs and it was the worst weather ever with it pouring with rain. We all went to visit a castle in the capital and were told that it closed in 10 minutes at 5 o’clock. So we were in a hurry and to add to the situation with all the rain we were completely wet. We walked the wrong way down slippery steps, ending up in the dungeon. We had decided to brave the weather but the people that we passed in the castle were sour faced and this started my friends and I laughing. The more miserable the other people we saw and the worse the weather, our laughter increased until we were braying with laughter. And despite us looking

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like wet-rats the Turkish men still made comments, such as “Lovely ladies, lovely ladies”, which caused my friends and I to laugh more. I felt better for laughing although I knew my behaviour was very childish and not necessarily funny. But we were in the wrong place in the dungeon so we were fooling around rather than moaning, or being miserable or having a glum face. I thought that possibly the others felt I was mad, something I experienced when I first moved from the North West of England to Wilshire in 1984. I would walk into the local shops and chat or try to establish a casual friendly rapport, and the person or people looked at me like I was mad. I realised that there were cultural differences in different parts of England and may be a divide between the North and South. My father, who has not been well with heart related problems, is likely where my sense of humour came from. I am part of a close-knit family with my parents and sister. And my sister was recently made redundant from her job. The future is uncertain. My parents live 180 miles away but I will do what I can (to help) because that’s life - there is doom and gloom but you have to think on the bright side. I make sure that I have something else in my life other than my job and staying at home, particularly in the winter when it would be easier to curl up into a ball at night when it’s dark and the light goes earlier. Depressed people do the opposite as they would tend to stay home, and I have done this. I was made redundant three times (I am a linguist), although at present I am employed as a Marketing and Communications Advisor for an emergency service”. “On the funny Turkish holiday in the castle dungeon we saw a puppet or dummy (of a man) hung outside, down at the bottom of the stairs. It was more like a disco dancing scene because a light had malfunctioned and was flashing on and off over the dummy, and this caused us to laugh more. We were cracking jokes and away from horrid work, choosing to have a good time, to make the most of the situation and not be sour faced. My jokes and laughter were not directed at anyone or at the expense of others. I’m always aware and sensitive of types of humour and when it is appropriate or not and am careful not to offend. I do not appreciate the type of humour presented in television shows such as America’s Funniest Videos. I am always concerned for the welfare of the person being filmed in the videos, especially when they are falling off something or a piece of equipment breaks – I do not find this type of humour funny”. 3. To follow up on how Pat would prescribe humour for other people: “I would start by going to comedy clubs because the entrance is often free or cheap and it provides an inexpensive evening activity and means that you come out of your comfort zone and meet other people (socialize) and do not stay at home. But it can be any activity: an evening course such as photography or learning a language because it is more important to get out of the house and do something different. My job future is uncertain and I do not know if I will be made redundant so the work environment is not a fun place at present. I suggest having something other than your paid job that provides a purpose. I’m taking an evening photography class, learning to speak Russian, and also completing a management diploma course. I would rather stay busy. I had not make a distinction between humour and laughter but on holiday in Turkey I identified the funny scenario as humour. Because it was created by what the locals were saying to my friends and I, in English but with a Turkish accent: “cheap as chips, cheaper than ASDA, lovely ladies etc”- the humour came from the incongruity of the situation”.

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“I love hearing people mimicking others, and half the fun of the Turkish holiday came from just that - not in a nasty way as in the people were not able to speak good English, but rather the nature of the English, which was spoken by the Turkish people I encountered and mimicked - sometimes quite rough and ready - one man shouted out to us in a market "hello, cheeky bollocks". We used this phrase a lot in our times together... incongruous and rude at the same time. What sort of people would say that in public, and do people actually talk like this?” (Analysis of Pat’s data is provided in chapter 7.) Participant initial analysis

IPA was used to identify the themes arising from each participant's meanings. I individually

analysed the data for the 20 participants. The main themes were provided as headings for each

individual participant. Any participant’s direct quotes are in italics. The following is the initial

analysis for Roger:

Roger presents as an expert on creating humour. This is evident in the rich detail he provides and the attention given to his e-interview answers. He seems to have a very positive attitude and be overly optimistic in his outlook, having survived a brain tumour where he was only given a 50/50 chance of living. He claims that he made a choice to actively create humour to enhance his life, and he successfully creates it as a coping mechanism: humour thus influenced by life experiences and the need for survival. Roger was the first male to participate in this research study. Reasons for creating humour According to Roger he is consciously creating humour, he initiates humour with others and he has developed his creation of humour over a number of years to achieve desirable outcomes. Roger claims that he has a stressful (8-hour workday) job, which he counteracts with humour, humour that he creates with his work colleagues because it makes work more fun. The connection between humour and having more fun at work is a prevalent theme. Roger is aware that having a laugh with his work colleagues helps to alleviate his stressful job but he claims that this is only part of the picture because it does not influence how much he laughs, and he laughs regardless of his work colleagues. And according to Roger one of the reasons why he creates humour in his day-to-day living, is to make the day pass faster, and to gain acceptance among his group of work colleagues. This fits with the idea of humour to help make the workday fun and go quicker, and also to help social bonding. Roger claims that creating humour is a way of fitting into a group and being accepted. When Roger and his colleagues laugh together at some of the office correspondence they create work team comradery, and the laughter helps team adhesiveness, and allows for an amicable work relationship. Roger also claims that he has always created humour, tending to see the funny side of things. Talking about funny situations has enabled him to talk to strangers because it provides a common ground from which to pursue further communication. The example Roger gave was that prior to his current stressful job, he travelled the world on his own for over ten years. He claims that humour has helped him make friends and sustain friendships; and the idea that

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Roger is fun to be with and his personality traits, and humour readiness attracts people. This will be explored further. Roger describes well how and why he creates humour to laugh. He claims that he has a network of friends that he laughs with, he laughs while watching television, and he always sees the funny side of situations in (everyday) life. He realises that he laughs at other people’s expense (he enjoys ridiculing or watching people ridicule themselves) when not always appropriate. This is a prevailing theme where others (participating in this research study) realise sometimes or even often that they laugh at stupid things people do and say. This fits with both the superiority and the incongruity theories of humour and laughter. For example: laughing when someone trips over, laughing when nobody else laughs or laughing longer than others, when they had already stopped. Roger felt that he was not as nice a person as he thought that he was because of his laughing at the expense of others. However, laughing at others’ misfortune (these misfortunes assert the person’s superiority on the shortcomings of others) originated with Plato. Roger presents as an empathic, thoughtful, and sensitive person and any contradiction between his personality traits and his reaction to the humorous may be because of how he identifies with humour, and the meaning and the necessity he claims that it holds for him. Since Roger needed to be optimistic to survive, he appears to make the creation of humour beneficial for him. He is aware that sometimes his laughter is “over the top” or exaggerated, but humour and laughing is his continual survival tool, a technique that he appears to have developed as a skill. Possibly there is a habitual element of humour that provides a role as well as comfort, and this has become a state of being for Roger. According to Roger his humour is inappropriate on occasions both at work and in his private life. It has gotten him in trouble in the past, and he is sure that it will in the future. However, Roger claims a world taken seriously or without humour is not an option for him, nor is it part of his nature and the person he has become. How he creates humour Roger would say that he deliberately does things differently because life is too short and life is what you make it, therefore better not to take it too seriously. “Yes I do create humour in my day-to-day living. If one of my work mates has a particular saying or action I will mimic them to get a laugh from other workers. For example, someone always answers the phone in a strange way, and when he is not at his desk I will copy this to get a laugh.” After work, Roger claims that he enjoys watching reality television and programmes showing video clips of people making fools of themselves, (falling off things, tripping up etcetera). Reality television and programmes such as America’s Funniest Videos or the BBC’s (British Broadcasting Corporation) World’s Craziest Fools, a video clip show featuring botched bank robberies and inept insurance fraudsters receive high viewer ratings because they are generally funny, appeal to the common denominator, people can easily relate to the scenarios presented, and the viewer is able to safely watch. In this respect, Roger is passively experiencing humour. How humour makes me feel According to Roger, the creation of humour is a way to feel liked, which he claims is a normal human need. Roger claims that he is laughter ready and he is a person who laughs a lot

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because he has a positive attitude and he is always looking for the humorous and good in everything, which in turn makes him feel good. Roger’s sentiments regarding how humour make him feel good, are very significant for him because (he claims) something bad happened to him when he was diagnosed with a non-cancerous brain tumour 12 years ago. The example Roger gave was that besides being given a 50/50 chance of surviving the operation to remove the tumour, he was advised there was a 70% chance of sustaining brain damage. Fortunately Roger says, he survived the operation with only minor on-going mobility problems, but he claims’ that “Something like that happening to you at 40 makes you look at things a lot differently” and therefore his life experiences have influenced his propensity for humour and the amount he laughs. In this respect, creating humour is a way to cope with and/or survive life’s adverse experiences. Humour at work

A lot of feelings were generated about the experience of humour at work and the importance

of humour and being able to laugh in the work environment. In particular that during a typical

workday that involved working for 8-hours in a stressful environment, humour was used as a

coping mechanism for interacting with work colleagues. It was even reported by one

participant that if humour were not an option at work, and employees were not able to share a

laugh together the individual would need to look for another job. And there was a connection

between life and professional experience in the creation of humour to enable the best possible

outcome at work from the team members. For example, the participants who were managers at

work and led teams described how they created or looked for humorous situations/scenarios in

order to cause laughter and help alleviate the stress of the work environment as well as ensure

meetings and interactions were productive. The participants showed that they had experience

in the just-right balance of humour in order that it was appropriate, timely and that it achieved

the intended outcome. All of the participants who worked Monday to Friday eight hours a day

expressed that humour helped make the work place: fun, more interesting and the long day to

go more quickly. There was a sense of belonging and a feeling of being part of a group or a

laughter club: a sub-group of employees that shared jokes, talked about funny television

programmes they had seen, retold real-life situations that had happened to a family member or

friend, and generally shared a laugh together at work. There was a feeling among most of the

participants that being too serious would be problematic within their work place.

Two verbatim examples of humour in the work place:

“At work … sometimes their spelling is terrible, they use incorrect words or their writing is

so bad and the words you can make out are just laughable” (Gaby).

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“I enjoy my work more when I have some good laughs in a day.” (Alicia)

The message appears to be that a good laugh shared by co-workers/colleagues does not

necessarily take much time away from the work day but it can improve the work environment

and leave the workers feeling more positive, connected with their colleagues, more part

of/comfortable in the work environment, and a reduction of stress depending on the nature of

the work role. The opposite could mean that fellow work colleagues who choose not to

participate in creating humour or laughing at the colleagues, who do, may be isolated, do not

feel connected/part of the humour/laughter group/club.

