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HE WHO LAUGHS BEST, LEAVES LAST: THE INFLUENCE OF
HUMOR ON THE ATTITUDES AND BEHAVIORS OF INTERNS
Journal: Academy of Management Learning & Education
Manuscript ID: AMLE-2013-0368-RES.R3
Manuscript Type: Research & Reviews
Submission Keywords:
Humor (or fun) as a motivator – benefits; pitfalls; caveats, Internships
programs, Connecting Management Theory and Practice, Structural Equations Modeling
Academy of Management Learning & Education
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HE WHO LAUGHS BEST, LEAVES LAST: THE INFLUENCE OF HUMOR ON THE
ATTITUDES AND BEHAVIOR OF INTERNS
Authors:
Filipe Sobral
Brazilian School of Public and Business Administration
Getulio Vargas Foundation - Brazil
Gazi Islam
Grenoble Ecole de Management, France
Insper Institute of Education and Research, Brazil
Acknowledgements:
This research was partially funded by grants from the Brazilian National Research Council
(CNPq) and the Rio de Janeiro Research Foundation (FAPERJ). We thank the editors, Dr.
Kenneth Brown and Dr. Holly Brower, and three anonymous reviewers for their insightful
comments and suggestions, which helped us to improve this article.
Brief professional note:
Filipe Sobral is an associate professor of organizational behavior at the Brazilian School of
Public and Business Administration at Getulio Vargas Foundation. His current research interests
are leadership processes, conflict dynamics and ethical decision-making. [email protected]
Gazi Islam is currently Associate Professor at Grenoble Ecole de Management, France. He has
served as faculty at Insper, Tulane University, and the University of New Orleans. His current
research interests include the organizational antecedents and consequences of identity, and the
relations between identity, group dynamics and the production of group and organizational
cultures. [email protected]
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HE WHO LAUGHS BEST, LEAVES LAST: THE INFLUENCE OF HUMOR ON THE
ATTITUDES AND BEHAVIORS OF INTERNS
ABSTRACT
Internships have become both an important part of undergraduate education and a critical tool for
management education and organizational recruitment. To better understand the drivers of
interns’ work outcomes, we hypothesize that supervisor humor plays a signaling role related to
interns that sends implicit messages about organizational and supervisory relationships and
thereby affects interns’ attitudes and behaviors. Using a sample of 184 students enrolled in
internship programs, this study empirically examines, through structural equation modeling, the
relationship between supervisor humor use and intern satisfaction, intention to stay and negligent
behavior at work. Our findings suggest that the use of positive humor is associated with a higher
level of intern satisfaction, whereas the use of negative humor has the opposite effect. Intern
satisfaction, moreover, is found to mediate the relationship between humor and interns’ attitudes
at work, suggesting that a supervisor’s use of appropriate humor can, through satisfaction, reduce
negligent behavior and improve willingness to accept permanent employment at the organization.
Based on these findings, we discuss the importance of the dyadic intern-supervisor relationship as
a key determinant of internship effectiveness.
Keywords: Internship; Humor; Satisfaction, Intention to stay; Negligent behavior
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Internships form a crucial link between business schools and the market (Ehrensal, 2001;
Liu, Xu, & Weitz, 2011; Perlin, 2011; Zhao & Liden; 2011), not only affecting students’ personal
(Haugh & Talwar, 2010), educational (D’Abate, Youndt, & Wenzel 2009), and career outcomes
(Liu et al., 2011) but also playing an increasingly important role in businesses’ recruiting and
selection (Narayanan, Olk & Fukami, 2010; Zhao & Liden, 2011). By providing realistic job
previews for candidates, together with rich evaluation mechanisms for businesses, internships
allow for an increased fit between firms and potential full-time job candidates. In addition to
developing future professionals by offering them real-life work experiences (Clark, 2003;
Daugherty, 2000), internships are valuable to companies as a source of human resources (Gault,
Redington, & Schalger, 2000; Hurst, 2008), securing a talent pool already entrenched in the
organization’s cultural values (Tovey, 2001). Not surprisingly, then, many corporations have
begun to rely almost exclusively on internships as a recruitment mechanism (Gerdes, 2009).