Humour enhancing wellbeing

Examples of how humour and laughter makes some of the participants feel:

“Whatever effect it (humour) has on others it makes me feel alive and well.” (Maureen)

“Laughing just makes me happier and see life in a different light.” (Gaby)

“If I'm sad and someone makes me laugh I feel much better.” (Nikaz)

“If I am feeling low laughter always makes me feel better.” (Sadie)

The prevalent theme among the participants’ responses that humour is related to or responsible

for facilitating an increased productivity, reduced stress, and employee connection are direct

derivatives of the inclusion of humour in the workplace, as discussed by Morreall (1997)

exploring humour in the workplace. He relates that when you utilize humour, you are able to

get people’s attention, you can relax them, get them into a good mood, and make more

receptive to your message, and thereby: you have created an atmosphere of consensus

(Morreall, 1997). Humour helps in the process of creativity and problem solving helps people

see things from many different perspectives; and this is exactly what the participants’ in my

study articulated.

However, there is little scientific support for the popular believe that people with a personality

type or particular personality traits of humour, cheerfulness, or optimism are any healthier

than people who do not have a disposition or propensity toward humour (Provine, 2000). But

the possibility remains that situational humour and laughter is an effective coping mechanism

for transient stress, such as in a work environment. The health-sustaining factor may not be the

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laughter itself but how humour and laughter are used to confront life’s challenges (Provine,

2000). In this study the majority of the participants are clearly saying that they are deliberately

seeking out humorous situations and opportunities to laugh because how to create humour can

be taught and learnt as part of a stress reduction technique.

Humour and stress

People who have access to their sense of humour in the midst of stress are much more resilient

than people who do not. There is a possibility that they are also emotionally more flexible

because the participants’ comments reflect what was found in a Canadian study (McGhee,

1999): Humour and Mental Health: using humour to cope with stress. After five humour

workshop sessions it showed that adults could improve their use of humour to cope with life

stress as well as improve their humour skills. In particular, the study (McGhee, 1999)

measured the stress levels of two groups: one who attended 5 humour workshop sessions and

the control group who had 8-weeks with sessions focusing on home and leisure activities. The

study found that if there was an active effort versus being passively engaged in an activity the

adults could cope better with stress in their life, and using humour meant it could be possible

to live a stress reduced or stress free life (McGhee, 1999). Because humour is effective in

fighting stress: laughter relaxes the facial muscles and relieves tension; laughter speeds the

oxygen into the human bodies system and lowers the blood pressure. Controlled studies (Berk,

1996, 2009) have shown that laughter stimulates the immune system, off-setting the negative

effects of stress. The following are two quotes from participants that related to humour,

laughter and stress relief.

“Laughter affects my life in a really positive way as I find it's kind of like a stress release.”

(Gloria)

“At work it can be a stress relief when you share/make a joke about something negative that

has happened.” (Lydia)

Findings from demographic data

The following tables represent the participants’ demographic data in five areas. Out of 20

participants one person chose not to answer the demographic questions, although the gender

and location (from the email address) are known. What is known from the demographic data,

is that more of the participants (35% or 7) are in the same age group: 45-54, and there are no

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participants older than this age group. This means that none of the participants had reached the

age of retirement. The majority of the participants described themselves as being white. The

highest level of education was a Master’s Degree and 30% of the participants had a College/4

year/Bachelor’s degree. Participants came from 5 different countries, on 4 continents with the

most (35% or 7) being located in New Zealand, and 6 located in the UK.

Age group Number of participants in group

18-24 years of age 4

25-34 3

35-44 5

45-54 7

55-64 0

65+ 0

Table 2: Age group number of participants

Gender Total number of participants

Female 14

Male 6

Table 3: Gender of participants

Race/Ethnicity (as described) Number of participants

Black African 2

European New Zealander 1

White and Maori 1

White German 1

White 14

Table 4: Race/ethnicity of participants

Highest Education Number of participants

High School 4

Associate’s/College 2 year 5

College/4 year/Bachelor’s Degree 6

Master’s Degree 4

PhD/Professional Doctorate 0

Table 5: Highest Education of participants

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Geographic Location

Country and Continent

Number of participants

Malawi, Africa 2

Germany, Europe 2

USA, North America 3

UK, Europe 6

New Zealand, Australia/Oceania 7

Table 6: Geographic location of the participants

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Chapter 7: Discussion The main purpose of this exploratory study was to gain an understanding of the lived

experience of humour. But also to generate knowledge to help better inform occupational

therapy practice and build upon knowledge within occupational science, in the domain of

occupational form, function and meaning. Aims were to explore meaning and provide a

description of how a range of adults generally experience humour in their day-to-day living.

To explore if and how people felt they create humour and any relationship between the lived

experience of humour and wellbeing. In order to find out in what circumstances, and for what

reasons they might create humour. Because by asking individuals what her/his views are about

this, more can be known about human actions; how people alter their behaviour (do things

differently) by creating humour, and if this is related to a sense of wellbeing (does it make

people feel better?). Demographic information was also found out to see if factors, such as

age or gender or education made a difference to the experience of humour.

I was able to explore and find out the answer to the research question: What are the lived

experiences of people who create humour in their day-to-day living? And there does seem to

be a relationship between experiencing humour and a sense of wellbeing for the people who

took part in this study. I have discussed my findings below, including the contribution I feel

that I have made to the understanding of humour, ideas for dissemination, future research, and

suggestions of how humour might be incorporated into the teaching of occupational therapy.

As the researcher I needed to make a decision about whether the words of the respondents

should be interpreted as conveying an enduring personal reality, or whether they are better

regarded as constructed in the moment-by-moment occasion (of being interviewed) to create a

particular identity or desired image for the researcher. From my client-centred perspective I

preferred to regard the participants’ accounts as a genuine attempt to convey what they have

experienced. I have thought about my preconceptions and how they may have influenced my

outcome but I am convinced that my conclusion is grounded in the data. I acknowledge that

my beliefs will have been projected onto the participants’ meanings, because my analysis of

the interview data will have been influenced by my biography (academic background, life

experience and personal values). I am mindful of this, although I could validate (member

check) the participants’ accounts according to usefulness, plausibility and acceptability criteria

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(for example, Reissman, 2008). Likewise, I am mindful that all research methods have flaws.

The IPA approach accepts that as a researcher I bring my philosophy to the process of analysis

but the end result can reflect both the participant and researcher’s point of view (Smith, 1996).

Summary of findings

Whatever the setting, humour was generally associated with feeling good, better performance,

improved attitude and desirable outcomes. Mainly adults smile, chuckle, and laugh socially

during conversation with others: co-workers, friends and family. The participants were self-

selecting; they demonstrated an awareness of their use of humour and laughter and were

mostly experts on the subject who provided a rich source of data.

All 20 participants viewed humour as positive, and necessary and as an everyday coping tool

to assist them socially (making friends and laughing with family, strengthening relationships

and sharing together as a group whether at work or home or socially), and at work with a

stressful job, or at home with family and in a parent role. They tended to all be optimistic and

look at life on the bright side: see the funny side of situations. They found humour enjoyable,

this included laughing when it was not appropriate, such as when someone tripped over or

said something they considered stupid/dumb.

All agreed that humour was important to them. They have chosen to use or add or create

humour as a role or part of their identity, some more actively than others depending on their

life experience. For others’ humour has likely become a habit and some because they believe

that they would cry if they did not laugh. I realise from their answers that if I had asked the

participants if they believed in the statement: laughter is good medicine they would have all

agreed. All had a humour-ready attitude, exploit the contagious laughter effect and are aware

that humour removes social inhibitions. These people are not discomforted by the idea of a

non-quantifiable phenomenon that is difficult to measure and perceived as not objective,

being put under the lens. The data shows the reality of people who create humour in their day-

to-day living so that others can begin to understand why they are doing this. It is helpful to be

able to read accounts of people who tell us about their experience/world.

My initial reflection on the findings

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I became very familiar with the content of all of the e-interviews and began writing the

content description interpretations. I felt I had created flow when immersed in writing the

descriptions and understanding what the lived experience was for the individuals’ responses.

It was interesting to learn that even though I had acknowledged researcher bias toward a

favourable outcome at the start of collecting my data, that all of the participants shared the

same sentiments that humour is positive, and the experience of humour enhances their day-to-

day living occupations and their sense of wellbeing. I am mindful that it is likely that it was

people who already have a humour-ready attitude who were interested in taking part in a

study on humour. The people I interviewed say there are benefits of creating humour in day-

to-day living: in particular it enhances not only their feeling good but others as well. They are

mostly all doing things differently in order to have a humour effect. They have developed their

sense of humour during their lives because it has been effective. They all have the trait of

appreciating and being able to express the humorous: being playful, being fun or funny and

possessing a disposition to find or make (create) causes for amusement. This raises the

question: Is humour something one always employs or can it be a state of being?

The following was identified:

• Humour is positive

• Humour reduces stress, is a coping mechanism (tool/skill) and Laughter unites people

• Humour is related with feeling better, a sense of wellbeing

• Humour improves relationships with work colleagues, friends and family and can

remove social inhibitions/boundaries (Social bonding)

• Humour is power such as expertise in creating humour professionally/in the

workplace)

• Humour helps a long workday to go by faster, makes work more interesting and more

fun

• Humour helps you to belong, such as to the group at work (social bonding)

• Creating humour and laughing is a confidence booster

• Humour is enjoyable

• Humour can help others feel more comfortable (social bonding)

• Humour helps you look on the funny side of life

• Humour makes you feel alive

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• Humour that results in a response such as laughter is about sharing

• Laughter is contagious

• Types of laughter: conversational laughter, situational, nervous

• Humour as a state of mind

• Humour can be passive (watching TV: stand-up comedians, comedy (American’s Most

Funniest Home Videos), talent shows (Britain’s Got Talent) or real-life (Jersey Shore),

reactive and actively created

• Humour is not always appropriate: it may be directed at another person or incident,

(when people trip/fall over or make what are considered stupid comments), and

laughter may be for too long/others have stopped or when nobody else laughs

• Humour is a person’s identity: the funny person/clown

• Humour is a role (instigator of laughter)

• Humour used to prevent depression; (happy rather than sad): laugh rather than cry

• Humour brings a smile to peoples’ faces

• Humour lightens situations (instead of look on the dark side, look on the bright side)

• Humour is used because life is too short

• Laughter can denote nervousness (the nervous giggle)

• Humour becomes habitual, a way-of-life

• Humour is difficult to explain: it is situational, in the moment, and you need to be

present

• Humour is spontaneous

• Humour fulfils a (fundamental) need

• Humour is intelligent.