Unexpectedly, despite the growing popularity of internships (Liu et al., 2011), little
research has investigated the antecedents of their effectiveness (Narayanan et al., 2010). A few
noteworthy studies have identified the importance of direct supervisors’ support during the
internship experience and the relationship between the characteristics of the work performed and
internship satisfaction (e.g., Anson & Forsberg, 1990; D’Abate et al., 2009). Although relatively
little research has appeared, the unique work-related experience of interns and how they use
supervisor and organizational cues to construct their initial workplace experiences have become
areas of increasing concern in the fields of management (Zhao & Liden, 2011) and management
education (D’Abate et al., 2009).
Because internships, as a rapidly emerging fusion of educational settings and the
workplace, inhabit a conceptual gray area (Perlin, 2011), much work remains to understand their
dynamics. Findings regarding internship experiences may help students before, during or after
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internships by facilitating choices and promoting reflection both inside and outside the classroom.
Understanding intern outcomes is also important for educational institutions, which can use
internship research to better design internship partnerships and programs and to improve
students’ educational experiences through counseling.
Additionally, because interns tend to be embedded in mentoring relationships from which
they derive their expectations about their organizations (Liu et al., 2011), one would expect
mentors to perform an important signaling function in organizations (cf., Wrzesniewski, Dutton,
& Debebe, 2003). According to this perspective, relationships communicate important
information about both the task and interpersonal aspects of work life, and, thus, they are the
proximal vehicles of organizational culture and policies. Furthermore, supervisors’ signals related
to the types of relationships to expect at work should have a strong relationship to interns’
subsequent job-related attitudes. Indeed, Rothman (2003) confirms that interpersonal
relationships are key to interns’ subsequent attitudes, and D’Abate, Youndt, and Wenzel (2009)
identify that the relationship with the supervisor is an important determinant of intern
satisfaction.
If supervisor relationships act largely as signaling mechanisms through which individuals
learn about their organizations’ cultures, then the use of humor as a signaling device (cf.,
Adelsward & Oberg, 1998; Romero & Pescosolido, 2008) should play an important role in this
process. Studies of humor in the workplace (e.g., Avolio, Howell, & Sosik, 1999; Duncan,
Smeltzer & Leap, 1990; Romero & Cruthirds, 2006) have pointed to its role in defining, teaching
and clarifying aspects of the workplace, while making the boss-subordinate relationship more
positive and less tense (Decker, 1987; Decker & Rotondo, 2001; Malone, 1980). As a result, the
use of humor by the direct supervisor may be associated with intern satisfaction and is an
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important variable in explaining negligent behavior during the internship and, ultimately, the
intention to continue in the organization after the internship concludes.
However, humor can be a double-edged sword. In addition to creating rapport and easing
tension, humor can create divisions, vent dissatisfaction, and constitute a form of workplace
cynicism or resistance (e.g., Fleming & Spicer, 2002; Rodrigues & Collinson, 1995). The
ambivalent nature of workplace humor makes it likely to have divergent effects in the workplace,
contributing to its richness as an area of study.
The goal of this paper is to understand how the direct supervisor’s use of humor as a
communication strategy relates to interns’ attitudes and behaviors. More specifically, this study
attempts to examine to what extent the use of positive and negative forms of humor in the
workplace determines satisfaction with an internship program, negligent behavior in the
workplace and interns’ intention to be permanently hired by the organization. A structural
equation model is tested to evaluate the dynamic relationship between these constructs.
Although the relationship between job attitudes and employee outcomes has been well
documented in the literature (e.g., Brief, 1998), this study differs from the existing literature in
several ways. First, this study focuses on the impact of humor on workplace relationships, which
is not well established in the literature (e.g., Mesmer-Magnus, Glew, & Viswesvaran, 2012).
Second, the effects of negative humor in particular have not been tested in this context. Third, the
research has not applied existing theory to internships, an emerging, yet understudied
organizational context. Finally, the mediation mechanism between humor and work outcomes via
attitudes remains unclear, with most humor research examining only direct effects.
The rest of this paper unfolds as follows. First, we review the extant literature on
organizational internships, arguing that the particular importance of relationships as
organizational information conduits makes signaling phenomena such as humor particularly
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salient to these relationships and predictive of job-related attitudes and outcomes. Next, we
describe an empirical examination of the effects of supervisor humor on interns’ attitudes and
behaviors, demonstrating that these effects depend on the specific informational content of the
supervisor’s humor. Finally, we discuss these effects in terms of our understanding of intern
relationships and humor in organizations.