The experience of humour

The twenty participants in my study gave accounts of their experiences of humour, with some

providing more rich detail in their e-interview answers than others. The individual accounts

were at one unique and remarkably similar because the feelings expressed about humour

reflected each other, regardless of individual’s age, gender, education, race/ethnicity or

geographic location. All of the participants were humour aware and this may have been why

they chose to participate in a study on humour, as it gave them an opportunity to share their

experiences of humour, including how important they believe humour is in their lives. The

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participants’ showed that the experience of humour is universal, a global phenomenon. They

did not require any definition of humour to understand what I meant by the term, albeit it was

necessary to provide guide questions to facilitate detailed answers within the e-interviews.

IPA was used to identify the themes arising from the participant’s meanings. The focus was on

the questions asked and only the data related to those questions because I was interested in the

participants’ experience (of humour). This involved a collaborative process of interpretation in

which each participant was provided with a copy of the analysis of her/his answers written as

a single case study. The participants were given the opportunity to comment and to change or

add to their case study as they saw fit in order to verify and justify the interpretations and to

show how IPA let me explain what the experience of humour is like for that person before

comparing all interviews. As the researcher, I was attempting to make sense of the interviewee

making sense of her/his experiences (a double hermeneutic: Smith, 1996).

Example of IPA analysis for Pat

The description that Pat provided of how and why she creates humour was gained over a period of 12 months by a series of e-interviews and a telephone interview. Her account shows that she has an established sense of humour; deliberately adds humour to her day, and she actively creates humour. In general, once I had a satisfactory thematic analysis, I looked for concepts and theories (psychological and sociological) that threw light on themes or issues in my analysis. Pat has verified (member checked) the analysis below and is happy that it captures how she makes sense of her experience of humour. Her direct quotes are in italics. Pat is aged 50, a linguist and works as a Marketing and Communications Advisor for an emergency service. She was born in the Cheshire area, in the North West of the UK, and moved to live in Wiltshire, South West England, in 1984. Humour has always been a normal part of her life. Pat explained that she does not have a typical day but that she does endeavour “to incorporate humour into most things” she does in her day-to-day living. She has been a very useful source of information because she is able to articulate well her lived experience of humour and give a clear idea and well developed reasons for why she creates humour, and the purpose it serves for her. The following is interpretative, as the methodology requires and is led by a conceptual level. Reasons for creating humour Creating humour is about removing the aspect of seriousness; making something (more) enjoyable, being playful, funny comments, asking absurd questions, humorous situations, looking for the humorous, references to television shows and comedians, telling jokes or riddles, smiling and laughing.

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Pat believes that it is more likely that she adds humour to her daily life as something that is less difficult and does not require as much imagination as creating humour might for a stand-up comedian: “Creating Humour is perhaps different from Adding Humour! Creating humour is more difficult and needs a lot of imagination. I would see this more as what a stand up comedian might do. Adding humour is easier as this may very well be taking the lead from somebody else who has said or done something, which then gives you the window of opportunity to make comment or play the clown. Adding humour can be done on a daily basis.” Pat is very humour aware and open to opportunities for humour. The examples she provides show that she does actively, deliberately and purposefully create humour. Coping mechanism/stress relief Similar to other remedies for stress, humour is quite simple. A sense of humour can help people keep things in perspective and when they make changes in their lives, and as an attempt to enhance their sense of wellbeing. Once amused or laughing, a person is more open to the more difficult changes they may need to make, and there are ways of developing and strengthening a sense of humour so that a person starts laughing rather than becoming stressed. Stress is experienced psychosomatically. The involuntary bodily reactions in humour are important in explaining its use to dispel stress amongst other things. Humour releases the bodily tension associated with stress, and this reflects back onto the associated psychological tension. However, it does not affect the original reasons for the stress, which probably continue to be active. So humour is like a headache pill that gets rid of the symptoms, leaving the causes unaffected - humour as social medicine? Humour in the workplace Humour applied in the workplace is increasingly being viewed as a means to promote teamwork, reduce stress, stimulate creativity and improve communication, morale and productivity. Pat was able to illustrate and explain well her reasons for creating humour at work with her colleagues during times of stress, as while she was being interviewed, she told me that: “redundancies are being discussed and implemented at the moment, so a lot of people are gloomy”. However, the main reason given for creating humour at work is a prevailing theme, that the day goes by a little more smoothly and more quickly if people are smiling and laughing. Discontent is suggested by the implication that it is good if the day goes more quickly; humour is created to ameliorate work, which is experienced all too often as an unsatisfactory, yet compulsory social interaction. This is one general social use of humour that appears to be an important support for unsatisfactory social structures and an alternative to radical action to change these structures. Pat says she initiates humour to elicit a reaction from work colleagues and to engage with them on a different level. She achieves this by playing the role of the comedian or clown to get a reaction from others, and likes it when others play a similar role. It seems that a lot of Pat’s reasons for creating humour, at the moment, are strategies for coping with her stressful job, and providing herself and others with comic relief from the pressures of a challenging work environment. Perhaps a model is needed for how to generalise from individual social interactions to understand their broader significance across society. Pat claims that it feels good to create humour in her day-to-day living, in particular at work because life is too short to have a gloomy outlook all the time. Reasons given for creating humour include being more able to face the work tasks ahead and to remain positive. Pat

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thinks that humour can help with morale and team spirit (a tool to help manage a recalcitrant workforce) in general as long as it is not taken the wrong way. What she means by a wrong way is that her humour is appropriate, friendly and not offensive or hurtful because she does not want to alienate herself; on the contrary, she attempts to bring people together. Pat’s added work responsibilities – the constant having to do more with less that has resulted in a dissatisfied workforce compared with a society that increasingly values leisure, which is equated with fun versus work with drudgery – means Pat and others are actively seeking ways to make work and the work place more enjoyable. Again, humour is compensation because the alternative is gloom. Likewise, Pat claims: “Some people in the emergency service business can be quite arrogant”, where she works but she can find humour in this (their attitude) and this makes them less intimidating, as it enables her to think that their behaviour and perhaps attitudes are a little foolish. This fits with the concept of humour being able to modify perceptions, and the ability to view people and situations in a different light: “lighter” and not so seriously – such as imagining a person in his underwear. An attempt to try and explain why adults laugh less than children, and take matters more seriously rather than see the funny side, is the idea that school aged children enter a world in which they are told that life is serious and they must not be silly, or clown about. Social function Humans often seek out a sense of humour in others because it is valued and people are proud to claim it in themselves, perhaps even more than good looks or intelligence. If someone has a great sense of humour, we reason, it means that they are happy, socially confident and have a healthy perspective on life. Pat claims according to her family and friends she has always been funny and they see it as a wonderful personality attribute. She does not want to be around people who take themselves too seriously and who cannot raise a smile, because they are not her type of people. It is typical of the majority of the participants’ responses that they actively seek out other humorous people. Pat claims that she will “often try to raise a smile or a laugh at whatever level”, as this is important to her in building relationships with people. Her closest friends are those who can make her laugh and whom she can make laugh. The example she gave was that she likes it when something she says or does can raise a smile, a laugh or a positive comment. Pat claims that she would not be the same person if she were serious. A direct quote from Pat: “Humour can only be a good thing” – but not if it helps to perpetuate an unsatisfactory social structure. Humour for social bonding and strengthening relationships is echoed in sentiments expressed by most of the participants. Within the emergency services, humour may unite and provide an intimacy otherwise not afforded. It may likewise be based on modelling behaviour because Pat appreciates the way some people working in the emergency service business make light of things when they are dealing with unpleasant situations. This suggests that reasons for creating humour, at least within the workplace, include being able to cope with tension and reduce stressful situations to a manageable level, and this is a theme consistent with the views of other participants. The way in which humour achieves these effects needs further analysis. Identity/role Humour is one type of communication, and it is essential in how we form meaning and negotiate our priorities, and establish our roles and identity with others. Pat discusses her

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identity with humour and how creating humour for her was as part of an accepted community life: a way in which to express herself on a daily basis. She reasoned that as someone from the northwest, Merseyside, Liverpool, Cheshire area, “repartee and banter are part of how the people are; having a ‘craic’ (fun) during their daily lives when they shop or meet people in the street and this is part of what northern English people are”: people who can laugh at themselves and at situations as part of their everyday life - humour as part of a general social culture, perhaps of a particular group. Pat compares life in the northwest of England where she was born and grew up with living now in the southwest of England: she found it hard, at first to fit in. Her comments and efforts to engage with those working in shops, 20-odd years ago were met with some strange looks. Pat has spent her entire life trying to make other people laugh and trying to figure out how to do it. This echoes the sentiments of other participants who claim that you can always learn to be funnier and you do not have to be a comedian to cultivate a sense of humour and work it into your day-to-day living/occupations. How humour is created Creating humour by introducing something funny is different from finding something funny that someone else has introduced, but passively enjoying a funny television or radio programme is considered to be passively creating humour. There are studies, which say that there is a difference between actively creating humour and passively creating humour. Below is what Pat says about her experience of humour in relation to why she creates it. It touches upon active and passive humour creation. Deliberately doing things differently Occupational Science is the study of changing or modifying how we do things (understanding how a person deliberately and purposefully creates humour helps to explain their volition and impetuous behaviour, and their explicit and implicit humour) and the impact this might have on occupation: form and meaning. This is because humans are occupational beings; it is not merely that occupation is an important part of human life. Pat says that she probably does deliberately do things differently to create humour in her day, and she explains in the following example why it would be humorous to do things differently. This is useful to know because it helps us understand humour and occupational behaviour. Pat created a humorous situation by creating a “Love Hate Fest” in her workplace. It brought work colleagues together in conversation, people who normally did not relate to one another or communicate, and in this respect the created humorous scenario helped to remove social inhibitions by facilitating dialogue and bringing people into contact; it provided a common ground, and something that other people could relate to easily. Pat explained how she achieved this by displaying a complete range of Marmite products for “lovers” and some sickly sweet cakes and other items for the “haters”. She subsequently invited the whole office and some other departments by email to participate. Pat claims that it went down well and “raised a smile” and some positive comments although it was actually only some food in the office, but “marketed up to be something a lot bigger and better than it was”. In addition, Pat said the Head of Department could not abide Marmite, therefore all the products were placed next to her desk to emphasise the jest. This was especially effective when she pulled a face and over dramatised her reaction. To highlight Pat’s reference to the Head of the Department, she is (metaphorically speaking) hitting the mallet on top of the head of the gong to raise it up, as one would in a carnival sideshow; directing the pun to create humour. Humour that may