INTERNSHIPS AS EXPERIENTIAL LEARNING THROUGH RELATIONSHIPS
Increasingly, traditional classroom models of business education are questioned (D’Abate
et al., 2009), with some claiming that business education has little or no relationship to
organizational reality (Ashkanasy, 2006). As a result, supervised internships are becoming more
important to provide a bridge between education and practical work experience (Navarro, 2008).
Although there are no official government statistics on internships, there are an estimated 1 to 2
million internships annually in the U.S. (Perlin, 2011), and research centers such as Vault
estimate that between 1980 and 2000, the percentage of undergraduate students participating in
internships increased from 3% to 77% (Vault, 2000).
Internships offer employers numerous benefits that range from facilitating knowledge
transfer from universities to organizations (Narayanan et al., 2010) to better screening of new
potential hires (Gabris & Mitchell, 1989; Gault et al., 2000; Hurst, 2008; Tovey, 2001).
Internships not only reduce costs but also increase flexibility in recruiting, selection and training
(Bailey, Hughes, & Barr 2000). Additionally, organizations are likely to achieve higher retention
rates when they hire their interns for full-time positions (D’Abate et al., 2009). The importance of
internships in recruiting and retention suggests that employers should not consider interns only as
temporary labor but that they should take seriously attempts to promote interns’ effective work
behaviors and intention to remain. From the student perspective, internships are a form of
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experiential learning that assist in the development of relevant skills tied to job contexts (Garavan
& Murphy, 2001), ease the transition from student to professional (Herr & Cramer, 1988; Paulson
& Baker, 1999; Taylor, 1988), and increase employability and starting salary (Gault et al., 2000).
Thus, effective leadership should benefit interns, who may see their work as the first step in
developing a career rather than as a part-time experiment.
In addition to students and organizations, educational institutions benefit from internship
programs. Some studies have shown that an internship program can enhance an educational
institution’s reputation and visibility (Divine, Linrud, Miller, & Wilson, 2007) and help it to
assess student learning and curriculum development (Sapp & Zhang, 2009). Furthermore,
feedback from internship sponsors can be used as a real-world assessment of students’ skills and
as input for curricular changes. Finally, the contacts with professionals in the business
community provided by internships can improve faculty members’ personal and professional
growth because internships may lead to opportunities for faculty consulting or research project
development (Divine et al., 2007).
Given all the potential benefits of internships, it is surprising that few studies have
examined the factors that influence positive internship experiences (D’Abate et al., 2009). The
literature on internships is largely descriptive and anecdotal, and very few studies have provided
hypothesis testing (Narayanan et al., 2010). What is evident from the literature, however, is that
supervisor relationships are central to the internship experience (Liu et al., 2011). Although these
relationships are crucial in organizations more generally, interns may be particularly sensitive to
supervisors’ behavior for several reasons. First, interns may not have a great deal of prior
experience in the workplace. Thus, being eager to construct a broad view of the workplace more
generally, they may be hyper-vigilant to the cues and signals that they receive during their
internships. Second, because internships are framed as “educational experiences” and linked to
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class credit, interns may be likely to use organizational experiences as forms of learning and to
see supervisors as mentors (cf., Liu et al., 2011). Third, because interns may inhabit low power
positions, and we know from the social psychology literature that low power stimulates vigilance
and attention to others (Keltner, Grunfeld, & Anderson, 2003), they should be highly sensitive to
supervisor messages. Finally, because interns often contemplate seeking a permanent job in the
organization (Zhao & Liden, 2011) but are not yet fully integrated, they may be searching for
cues to inform their future options and preferences.
Therefore, we argue that supervisor relationship quality may act as a vehicle for interns’
perception of organizational aspects. This implies that intern satisfaction, together with other job-
related attitudes and behavior, should be related to the impressions that interns gain through these
relationships. Conversely, interns’ satisfaction is a concern not only to students but also to
organizations because research has demonstrated links between intern satisfaction and important
behavioral variables that affect organizational outcomes, such as stress, commitment,
absenteeism and turnover (Hellman, 1997; Knoop, 1995; Sagie, 1998; Steinhardt et al., 2003;
Tett & Meyer, 1993).
In this study, we focus on two primary types of outcomes. The first, intent to remain with
the organization, is defined as the intern’s desire to continue within the organization and involves
the desire to develop a career within the organization in the capacity of formal employment.
Intention to remain is key to internships because of their centrality as potential recruitment
mechanisms, and intention to remain is central to interns’ career development. This variable is
particularly relevant to interns because of the inherent precariousness of such positions vis-à-vis
traditional employment, raising the important question of when interns will attempt to “solidify”
their employment status. The second outcome variable, negligent behavior, is defined as
remaining at work but putting forth less effort, attention, or engagement (e.g., Leck & Saunders,
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1992). Both negligent behavior and intent to remain are derived from Hirschman’s (1970) exit-
voice-loyalty-neglect model, in which exit and neglect intentions are low-power responses to
negative work experiences. Negligent behavior and intent to remain are thus particularly relevant
to intern situations because interns presumably are not usually powerful actors. Because loyalty
may be less critical in relationships that are often short term, and many internships may limit the
possibility for voice, exit and neglect-related behaviors may be a particularly salient response to
intern dissatisfaction and thus are an intuitive outcome measure.
As set forth below, humor allows for the establishment of positive supervisor
relationships that pass important organizational information through the interpersonal
relationship. These relationships tacitly teach interns about the workplace via the subtle signals
present in humor episodes. To see how this is the case, we turn to research on humor in
organizations.
HUMOR AS INFORMATION ABOUT WORK THROUGH RELATIONSHIPS
According to Duncan, Smeltzer and Leap (1990: 255), the study of humor in interpersonal
relationships in the workplace “has the potential to generate important ideas for the field of
business administration and organizational behavior”. Among the range of formal motivational
mechanisms from which managers can choose, humor is one of the most promising because it
establishes relationships through signals that go beyond the interpersonal relationship to represent
sensitive and elusive organizational aspects (Romero & Pescosolido, 2008). A recent meta-
analysis by Mesmer-Magnus et al. (2012) supports the role of humor in work-related and leader
effectiveness.
However, as Crawford (1994: 54) notes, “Perhaps out of all communication strategies
used by leaders, the use of humor may be the most promising, but is also the least understood”.
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Some early reviews note the continuing, sporadic nature of such research (Duncan, Smeltzer, &
Leap, 1990), and, almost 20 years later, Mesmer-Magnus et al. (2012) acknowledge that
fundamental debates about the conceptualization of humor remain unresolved, particularly with
respect to forms of humor that deviate from “positive” humor (Martin, Puhlik-Doris, Larsen,
Gray, & Weir, 2003; Veselka, Schermer, Martin, & Vernon, 2010). Acknowledging the
multifaceted nature of humor, they both maintain the predictive importance of humor and lament
the fact that there is “little shared understanding” of its effects (Mesmer-Magnus et al., 2012, p.
155). However, in their meta-analysis of the area, they maintain that throughout these debates
there is the recognition that humor is fundamentally a communicative phenomenon between
individuals.
The interpersonal nature of humor explains the ease of socialization by bringing team
members closer together (Duncan, 1982) and improving interpersonal relationships (Romero &
Cruthirds, 2006). Studies have found that humor increases staff morale (Gruner, 1996), forming
the basis for a positive organizational culture (Clouse & Spurgeon, 1995); it also encourages
collective and individual creativity (Arendt, 2009; Lang & Lee, 2010; Murdock & Ganim, 1993),
improves motivation (Crawford, 1994), and increases both group productivity (Clouse &
Spurgeon, 1995) and overall organizational efficiency (Romero & Cruthirds, 2006). Moreover,
by promoting a more pleasant work environment and allowing people to better address
ambiguity, humor is an effective tool for dealing with stress (Arendt, 2009; Duncan, 1982;
Yovitch, Dale, & Hudak, 1990). Thus, not surprisingly, we conclude that humor not only
improves the atmosphere in the workplace (Decker & Rotondo, 2001) but also has an impact on
organizational performance (Avolio, Howell, & Sosik, 1999). Additionally, because humor is
considered a communicational style or set of behaviors (e.g., Crawford, 1994) rather than a stable
personality trait, it may provide a malleable factor in management that can be learned, trained, or
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otherwise leveraged for organizational advantage (Mesmer-Magnus et al., 2012). Although one
might question the possibility of learning to use humor well or of training managers to be
humorous (although see Romero & Cruthirds, 2006), managers might at the very least be trained
to refrain from more ineffective forms of humor, thus providing some degree of organizational
control over deleterious humor outcomes.