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have been created at the expense of another fits with the superiority theory of humour because these types of situations make people feel superior to other people. Pat claims that this was: “very childish behaviour, but fun” and this may relate to adults being taught not to be silly because it is childish behaviour: the act your age and not your shoe size kind of sentiment. The idea that childlike behaviour can lead to more creative thoughts and actions could, however be explored further, in particular with regard to humans possessing an innate creative energy that demands to be expressed. There may similarly be a connection with play, a child’s primary occupation, and the balance between work and play. Passively creating humour According to Pat, she finds Chris Moyles and Scott Mills on BBC Radio One humorous, and some of her closest friends who can do impressions make her laugh, and she models this behaviour. Pat claims that “Laughter can unite people” because humour transcends organisational, local, regional, national and international borders. The example Pat gave was when she laughs listening to BBC Radio One because she is not representative of their target audience, being much older, and this is one of the reasons that she likes the humour on BBC One because it transcends age, race, gender, belief, or class barriers. This is another social function of humour, but it can also exclude people as in the case of racist jokes. Humour seems to be universal in all societies, it also may be one of the reasons why Pat has a wealth of information on humour, because she is one of the oldest research participants, and has been making people laugh since she was a child. Dry/deadpan style of humour Deadpan is a form of comic delivery in which humour is presented without a change in emotion or body language and usually spoken in a casual, monotone. Deadpan humour is a tool that can elicit attentiveness. Pat provides clear examples of the deadpan style of humour she creates in her work environment. For example, if someone asks her a serious question, she will sometimes answer totally truthfully, which may make the person laugh because they think it is a joke, whereas often Pat claims it is not a joke. This would be true of the following quote from George Bernard Shaw’s: “My way of joking is to tell the truth – the funniest joke in the world”. This is known as deadpan style humour. Pat’s examples show how she takes mundane perhaps tedious, rhetorical dialogue with colleagues and makes it funny. A work colleague asks: “How are you today?” Pat chimes with “Really rather average, what about you?” Her style of humour may not be typical of others; there is a subtleness and even a cynicism that becomes apparent within her dialogue, such as when she says, “I may have to take my humour elsewhere if it’s (the subtleness of her jest) not appreciated”. This idea borders on the idea of playful humour, and simplicity, an approach that does not attempt to cover up, but is not explicit. Pat claims her deadpan humour presents what others’ think on occasion but do not ever verbalise, and this is related to the idea that the verboten or potentially sensitive issues can be presented by creating humour in order not to be offensive. The issue of different humour presentation styles needs to be examined with respect to Pat’s comments. Being humorous Being humorous is defined as having or expressing humour, being funny, amusing, comical, compared with the definition of being silly: exhibiting a lack of wisdom or good sense, being foolish or frivolous. Pat felt that humour, comedy, silliness and making people laugh may differ slightly, and she may simply be silly rather than humorous. This is consistent with the

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concept of friendly humour that does not create conflicts, is not insulting or a variation of bullying, although it still involves an element of risk, and the timing of delivery of the punch line is still relevant. Therefore, when a person decides to play the role of funny person, elicit a laugh, tell a joke etcetera, the reward or benefit must out weigh the pun/joke not succeeding in being funny, or not producing the desired smile or laughter response. This suggests that the delivery of humour is a skill but the premise is the same whether you are or are not a stand up comedian. This bears more thinking about because there are risks involved in being humorous such as not being funny, socially accepted, understood, etcetera. Cultural differences Humour has been found to occur in virtually everybody across the many different cultures around the world. Although, humour tends to be construed in different ways by different cultural groups, this is a result of cultural and linguistic differences. One example of this type of difference is that there is a greater use of humour in UK advertising, which tends to contain more satire and punning than US advertising. According to Pat there are cultural differences and she claims that in her experience: “the English are known for having a self-deprecating sense of humour that other nations just do not understand”. The participants from Britain and from New Zealand all claim that the residents of these countries laugh more at people who take themselves terribly seriously, whereas other nations (in particular the US) appreciate the Benny Hill, slapstick humour of slipping on a banana skin. Pat claims that she likes to create humour by mimicking a foreign or funny accent, and if the other person is able to reciprocate, this feels even better to her. In this respect Pat is consciously initiating humour, looking for the humorous and taking advantage of opportunities to express humour. She stresses that she does not create humour at the expense of others; however other participants claimed that humour could be drawn from people’s inadequacies (superiority theory of humour). How humour makes me feel Positive emotions/natural state responses that accompany humour can reduce levels of conflicting (non-productive) emotions and allow people to engage in more creative problem solving. Being mindful of terminology: positive emotions are natural state responses and negative emotions are conflicting emotional responses, such as a reaction to stress. A sense of humour could be one of the most powerful tools (free and readily available) a person has, to make certain that her/his daily mood and emotional natural state support a sense of wellbeing. Comments on the way that humour makes Pat feel are interspersed throughout her answers and the prevailing sentiment is that she associates it with feeling good, positive and better. It seems to be connected with self-preservation, although Pat is clear that humour has been a normal part of her daily life since she was a child. Feeling better The assumption is that when a person experiences humour actively or passively and smiles or laughs, the world around seems a better place. And the very sense of wellbeing: the feeling good or better or more positive that was experienced, may itself be restorative. A sense of wellbeing is implied rather than explicitly stated. This is what Pat had to say about her experience of humour in relation to her descriptions of feelings: physical and emotional: “It is a fact that humour makes you feel better, even smiling when you do not feel like it eventually makes you feel better”. One of the examples Pat gave for feeling good was laughing when she

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listens to certain programmes on the radio. She said that she does not like the long drive to and from her job but she feels better if she listens to something humorous on the radio: “The incongruity of certain things, such as the posh BBC Radio 4 lady reading out some banal emails on the Scott Mills show on Radio 1, taking the “Mickey” out of establishment idylls, making a quick response to a question using word play, using contemporary references and skewing their relevance, using bathos, belittling a grand gesture, which politicians and people of that ilk like to make”. One of the main theories of humour is that of incongruity and how humour arises out of something that is out of keeping or place, and this relates to humour being able to modify our perceptions. On the other hand, Freud’s theory of humour is that, like dreams, it can be related to the unconscious content, and jokes happen when the conscious allows the expression of thoughts that society may suppress or forbid. Laughing when alone When you experience humour and laugh, you are almost always in the presence of another person, whether they are physically present or imagined on the radio or television. Laughing in social settings is far more common (normal, socially acceptable behaviour) than when a person is alone. Pat says, she feels good when she laughs: it helps her cope, particularly when she is driving to and from work. She tells of how she has been seen driving and laughing out loud alone in her car (when listening to BBC Radio One). The friends, who saw Pat, said they thought she was laughing while talking on the phone rather than alone in her car. The assumption here is that it is not possible to laugh without other people being present. It is commonplace that you can laugh at yourself, but again not usually when alone. Although Gloria was another participant, who like Pat provided examples of seeking humorous situations and laughing when alone.

Questions for discussion on analysis

My initial analysis shows that humour matters to the 20 participants who took part in my

study. Then I reflected upon what more I needed to find out in order to inform my practice,

and explore further the impact that humour plays during activities and the relationship with

occupational science and this meant (i) returning to the literature, and (ii) going back to the

participants to ask another series of follow-up questions.

Humour and its occurrence in everyday life are essentially about relationships because humour

is inherently social: a quintessential human social signal. Therefore, humour is about

relationships; it is a behavioural response. There is a relationship between humour at work:

occupation and wellbeing. At this point I did not have any conclusion, and I needed to discuss

my findings with my advisors. It was suggested that I give some thought to terminology, in

particular endeavouring not to use the terms positive or negative but rather think of positive

emotions as natural state responses and negative emotions as conflicting emotional responses,

such as a reaction to stress.

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Possible bias

There is a possible bias in the sample because it seems that only those who have an awareness

of humour and felt that they may create humour, volunteered to participate. Therefore, there is

a possible bias and benefit to the study because the participants were self-selecting. They

appear to all be experts on the subject of humour, experienced with humour, humour-ready

and aware of how they create humour in their everyday activities and also of how they have

been doing so throughout their lives.

Possible disadvantages to humour

There may be disadvantages/ a downside to humour. I suspected that one of the participants

after completing answering the research questions felt her life was not as happy as she thought

it was in reflection of the answers she had provided. And although humour normally elicits

laughter, and laughing and crying are considered polar opposites of the emotional spectrum,

they are neurologically linked (Provine, 2000). Laughter may be considered the best medicine

but it is likely not without side effects, they are just unknown. There is actually little scientific

evidence support for popular believe that people with personality traits of humour are

healthier. But the possibility remains that humour is an effective coping mechanism for

transient stress. Humour created and used as a stress reducing and coping mechanism have

been discussed below.

What I discovered from my initial analysis was that there is this prevailing, almost intuitive

feeling that humour is best medicine or you can laugh yourself to health or maintain your

wellbeing (physically and mentally) by laughing every day and this involves actively creating

humour. This enthusiasm for humour as best medicine promotes a tentative hypothesis that

many people hope is true, and it is encouraged by articles that promote humour or laughter

therapy as an ideal treatment that makes us feel good, is free, has no bad side effects, and is

even contagious. Whereas in truth, laughter is no more evolved to make us feel good or

improve our health than walking evolved to promote cardiovascular fitness (Provine, 2000). I

refer to Robert Provine (1996,2009) because he is a laughter researcher who started his

research in the laboratories but realised that he needed to observe people laughing in their

natural environment. He also advocates that laughter research concentrates on asking the

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laughing people. I acknowledge that I need a consistent view regarding the literature, which is

less extreme in either direction.

Model for humour

From this study I found that people have used a model for the way they create humour in their

lives. For example, they have been influenced by their culture, (North England Merseyside

sense-of-humour, Greek comedy versus Greek tragedy), popular current comedians, television

shows, in particular comedy sitcoms but increasingly real-life shows (Jersey Shore, Britain

Has Talent, America’s Funniest Home Videos). At some point in the participants’ lives they

adopted humour and this has some relation to life experiences, such as losing a parent or

friend at an early age, surviving cancer, being aware of being low in mood, sad or wanting to

cry. They are emotionally counteracting states with humour and often with the necessity for

and act of physically laughing. There is also a connection between social bonding and good

communication skills and humour because all of the participants are creating humour or

adapting humour (telling jokes, funny scenarios, recalling comedy TV programmes, etcetera)

to improve or enhance relationships with family, friends and work colleagues. Therefore,

humour is playing an important role in communication at work: during occupation/activities.

Humour and stress

A key idea is that you need to actively use your sense of humour in dealing with the hassles

and stresses in your life to get the coping benefits. A person can possess a good sense of

humour but abandon it when a high level of stress is reached or in a critical moment or during

a crisis. It is also related to how a person’s mood is on any one day because this can effect

whether a person is able to quickly and easily access a playful attitude, and be the one who

comes up with clever quips or finds a funny side to things that happen, and be able to poke

fun at her/himself. Because in order for people to be able to manage stress effectively in their

lives it needs to happen everyday regardless of whether the day is considered a good day or a

bad day. And this is essentially what all of the participants in this study say that they actively

make humour part of their day-to-day living.

This view was supported by a Canadian study (McGee, 1999) that found that even if a person

finds a lot of humour in everyday life, it does not help you cope with stress unless you also

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make an effort to actively use humour to deal with that stress. People who have access to their

sense of humour in the midst of stress are much more resilient than the rest of us: they are

emotionally more flexible, and can bend without breaking in the midst of the most difficult

circumstances (McGee, 1999). People who grow-up with parents, who showed a good sense

of humour in the midst of stress, are more likely to have the same abilities.

The Canadian study (McGee, 1999) recruited seniors living in different retirement centres:

one group spent 8 weeks focusing on the Home-play (activities designed to build humour

skills within an 8-step programme), while a second group simply got together weekly to

watch comedy films (from the 40s and 50s). The first group made an active effort to improve

their humour skills, while the second group was passively engaged in humour without trying

to improve their sense of humour. While the two groups showed similar coping abilities at the

beginning of the study, the group going through the Humour Skills Program scored

significantly higher on two different measures of coping at the end of eight weeks. The

findings showed that they were not only coping better with the stress in their lives; they were

also actively using humour as coping tool more than they had before the programme started

(McGee, 1999).

The most prevalent feelings experienced by the participants were in relation to stress, and

feeling good or better. What was evident from the participants’ experience of humour was it is

helping to reduce stress because when a person is able to laugh, the workday’s tension

subside. This is an effect experienced by all of the participants in this study. Another point is

that laughter, as a result of humour, is part of what defines us as humans: it is not only innate

but it is part of human survival. And it turns out that laughter is literally contagious because

humans copy what others’ do; to be empathetic and this means that when people see others’

performing the same actions such as laughing in a comedy show audience, they laugh too. It is

also why television shows add laugh tracks. Laughter, in effect is a form of communication

and it helps us to engage and connect, and send a signal directly to others’ that we are relaxed,

supportive, sympathetic, and on/in the same team/group. When people laugh together they

share humour and it becomes purposeful: a common focus and it is a socially engaging

experience. Creating humour enhances the way people listen and engage. In a professional

capacity, such as in occupational therapy practice this means that service users are more likely

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to follow what is being said when humour is part of the message. Humour can also help

improve rapport and possibly trust. Put simply, when a person creates humour or when

another person experiences humour actively or passively and laughs, the world around seems

a better place. And it seems that the very sense of wellbeing: the feeling good or better that

was experienced by all of the participants, may itself be restorative.

There is the idea that laughter is consciously controlled and this was raised by a number of

participants, including that they sought and continue to seek out partners and friends who love

to laugh or make them laugh. That people seek relationships in which they can share humour

and laugh because laughter is considered a quintessential human social signal. The importance

of the social dynamics of humour and the impact on conversational humour and laughter is

apparent in the participants’ replies.

What is apparent is, that since starting this research study humour is trending, and researchers,

particularly in the UK and the USA are currently looking at how humour might benefit health.

Because it seems that in addition to improving communication and aspects of social bonding,

humour and laughter have potentially profound, beneficial and physiological effects that are

just now beginning to be understood. Humour transcends meaning. The lived experience of

humour as described and interpreted within this study has a meaning that could be said to go

beyond the limits of understanding. But part of the conundrum of humour needs to be better

understood in terms of occupation: function, form and meaning: peoples’ actions: deliberately

doing things differently. The following is a quote from Claudia about doing something

deliberately because it is humorous and has a positive effect on her wellbeing.

“I found a tiny doll & a plastic frog in the front of my van and I deliberately left them on

display in the brim of a hat on the dashboard because it’s amusing. Doing something like this

has a positive impact on my wellbeing”. (See Appendix for Claudia’s case study.)

Dissemination strategy

Through dissemination of the information I gained from this research study, I aim to inform

professional health care workers about the role of humour. I aim to make a contribution to the

understanding and meaning of:

1. How people experience humour in their day-to-day living

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2. Any relationship between the lived experiences of humour and wellbeing

Through discussion with others I have had the opportunity to share my ideas with my

professional doctoral cohort, other colleagues, friends, friends of friends, and people in

general that I meet on a daily basis. It was very helpful to see my research idea embraced by

others and also to hear other perspectives. It seems that humour, as a subject, generates a great

deal of discussion, and most people are keen to share their experiences and stories. In this way

I have found that being open with others about my study served to motivate me further and

also allowed me the opportunity to explore different avenues from the various suggestions

made. One suggestion was that I turned my research question upside down to ask: What

happens if we do not laugh? Discussion has meant that the more that I have explained my idea

to others, the clearer, and more tangible it has become to me.

Suggestions for future research

Future research could involve interviewing a greater number of people in order that the

experience of humour could be more meaningful to a larger, global population, for example, a

longitudinal population health study. Being part of a research team or at least employing

another person/s to interview people so that it is not the primary researcher who is responsible

for asking the participants the questions and thereby eliminate researcher bias. Another way

forward could include using the Internet to recruit more participants by setting up a worldwide

web site and initially using a survey to generate quantitative data before collecting information

from interviews. Social media, which includes web-based and mobile based technologies that

are used to turn communication into interactive dialogue, such as Twitter or a discussion

forum on Facebook where people can contribute and a far larger number of people and wider

audience can potentially be reached. Another suggestion could be a comparison study of

attending humour workshop sessions versus a stress or anxiety management course. Lastly but

not least, humour and laughter need to be recognised as significant topics for clinical studies, a

position consistent with the prominence of humour in day-to-day life.

Ideas for incorporating the teaching of humour by occupational therapists

Occupational therapy literature and humour has received little recognition especially

concerning occupational therapy and educators. But humour is considered a key teacher for

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immediacy behaviour and can be a useful tool in the educator’s repertoire to gain attention,

facilitate creative thinking, motivate students, and facilitate learning outcomes (Southam and

Schwartz, 2004). However, for humour to be effective it needs to be used in moderation,

appropriate to the adult leaner, and be relevant to understanding the subject being taught

(Southam and Schwartz, 2004). Other considerations are gender because the majority of

occupational therapy students are female and they appear to have less appreciation of jokes

compared with males, although they appreciate other types of humour, such as stories or

accounts of situations they can relate to (Southam and Schwartz, 2004). The idea is that by

using appropriate humour as an educational or practice tool, it can increase the passion of the

person teaching or the occupational therapist’s interaction in practice, and promote learning

outcomes for the students, and positive intervention outcomes for service users. The following

list was originally compiled by Southam and Scwartz (2004) and added to by me.

Considerations and strategies for humour use in teaching or practice

Know your own style of humour, know your intended audience (student or service user group)

and be sensitive and be familiar with appropriate and inappropriate humour. Be aware that

humour appreciation is unique to each individual depending one her/his age, culture, intellect

and the moment-in-time/context. Humour is personal and enigmatic, and must be used

appropriately to be effective and also to not be offensive. Keep in mind that you are creating

humour to use as a tool not as a stand-up comedian.

1. Consider the environment because this is important for the free expression of humour.

Large lecture halls may be more difficult than smaller groups held where seating can

be moved into a circle.

2. A relaxed, and approachable instructor/occupational therapist is more able to engage

students/others.

3. Teaching may begin with warm-up activities, such as start by giving an example of one

positive or funny thing about yourself, that happened over the last week or that was

seen in a film or on television, and then ask for others in the group to participate with

their accounts. Research the many ideas presented in books specifically for teachers

who want to implement humour into their teaching plan.

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4. It may be necessary at first to consider how to create humour in your own day-to-day

life and be self-aware and humour aware:

(i) Think about your humour type

(ii) Think about the style of humour of each person that you meet

(iii) Think about what humour can be easily and generally created and used with

most people that you meet.

(iv) Think about what humour could offend

(v) Be mindful to validate others’ feelings first

(vi) Be aware that humour can be inappropriate

(vii) Think about how you can create suitable humour in your day-to-day living.

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Chapter 8: Conclusion The aim of this study was to explore the experience of humour, to understand what it means to

others when they create humour in their day-to-day living, including any relationship between

humour and an enhanced feeling of wellbeing. The outcome of this study has been the

production of an original, comprehensive account of the lived experience of humour that is

different from what has come before because people were asked if, how and why they created

humour. The understanding that was gained may contribute to existing knowledge on humour

and could inform occupational therapy practice about how people do things differently.

I spent a great deal of time discussing my research idea and possible questions with family,

friends, colleagues, and strangers. I piloted my study with two people known to me in order to

help me refine further my email-based method of collecting data. I used the pilot study to

adjust my sample list of questions. I considered that my role as researcher was to facilitate the

participant’s answers. Probes within the emails sent from me / the researcher to the participant

were minimal. I was aware of giving the person plenty of time to respond. It was not necessary

to follow the sequence of questions as designed. I used a list of themes or headings that could

be adjusted accordingly to ask each interviewee about her/his experience of humour. I asked

further questions for clarification (respondent verification), and to be aware of any

assumptions on my behalf before moving onto the next question/s or ending the interview. I

also asked for demographic information.

What I was trying to accomplish in my research was to understand others’ experience of

humour and to explain their meaning. My aim was to use the e-interviews to find out about the

participants’ lived experiences of humour, and this I have partly accomplished. In answer to

my research question, I was able to gain a picture from the participants’ e-interview responses

about how and why people experience humour in their lives. I was able to explore the

relationship between humour and a sense of wellbeing Although, intuitively the participants

believe that there is a connection between their feeling better and their ability to find day-to-

day situations humorous and laugh in the face of adversity, this was difficult to qualify and

beyond the scope of this study. However, it could be an area for future research.