With respect to the communication function of humor, Adelsward and Oberg (1998) find
that humor signals sensitive organizational information that might be difficult to explicitly
express, and it often contains important information. Furthermore, humor increases the
persuasiveness of supervisor communications (Greatbatch & Clark, 2002), having a positive
effect on organizational socialization by making interactions less tense (Morreall, 1991).
According to Meyer (2000), one way that humor works is through a principle of
incongruity, whereby surprising aspects of the environment, when resolved, give rise to
humorous reactions that clarify situations and create identifications. Thus, for example, a
manager can tacitly provide organizational information by making jokes, where “getting” the
joke implicitly requires accepting the underlying organizational premise. Thus, for example, if a
manager jokingly says, “Well, we might have to work all night tonight”, he may be passing both
information about the business’s work ethic and humorously exaggerating the amount of
required, creating both a socialization message and a reinforcing affirmation about respect for the
employee. Such a statement also shows that the manager not only understands the worker’s initial
hesitation at such a suggestion but also commiserates, thus creating a social bond. Such messages
are simultaneously engaging and informative and thus draw attention to and reduce the need for
prolonged explanations (Gruner, 1996). We refer to these socially reaffirming forms of humor as
positive humor.
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At the same time, humor can function to distance individuals and to enforce norms
(Meyer, 2000), effects that can create interpersonal tension and constitute an assertion of power
over others (Duncan, Leap, & Smeltzer, 1990). Thus, although the majority of the literature
discusses positive humor, some studies suggest that humor also has a “dark side” and may be
more complex than simply promoting social bonds. For example, Holmes and Marra (2006) find
that humor can be used either as a way to collaborate and create solidarity or as a way to generate
conflict. Duncan et al. (1990), at the same time, note the possibility for supervisory humor to spill
over into harassment, depending on its framing. Some authors discuss negative forms of humor
that can be used aggressively to criticize and provoke others, such as sarcasm, irony, ridicule and
mockery (Chen & Martin, 2007; Martin et al., 2003).
Indeed, humor can tacitly send negative messages about organizations under a veneer of
positivity, thus constituting a subtle “weapon” against the organization (Fleming & Spicer, 2002).
Similarly, Sturdy, and Fineman (2001) describe the “safety valve” function of workplace humor
as a way to safely send negative messages and thus to vent frustrations. This aspect of negative
humor makes sense given the “incongruity” principle described previously; humorous techniques
may be used precisely when managers wish to express contradictory organizational messages
(Hatch & Ehrlich, 1993), as suggested in the example above. In this context, some authors
describe negative workplace humor as a “significant form” of misbehavior (Ackroyd &
Thompson, 1999: 103). In cases in which employees use supervisor cues to interpret
organizational aspects, one would expect the use of negative humor to send a doubly negative
message, not only pointing out unsatisfactory organizational aspects but also highlighting the
difficulty in openly discussing those aspects. Thus, such humor should be negatively related to
job attitudes. We refer to such forms of abrasive humor as negative humor.
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We see from the above discussion that humor contains a multitude of functions and social
uses (e.g., Cooper, 2008; Duncan et al., 1990; Meyer, 2000). Although it is beyond the scope of
this paper to examine each function distinctly, we broadly distinguish between positive and
negative uses of humor in the workplace. The majority of the literature has shown the positive
effects of humor in organizations, in terms of both attitudes and outcomes (e.g., Mesmer-Magnus
et al., 2012), and suggests that individual and organizational outcomes at work are influenced by
the use of humor (Avolio et al., 1999; Decker, 1987; Vecchio et al., 2009). However, there is far
less research that has examined the potentially negative aspects of humor (for exceptions see
Fleming & Spicer, 2002; Martin et al., 2003; Veselka et al., 2010). Moreover, although past
research has examined the workforce generally, our interest is in the intern population. This
interest highlights the central aspects of supervisor-intern relationships and socialization and
learning. Additionally, it allows us to explore an organizational population that has not been
sufficiently studied (Narayanan et al., 2010) and that has key implications for management
learning and education (Zhao & Liden, 2011). In the next section, we apply the literature
outlined above to specific theoretical predictions involving interns and describe an empirical
study designed to test these predictions.