This original, practical, and relevant study could potentially have an impact on professional

practice because it contributes to the knowledge base of occupational therapy by providing an

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understanding of humour and its relationship with human actions: occupation (doing things

differently) and a feeling of a sense of wellbeing. This exploratory study could lead to change

in how humour is viewed, in particular in relation to how people deliberately do things

differently when they create humour in their day-to-day living. The long period of analysis

meant that I was very familiar with the generated information. It was member checked with

the participants in order that I could interpret and reflect back what they said and they could

have the opportunity to change or add anything. Critically the result of my novice application

of IPA was primarily descriptive and did not achieve a greater depth. This may have been

because I chose to analyse all of the participants’ data.

The participants in this study may not benefit directly from the findings. But the data, which

was collected by e-interviews, meant that there was little or no risk to the participants or the

researcher. This study found meaningful information that could provide occupational

therapists and other healthcare professionals with some understanding of how humour can

empower service users because they could potentially benefit from creating humour in their

day-to-day living, rather than depending on occupational therapists or anyone else to be

humorous.

Reflective comments

I have kept an on line reflective journal. And presented my reflection and reflexivity as an end

section because I found it useful for working through the way in which, my researcher role has

developed, my strengths and limitations.

Reflecting initially on how the development of my research raises awareness of humour for

other practitioners, I have noted the positive impact of my project; the encouraging and

supportive feedback that I have received from friends, colleagues and strangers. I have been

able to engage the interest of others and for me, the best possible outcome would be that

humour is better understood and that this has an impact on the implementation of health care

practice, by helping to empower service users.

In order to arrive at the research questions that would elicit the information I sought, I first

reflected on what humour means to me. What initially came to mind were the immortal words

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spoken by Baldrick in the episode: Blackadder Goes Forth, the satirical and historical BBC

sitcom. Blackadder played by actor Rowan Atkinson, and Tony Robinson as Baldrick,

Blackadder’s sidekick - the underdog the British always seem to support, who becomes the

working class hero. Blackadder and Baldrick are stuck in the trenches during world war one,

and Baldrick says: “Never fear, I have a cunning plan”! This led me to realise that humour has

been a fundamental element of my daily life for as long as I can remember. I grew up with

humour, and laughing. I was exposed to experimental theatre in the 1970s and to the absurd,

from Monty Python’s Frying Circus to The Saturday Banana Show. I recall sitting next to

Spike Milligan who was waving his arms profusely and laughing uproariously during an

opening performance at the Round House, London. At some point I noted that people

appreciated listening to the amusing stories that I told, that I could be funny, and this was

beneficial in social situations. In addition, I have always been extremely optimistic and

pragmatic, and have a tendency to view most situations positively. This I relate to having a

good sense of humour and being able to find the funny in funny or not so funny, more

obscure, dark side of humour.

Since becoming a researcher, I have re-evaluated the basis for my beliefs in relation to what I

now know about humour. I have discovered that there could be a connection between my

ability to laugh, including laughing in the face of adversity, and my wellbeing. For example, I

have no immediate health concerns: I sleep well, my concentration is good, my confidence is

high, and I am popular, very motivated, and my bowels are regular! Seriously, I am a very

resilient person and this fits with the research that found a sense of humour increases

resilience. Of course it is difficult to know the cause and effect of humour and laughter, and it

is likely a combination of factors, such as genetics, personality type, and life-style.

I have reflected on the process of completing and writing a research study thesis. Participants

gave up time for this study; therefore I needed to have a realistic idea of the intended outcome.

I believe that I have presented a convincing argument about the benefits of humour and found

that the individuals who kindly participated in my study believe humour is immensely

important to them, and not being able to laugh would be detrimental to their wellbeing.

The annual presentation at the University of Brighton’s summer conferences was a positive

vehicle for feedback on my research study-in progress. Because after presenting my research

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for the first time, I realised that I was on to something that others found equally as appealing. I

had presented my research within a partly fictitious story about my identity as an undercover

spy working as a menopausal occupational therapist. I was recruited at Luton airport while

attempting to catch an Easyjet flight to Switzerland with a jar of Marmite over 100ml in my

hand luggage: an alarm went off and a red light flashed. The security manager tested my son’s

school back-pack (that I had dubiously borrowed) for explosives; he said, “Madam or was it

Miss, if this tests positive again for explosives we are going to interrogate you”. I was

thinking about the airport security sign I had seen that stated: Jokes about explosives are not

funny. All such matters will be taken seriously. Thank you for your restraint.

After the over whelming positive feedback I received about my research topic I began to

collect funny texts that I could use to make presenting my research more captivating. I added

several humorous images to my power point presentation, which were well received by the

audience including by my advisors. Whereas the professional doctorate programme leader told

me that my study and writing was superficial! In keeping with my prevailing sense of humour

I planned to introduce my next presentation with something humorous. But I had the good

fortunate to chat with Dr. Lee Berk and he stressed that I keep my presentation scientific to

illustrate the research in the field of humour. In conclusion, I agree with Maureen’s statement

that humour has been a tool for survival most of my insane life. And end with a quote from

Claudia: “…'fuckin 'ell', but in a good way. I just spotted that I'm using a watered down

comedy trick (high-octane swearing) to try to keep you interested”.

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Murakami, H. (2003) Underground The Tokyo Gas Attack and the Japanese Psyche London: Vintage Ricoeur, P. (1974) The conflict of Interpretations: Essays on Hermeneutics US: Northwestern University Press Rorty, R. (1989) Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Paterson, M. and Higgs, J. (2005) Using Hermeneutics as a Qualitative Research Approach in Professional Practice The Qualitative Report, Volume 10 Number 2 (6) pp. 339-357 Popper, K. (1972) Objective Knowledge An Evolutionary Approach Oxford: Oxford University Press Schön, D. (1983) The reflective practitioner San Francisco: Basic Books Harper Collins Shields, C. J. (2011) AND SO IT GOES: KURT VONNEGUT: A LIFE New York: HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY APPENDIX Introduction to Case study This is a sample of analysis for one participant. My overall aim was to develop an organised, reflective, detailed and transparent account of the meaning of the rich data collected in e-interviews (first-person verbatim record). How I integrate my worldview into the research process I accepted that I cannot put aside my personal worldview in undertaking this research and I adopted an approach that allowed me to bring my worldview to the table, which allows my involvement in the research process to be seen by those who judge it as rigorous, believable, truthful and honest. Claudia’s account is always given in italics. Overview of case study with demographic data Case Number

of emails Age group

Gender Race Highest education

Geographic location

Account summary

Claudia (pseudonym) Consent Participant number: 12

6 45-54 “47”

Female White British

College: Foundation degree/two years higher education: Play Worker

East Sussex, England

Deliberately creates visual humour; Sense of wellbeing; High octane swearing; Nervous giggle

Table 1 provides an overview of this case study Stage 1 Raw data initial comments and reflection All the raw data from Claudia is provided at the end of chapter 1 – email thread number 12. Excerpt of my initial reflective notes on raw data e-interview text

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I like the connection Claudia made with liking dark humour. Also that it is difficult to explain what we find funny; that it's about being in a particular situation (contextual) and at that moment. And that it's often difficult to relate to someone else not present or explain why it was so funny. Very relevant point made about the nervous giggle used socially. Need to ask if Claudia has always, as a child found things funny and a wee absurd, and whether there is anything she would like to add that I have not asked? Reflection extract following second e-interview My initial feelings were that I could relate to Claudia’s account because her experience of humour in her day-to-day living includes high octane swearing and I identify with this. I noted in my reflection that I had opened the email from Claudia early in the morning because I needed to be up and going: Wow, love the high-octane swearing, a very funny reply. Stage 1 continued: Read and reread transcripts I noted down observations about the date and this included themes, summaries, questions, use of words and metaphors. It was a very open stage of analysis and I have represented it simply my writing my reflection on the e-interviews after reading and re-reading and by simply using with two colours: Pink equals common words that appear and are connected to the prevailing sentiments: themes and subthemes. Red equals exceptional or out of the ordinary statements. Example: Claudia’s response struck an accord with me in particular because of her sense of humour and “high octane swearing” (coping mechanism/communication/engaging technique)– her replies made me laugh! Basically I need to quote Claudia verbatim because it keeps it funny. She was second eldest in a family of seven siblings and she remembers that she was a serious child, a happy childhood but not carefree. She did not appreciate nonsense rhymes, found them awful and she thought Edward Lear’s limericks were crap. Today she laughs at normal, everyday domestic situations; even arguments have become funny to Claudia. It is difficult to relate to someone not present what was so funny; to explain (concrete examples) what exactly made you laugh because it is situational, in the moment and you may need to be present to appreciation the funniness. Claudia works with children as a play specialist and she creates humour with her work colleagues in particular the colleagues she supervises; she uses laughter to make light of situations, to find the funny side. Claudia appreciates black/dark humour in TV & films (example: film: Fargo: simultaneously a comedy of errors, and a taut suspense thriller, or a darkly amusing thriller). She suspects that she controls her humour and how much she laughs depending on whom she is with, she acknowledges that she has a nervous laugh/giggle and that she laughs when she believes that she has messed-up (made a mistake). Claudia describes how she is dressing to create humour/be funny and how she is using objects to create visual humour. Need to explore further the idea of creating chaos as a simultaneously terrifying and amusing entity and similarity with incongruity theory of humour. Coding Claudia’s data

(i) I began by reflecting on my preconceptions by writing down my initial ideas and identifying and bracketing off my preconceptions (this included keeping an analytic dairy and discussing my initial findings with my supervisors to develop rigour and focus).

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(ii) Next by a close line-by-line analysis, I identified the things that matter to Claudia (experiences, events, relationships, concepts and any concerns); the meaning of those things for Claudia (experiential claims), and this included ways in which I could characterise her stance (disposition).

(iii) Identification of the emergent, prevailing themes by developing dialogue between the my coding of the data and what Claudia’s experiences meant, which in turn led to the development of a more interpretative account. I went back to the data to ask more questions of it and be creative

Stage 2: asking further questions of the raw data Phenomenological and interpretative coding questions I needed to ask of the data: What experiences does Claudia describe? What are the key features of those experiences for Claudia? What do these experiences appear to mean to Claudia? How do I characterise Claudia’s stance in relation to her experiences? Figure 1 shows my initial identification of significant, prevailing, interesting concepts as clusters applied to Claudia’s experiences of humour in day-to-living in order to begin to organise her accounts in the raw data into a meaningful, structured framework. I was relating Claudia’s account to my main research question: What are the lived experiences of people who create humour in their day-to-day living?

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Figure 1: The first concepts and associated clusters of what’s significant and interesting Preconceptions In thinking about my preconceptions I was surprised that Claudia was a serious child and did not appreciate Edward Lear and his nonsense rhymes until she was an adult. And I assumed that a funny adult would have been a funny child. The experience of how Claudia creates visual humour is an exception including her account of wearing funny clothes with the intention for others to find them humorous. Reflection excerpt following follow-up questions Claudia writes about wearing clothes to be funny and also how she made a home for the tiny doll and frog and found it amusing, even beneficial to look at- more so than watching back-to-back episodes of Green Wing, which does constitute creating humour deliberately albeit passively to her day-to-day living. She did not write previously about wearing clothes to be

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funny or about the significance of arranging the objects/visual humour. Yes, I agree it is very difficult to quantify humour but Claudia’s descriptions make it possible to appreciate her sense of humour, in part because I can relate to it. The important/significant/meaningful statement that creating visual humour has a better impact on her sense of wellbeing than watching comedy television on a sunny afternoon needs to be explored further– perhaps because creating visual humour is an active occupation, and there is an end product. Stage 3: further development of data through member checking Claudia’s email reply received September 4, 2011 Thanks for sending all the accounts that you wrote up. They are fascinating, especially the men’s acknowledgement and your expansion of the humour (charm) IQ presumption thing- or am I just letting on how hung up I am? (And, yes, that made me laugh!) I'm happy with what you've written about my contribution, and thanks for involving me- it burbled my brain a bit but it was fun. All good wishes My member checked description account of Claudia with initial analysis Claudia (who is happy to be called Claudia, as it is “a jolly refined name”) is able to give a clear idea of what she finds funny and the notion of a preference for dark humour. Although Claudia claims this depends on the given time: “I like humorous things that are quite dark. And my taste alters at different times, for example I swear a bought a DVD of a film called 'Fargo' because the film had made me laugh a lot but when I put on the copy I'd bought, it was so violent and suspenseful that I couldn't watch it at all.” Fargo, the example Claudia provides, was an immensely popular mainstream film that mixed a morbid plot with humour, and was likely very humorous because of incongruity (simultaneously a comedy of errors, and a taut suspense thriller, which is darkly amusing). And the lead character, a female police office had a very deadpan style of line delivery. Claudia says that she appreciates black/dark humour in television as well as in films (for example the TV series the Green Wing provided below). According to Claudia she does not deliberately add humour to her day that much at the moment, except in a passive way, for example by watching back-to-back episodes of Green Wing on the bank holiday Monday, when it was bright sunshine outside. Claudia says, “That's not really a very humorous pursuit, is it?” Green Wing is a British sitcom set in a fictional hospital but there are no medical storylines; the action is produced by a series of soap opera style twists and turns in the personal lives of the characters. They proceed through a series of often, absurd sketch-like scenes, or by sequences where the film is slowed down or sped up, emphasising the body language of the characters. The watching of funny television programmes is a passive behaviour however it constitutes consciously seeking out humour. Claudia intentionally wears clothes that she thinks are funny in order to elicit a reaction from other people and for them to find it funny. “I sometimes wear clothes that I think are funny- I think that I intend for other people to find them funny as well but it's likely that they think I just look a bit weird”. Claudia offers an exposé of what humour means to her including the idea that her style of humour may be considered a bit weird. Whereas, I would describe Claudia’s style of humour (from the account she provides) as more quirky and idiosyncratic: different but in a good, funny way, as it has an individual quality and another dimension, not expressed by any of the other participants’.

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According to Claudia humour is difficult to conceptualise, as distinct from other things and states. And in Claudia’s life and work, she has ended up with “a lot of leftover stuff, these are things that are out of place which butt up against each other and make her laugh”. For example, she explained that she found a tiny doll and a plastic frog in the front of her van and she deliberately left them on display in the brim of a hat on the dashboard because she thought it was somewhat amusing. Visually this created scenario becomes funny because the objects have been placed in an expected place and one is of an unexpected size. Claudia explained that this deliberate but subtle action has a better positive impact on her sense of wellbeing than watching even comedy television on a sunny afternoon. This can be explained as visually created humour because Claudia takes objects and arranges them for her amusement, and possibly the amusement of others. This example does not fit my preconception of how a person might deliberately create humour in her/his day-to-day living, and I feel that I need to explore this idea more deeply because humour can be a verbal, visual or physical cognitive experience that provokes laughter and provides amusement. Claudia reasons that humour and measuring what is and what is not funny is difficult to quantify. A direct quote from Claudia: “The chaos I create, I find terrifying and amusing at one and the same time”. Claudia’s response struck an accord with me in particular because of her style of humour, and “high octane swearing” makes me laugh. “…'fuckin 'ell', but in a good way. I just spotted that I'm using a watered down comedy trick (high-octane swearing) to try to keep you interested”. However there is a time, place and context for swearing in moderation even in comedy. Although, people have been swearing for centuries and those in power have been trying to censor it for just as long, today there is an acceptance of swearing, as long as people are careful about the context and avoid bad language in front of children or in polite society. Claudia recalls that she was a serious child, the second eldest in a family of seven siblings, and a happy childhood but not carefree. She did not appreciate nonsense rhymes, she found them awful and she thought, Edward Lear’s limericks were “crap”. Claudia states that it was embarrassing to dislike Edward Lear’s limericks and she recalls her teacher reading Lear as a treat to the class at the end of the school day and this would make her say the childish equivalent of “fuckin ‘ell” under her breath. Today she is very fond of Edward Lear but she acknowledges that as an adult compared with when she was a child, she has a concept of the absurd as something separate from the ordinary. Today Claudia laughs at normal, everyday domestic situations; even arguments have become funny to Claudia. She explains that it is difficult to relate to someone not present what was so funny; to give concrete examples of what exactly made you laugh is difficult because it is situational, in the moment and a person may need to be physically present to appreciation the funniness. But she provides an example of a friend who is very outspoken and not politically correct in his comments. He will refer to a woman as having “a face like a bag of spanners” if he does not find her attractive. Claudia gave an example of in the moment/situational humour: she met with a friend and the friend described going to the cinema with her teenage daughter. Her friend described what she was wearing: brown cords, brown shirt, brown jumper, and that she had asked her daughter whether she looked okay. Her daughter replied, “It is only yourself that you are embarrassing” This was not delivered as a joke but recalling the situation caused Claudia and her friend to burst out laughing. Claudia explains that she understands that there are a lot of

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reasons why they would laugh at this situation: “the fact that her daughter has become a young woman with her own views, is a pleasure in itself but unfettered cattiness is a by-product and this becomes funnier if you take the edge off the insecurity that its meant to cause, by sharing it with an ally. It was another fuckin 'ell, but in a good way”, a direct quote. Humour for social bonding, and as a tool in which to present and manage sensitive topics are similar to concepts given by other participants. Claudia works with children as a play worker and she uses laughter with her work colleagues in particular the colleagues she supervises; she uses laughter to make light of situations, to find the funny side. Other participants who explained how they use humour and laughter to facilitate better work performance and improve communication among the staff they manage echo these sentiments. Claudia, supervising a session suggested to one of her work colleagues that she wear some different shoes to work because they are play workers and carry heavy loads and activities include woodwork. The colleague was a new member of staff who is wearing a pair of flip-flop type sandals to work. Claudia recalls that she said to the colleague that it would be safer to wear shoes with toes but the colleague looked nonplussed and began to laugh. This caused Claudia to laugh because the laughter was infectious and it seemed ridiculous to tell a grown woman what to wear on her feet, although Claudia had intended to make a serious point, it made her feel silly and that was funny: “…she normally wears a pair of flip-flop type sandals. When I said it might be safer to wear shoes with toes she looked a bit non-plussed and then started to laugh. That made me laugh as well, I think, because it's a bit ridiculous to tell a grown woman what to wear on her feet- (I think that her laugh itself was infectious as well). I think I thought I was making a serious point and then I felt silly. That was funny.” Claudia suspects that she controls her laughing depending on present company, and she acknowledges that she has a nervous laugh/giggle because she laughs when she believes that she has messed-up (made a mistake). In general, Claudia does not believe that she is a person that laughs a lot but she does have a kind of despairing giggle when she feels that she has made a faux pas (a French term that literally means to misstep) socially. Claudia did not want me to change what I had written about her account of humour. I then developed the second figure to clarify the clusters and prevailing themes. This is illustrated in the Figure 2 below, however I also used non-electronic methods such as post-its that I could move around on a large piece of paper to put words, categories, and emerging themes into an order for myself as part of the ongoing process of analysis.

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Figure 2: Prevailing major themes and clusters of subthemes Stage 4 presented in a mind map to produce summary table This includes master themes as headings with sub-themes underneath.

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Stage 4: Summary table developed with master and subthemes Master themes

Participants Subthemes Participant contribution to subtheme

Key cross references

Indicative quotes

Notes

How I create humour

Claudia (Majority of participants)

Passively watching comedy TV series

Claudia (Others)

Claudia (L62)

“by watching back-to-back episodes of Green Wing on the bank holiday Monday, when it was sunshine outside.”

Claudia not sure she is deliberately creating humour at this moment. Most of the participants gave watching TV as example.

Deliberately wearing funny clothes

Claudia (only) Claudia (L: 65)

“I wear clothes that I think are funny…I intend for people to find them funny but it's likely they think I just look a bit weird”

Claudia an exception deliberately wearing funny clothes. She intends to be funny but thinks she appears weird.

Deliberate swearing

Claudia

Claudia (L: 40)

'fuckin 'ell', but in a good way. I just spotted I'm using a watered down comedy trick…”

Claudia explains she’s using swearing to keep me interested.

Visual humour

Claudia (L: 67-70)

“I found a tiny doll & a plastic frog in the front of my van and I deliberately left them on display in the brim of a hat on the dashboard because it’s amusing. Doing something like this has a positive impact on my wellbeing”.

Deliberately, actively creating visual humour for a reaction. Very creative, purposeful occupation, with end product. Claudia feels this has a better positive impact on her sense of wellbeing than passive humour.