RESEARCH MODEL AND HYPOTHESIS DEVELOPMENT
Although the above studies have not specifically focused on interns, there is reason to
believe that the effects that those studies find are especially pertinent to this population. As noted
above, the supervisor relationship is likely to be especially salient to interns (Liu et al., 2011).
Because interns are both learning about organizational life and considering possible employment
at the organization and may be particularly driven by career development motives
(Wrzesniewski, Mccauley, Rozin, & Schwartz, 1997), they are likely to interpret supervisor
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messages with particular enthusiasm and take supervisor messages seriously (Wrzesniewski et
al., 2003). In this context, humor is likely to play an important role in forming intern job
attitudes and subsequent intention to remain in or to leave the organization.
Positive Humor. Because the use of positive humor by managers facilitates the
development of interpersonal relationships, reduces workplace stress, and aids in workplace
socialization (Duncan & Feisal, 1989; Morreall, 1991), it is likely to lead interns to feel as though
they are part of the group (Duncan, 1982) and to see the organization in light of its positive
aspects. Mesmer-Magnus et al. (2012), for instance, specify multiple ways in which leaders’
positive humor can improve workplace environments, such as reducing supervisor-subordinate
social distance, facilitating learning and change, and creating affective bonds. Thus, it stands to
reason that positive humor, as a communication strategy by the direct supervisor, creates a more
relaxed and informal work environment that increases interns’ overall feeling of happiness with
their internship program:
H1a: The supervisor’s use of positive humor is positively associated with interns’
satisfaction.
In addition to its effect on intern satisfaction, humor can be taken as a sign of an
organization’s open, welcoming attitude. Young workers, who prefer a “fun” workplace (Romero
& Pescosolido 2008), are likely to be drawn to a “fun” work situation, reducing their withdrawal
behaviors (although some have noted potential negative effects of fun, e.g., Meyer, 1999;
Romero & Pescosolido, 2008). Additionally, the increased persuasiveness of humorous messages
(Greatbatch & Clark, 2002) should augment supervisors’ influence and cement interns’ sense that
it is worth continuing at the organization. Thus, positive humor should exert a direct negative
effect on negligent behavior during the internship and a positive effect on increasing the intention
to be permanently hired by the host company after the end of the internship:
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H1b: The supervisor’s use of positive humor is negatively associated with interns’
negligent behavior.
H1c: The supervisor’s use of positive humor is positively associated with interns’
intention to remain at the company after the end of the internship.
Negative Humor. Despite the largely positive effects hypothesized above, humor takes
multiple forms and is used to communicate diverse messages (Decker & Rotondo, 1999, 2001;
Romero & Pescosolido, 2008). Negative humor may result in poor conduct and cause political
and aggressive behavior, affecting the work climate and interpersonal relationships (Decker &
Rotondo, 2001). Negative humor is also associated with negative emotional reactions, such as
neuroticism, anger, and aggression (Romero & Pescosolido, 2008). In fact, studies have shown
that undesirable and less healthy forms of humor may not only irritate and strain those involved
(Duncan & Feisal, 1989) but also hinder the development of interpersonal relationships (Kuiper
et al., 2004). Thus, when humor is used to attack or ridicule (e.g., Chen & Martin, 2007) or to
pass negative tacit messages about the organization (e.g., Fleming & Spicer, 2002), one can
predict both that the supervisor-intern relationship is compromised and that interns perceive the
organization in a negative light; thus, humor used to attack or ridicule leads to dissatisfaction
with the internship program:
H2a: The supervisor’s use of negative humor is negatively associated with interns’
satisfaction.
Beyond the evaluative content of negative humor as a driver of intern satisfaction, we can
also imagine a direct effect on withdrawal, negligent behavior and turnover intention. Some
authors describe the harsh conditions, including mockery, associated with apprenticeships and
internships (Perlin, 2011). Interns, seen as newcomers to the organization, usually are one of the
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primary targets of negative humor (Duncan & Feisal, 1989) and are subject to various situations
in which they may encounter mockery, irony and sarcasm, often with sexual undertones (e.g.,
Alcadipani & Rosa, 2010). The negative psychological effects of this kind of humor (Frewen et
al., 2008) may result in interns wanting to leave an organization in which supervisors use
abrasive humor in their communication. Additionally, interns may be motivated to avoid work
situations in which they expect to encounter such humor, leading to increased negligent behavior:
H2b: The supervisor’s use of negative humor is positively associated with interns’
negligent behavior.