Table of themes (sample)

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Stage 5: Analysis Once the summary table of master themes was completed I wrote the analysis up as a single case study/narrative account, which included some comparison with other participants (the pseudonym names will be added). There is some repetition in the Analysis account and what was already presented in the member checking account previously in Stage 4. In the final analysis presented in my discussion chapter, the prevailing master themes across the participants’ accounts will be presented and discussed, and the concepts explored in more detail where I feel that I need to investigate the theory more deeply. Additionally, I will add the subthemes as subheadings under the master (prevailing) themes when the data is analysed collectively to show clearly my pathway, and discussion of each theme. Claudia Analysis Claudia has been a useful source of information about humour as she has experienced it in her day-to-day living. In addition she is articulate and has quite well developed ideas about the reasons she deliberately and actively creates humour in her day-to-day living. And Claudia’s idea of how she deliberately creates humour is exceptional because she creates humour visually with objects, and she dresses differently to be humorous for others. Likewise, Claudia is able to give a clear idea of what she finds humorous and the notion of a preference for dark humour. She offers an exposé of what humour means to her, including the idea that her style of humour may be considered a bit weird. Reasons for creating humour The concept of how she creates humour, actively or passively in her day-to-day living surfaced throughout the interviews in different places. Talking about her work with children as a play worker, Claudia claims that she creates humour in order to cause laughter among her work colleagues in particular the colleagues she supervises. She thinks that laughter can make light of situations, and help to address sensitive issues and also to find the funny side of an awkward situation. This statement very much echoes the sentiments of other participants who also claimed that they create humour and laughter to facilitate better work performance and improve communication among the staff they manage. The example Claudia gave, was when she was supervising a session with the children and she suggested to one of her work colleagues that she wear some different shoes to work because they are play workers and carry heavy loads and their activities include woodwork. Claudia told me that the colleague was a new member of staff who was wearing a pair of flip-flop type sandals to work, and that she said to the colleague that it would be safer to wear shoes with toes but the colleague looked nonplussed and began to laugh. This according to Claudia caused her to laugh because the laughter was infectious and it seemed ridiculous to tell a grown woman what to wear on her feet, although Claudia had intended to make a serious point, it made her feel silly and that was funny to her. Another reason for creating humour, according to Claudia, is that she suspects that she controls her humour and how much she laughs depending on present company, and the social setting. And this idea is related to the concept of nervous laughter because Claudia mentioned on several occasions one of the reasons she creates humour is to mask her nervousness. She described that she has a nervous laugh/giggle when she believes that she has messed-up (made a mistake) in social situations. In general, Claudia felt that she did not believe that she is a person who creates humour a lot or laughs a lot but she does have “a kind of despairing

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giggle” when she feels that she has made a faux pas (a French term that literally means to misstep) socially. Although her claim may conflict with a later account of how she creates humour deliberately arranging objects and dressing differently. Laughing and giggling can be an automatic reaction that denotes nervousness or laughing instead of crying because laughing would be deemed more socially acceptable. There was one male participant who mentioned nervous laughter as something different that laugh out a loud humour, and one other female participant who gave an example of laughing when she is afraid or anxious. This idea would fit with the relief theory of humour that maintains that laughter is a homeostatic mechanism by which psychological tension is reduced. Claudia is thus, creating humour to facilitate the relief of tension caused by her fear of making a social mistake. Humour according to the relief theory, is created mainly to overcome sociocultural inhibitions and reveal suppressed desires, so laughing or giggling would occur as a result of this release of nervous energy. How she creates humour Claudia describes how she creates humour passively watching television (a particular TV series) and her account is similar to that of the majority of the participants who mention watching a variety of TV programmes that they find humorous for a number of different reasons. According to Claudia, she does not deliberately create humour in her day except in a passive way, and the example she gave was watching back-to-back episodes of Green Wing on a bank holiday Monday, when it was bright sunshine outside. Green Wing is a British sitcom set in a fictional hospital but there are no medical storylines; the action is produced by a series of soap opera style twists and turns in the personal lives of the characters. They proceed through a series of often, absurd sketch-like scenes, or by sequences where the film is slowed down or sped up, emphasising the body language of the characters. The watching of funny television programmes is a passive behaviour however it constitutes consciously seeking out humour. The concept of visual humour was another subtheme, which emerged without prompting during the follow-up e-interviews, and is strongly related to ways in which humour can be created. Claudia is an exception in being the only participant who said that she intentionally wears clothes that she thinks are funny in order to elicit a reaction from other people and for them to find it funny. This appears to be an example of deliberately creating humour, although Claudia thinks that she does not intentionally create humour, rather that she has a style of humour that is very subtle, understated and more a result of her passive behaviour and as a reaction to her immediate surroundings. It is evident in Claudia’s style of humour and the description of the visual humour she facilitates that her creation of humour tends to involve objects not people and speech (verbal humour), although I am unsure about this idea and need to find out more. Claudia provided a further exceptionally example of creating visual humour when she told me that in her life and work, she has ended up with “a lot of leftover stuff, these are things that are out of place, which butt up against each other and make her laugh”. The creative example that she gave was how she found a tiny doll and a plastic frog in the front of her van and she deliberately left them on display in the brim of a hat on the dashboard because she thought it was somewhat amusing. Visually, this created scenario becomes funny because the objects have been placed in an unexpected place and one is of an unexpected size. Claudia claims that this deliberate but subtle action has a better positive impact on her sense of wellbeing than

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watching comedy television. This may be because she has deliberately and actively created something for an effect and she has an end product, which is different than passively watching a TV series. This can be explained further as visually created humour because Claudia takes objects and arranges them for her amusement, and possibly the amusement of others. Claudia’s visually created humour did not fit my preconception of how a person might deliberately create humour in her/his day-to-day living, and I feel that I need to explore this idea more deeply because humour can be a verbal, visual or physical cognitive experience that is humorous and provokes laughter and provides amusement. The idea of a visual or sight gag is anything that conveys its humour visually, usually without any words being used. Visual gags are often used in surreal comedy, such as Monty Python’s Flying Circus sketch called Mrs Gorilla in which a series of middle-age women have been shopping and bought piston engines. This sketch represents, to me what is so funny about Monty Python’s Flying Circus and visual humour, and it relates well to the incongruity theory that proposes that humour is perceived at the moment of realization of incongruity between the concept involved in a certain situation and the real objects thought to be in some relation to the concept. For example, Claudia describes putting her objects (the tiny doll and plastic frog toy) into the real relation (on the dashboard in her van on visual display).

Another related subtheme is the concept of humour and swearing. And Claudia offers a good portray of her style of humour when she talks about her “high octane swearing” that she interjects into her speech. This would be considered verbal humour, and swearing makes me laugh because I can identify with it as I have a tendency to swear when I am blowing off stream. The related concept is that people need an outlet for strong emotions, and in early childhood, crying is an acceptable way to show emotions and relieve stress and anxiety but as children grow up Western society discourages them from crying in public. Swearing may be an instinctive response to something painful and unexpected (like hitting your head on an open cupboard door) or something frustrating and upsetting (like the train being delayed or cancelled on way to a job interview). This is one of the most common uses for swearing, and many researchers believe that it helps relieve stress and blow off steam, like crying does for small children. Beyond angry or upset words said in the heat of the moment, swearing does a lot of work in social interactions. And it seems that swearing presented with humour appears to be more acceptable and less offensive.

Other information about the experience of humour in day-to-day living is related to Claudia’s perception of humour and how it may have developed for her because she did not always find things so humorous when she was a child. According to Claudia, she was not always funny and did not find things humorous when she was a child, rather that she was a serious child, “the second eldest in a family of seven siblings, and a happy childhood but not carefree”. She gave the example of not appreciating nonsense rhymes that she found them awful and she thought, Edward Lear’s limericks were “crap”. Today Claudia says that she finds nonsensical jokes and rhymes, such as Lear’s limericks funny because she understands them. I feel that I need to investigate more deeply the idea that humour needs to be understood in order for it to be humorous. Claudia also gave examples of finding normal, everyday domestic situations, even arguments funny as an adult, and this may be related to her preference for dark humour. The other information about the experience of humour is the idea that humour can be considered weird. According to Claudia her style of humour would be considered weird by

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others because it is quirky and idiosyncratic: different but in a good, funny way, as it has an individual quality and another dimension, not expressed by any of the other participants. This led to Claudia reasoning that humour and measuring what is, and what is not funny is difficult to quantify. This is because humour is contextual and usually individuals experience humour in the unexpected or incongruous but how funny a person finds something depends how the specific context of that thing relates to her/his knowledge and experiences. A direct quote from Claudia: “The chaos I create, I find terrifying and amusing at one and the same time”. And Claudia’s statement fits well with the congruous theory of humour, in which humour is derived from contradiction. Another idea raised is that it is difficult to provide people, such as me/the researcher not present in the moment, with a concrete example of what is humorous and this is a prevailing theme echoed by other participants. Claudia thinks that it is difficult to provide concrete examples of what is funny because humour is situational, in the moment and a person may need to be physically present to appreciation the funniness. Claudia gave an example of in the moment/situational or contextual humour in which she met with a friend and the friend described going to the cinema with her teenage daughter. Her friend described what she was wearing: brown cords, brown shirt, brown jumper, and that she had asked her daughter whether she looked okay. Her daughter replied, “It is only yourself that you are embarrassing”. This was not delivered as a joke but recalling the situation caused Claudia and her friend to burst out laughing. Claudia claims that she understands that there are different reasons why they would find this situation humorous and laugh but by sharing the situation with an ally it became funnier because it took the edge off the insecurity that the daughter meant to cause. “It was another fuckin 'ell, but in a good way”, a direct quote from Claudia. And other participants echo the sentiment that humour is the funniest when it tells the truth. Likewise, humour serves to facilitate social bonding, and as a tool in which to present and manage sensitive topics are similar to concepts given by other participants, and these ideas will be explored further. As well as the idea that according to Claudia, her “high-octane swearing is a watered down comedy trick to try to keep others’ interested in what she is saying”. Claudia claims that she appreciates black/dark humour in television and in films, such as Fargo: simultaneously a comedy of errors, and a taut suspense thriller, which is darkly amusing. And how she creates humour is often modelled from the humour she appreciates, and also from possessing a dry sense of humour. A dry sense of humour does not readily call attention to itself as being humorous. It is not silly, in your face, and trying to be funny, laugh-out-aloud humour, such as Jim Carrey comedian/actor humour. It is often something that requires some thought before the humorous implication is obvious/the person finds it funny/gets the joke. People with a dry sense of humour can be misunderstood because it is hard to tell if they are joking or are serious; such as the work colleague laughing when Claudia is not joking but making a serious statement. A good example is Steven Wright the American comedian known for his distinctly lethargic voice and slow, deadpan delivery of ironic and sometimes nonsensical jokes and one-liners with contrived situations.