H2c: The supervisor’s use of negative humor is negatively associated with interns’
intention to remain in the company after the end of the internship.
Mediation effects of humor and intern satisfaction. Thus far, we have argued that positive
and negative humor relate to interns’ satisfaction with the internship program, negligence and
intention to obtain a full-time job at the host company after the end of the internship. These
effects complement past work on the diverse effects of humor while following the call of
Mesmer-Magnus et al. (2012) for more research on negative forms of humor. That literature,
however, stops short of examining moderation/mediation mechanisms that further explain the
effects of humor. We thus complete our theoretical model by positing that work evaluations
provide a mechanism by which humor relates to negligent behavior and turnover intention. In
other words, humor alone is not expected to relate to interns’ work outcomes, but, instead, the
satisfaction or dissatisfaction caused by the supervisor’s use of humor is expected to explain the
link. More specifically, we suggest that positive humor affects the latter through increasing
satisfaction, which in turn decreases negligent and withdrawal behaviors at work and increases
the intention to remain at the company, whereas negative humor has the opposite effect.
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As described above, humor both increases affective social bonds and transmits relevant
work-related information in organizations Adelsward & Oberg, 1998; Decker & Rotondo, 2001).
Intern satisfaction is likely to be closely related to both of these effects of humor because
satisfaction contains both cognitive and affective components (e.g., Eagly & Chaiken, 1993). On
the cognitive level, humor can send positive (or negative) work-related information used to form
attitudes, whereas, on the affective level, humor can increase positive (or negative) affect,
influencing satisfaction through a separate channel. Furthermore, positive attitudes towards the
work environment reflect employees’ appreciation of organizational working conditions and
increase their propensity to stay with the organization (e.g., Hom, Mitchell, Lee & Griffeth,
2012). On the other hand, less satisfied employees are more likely to leave the organization (e.g.,
Judge et al., 2001). Similarly, among interns who stay, satisfaction should lead to reduced work
negligence, such as absenteeism and lateness (e.g., Elicker et al., 2008; Darr & Johns, 2008).
These negligent behaviors, as described by Farrell (1983), are responses to dissatisfaction that go
beyond simple turnover decisions. Because past research (e.g., Podsakoff, LePine & LePine,
2007) has established links between such attitudes and withdrawal and exit behavior, humor’s
effects on such behaviors may be largely due to its effects on attitudes.
Thus, positive humor may have an indirect effect on interns’ propensity to stay in an
organization, and among those who stay, to reduce their negligent behavior. Negative humor, on
the contrary, should exert a negative indirect effect on the intention to stay and conversely, a
positive indirect effect on negligent behavior, mediated by intern satisfaction. In conclusion, we
predict that interns’ satisfaction should mediate the relationship between the supervisor’s humor
and interns’ behaviors; nevertheless, we believe that it is possible that other mechanisms,
including relational effects such as identification, could also explain this relationship
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independently of satisfaction. Thus, we posit intern satisfaction as one possible mediating
mechanism between humor and intern outcomes.
H3a: Intern satisfaction mediates the relationship between the supervisor’s use of humor
and intention to continue in the company.
H3b: Intern satisfaction mediates the relationship between the supervisor’s use of humor
and negligent behavior.
METHOD
Participants and Procedures
Participants were recruited from career centers and internship programs at three
universities in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Brazil has the advantage of an extensive history of using
internships in higher education. The Brazilian internship model typically involves undergraduate
students working on sponsored projects during the final years before graduation. In Brazil,
internships are required for most academic majors (including business, law, psychology and
engineering) and are federally regulated by the Internship Act (Law no. 11.788, September 25,
2008). The Internship Act defines internships as a supervised educational mechanism that aims to
prepare students to enter the labor market, specifying that interns must receive academic
oversight and that the work activities must be related to their academic majors. Thus, unlike in
other contexts, such as the U.S. (Perlin, 2011), in Brazil internships are legally formalized and
require significant academic involvement.
Survey invitations were administered directly by emails from business school career
centers and not in discrete collection sessions. Therefore, we do not know the precise number of
interns who were invited to participate and thus cannot provide an exact response rate. The
survey invitation included a cover letter explaining the research topic, instructions to participants
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and the survey link. As an incentive, students were offered lottery tickets for a prize that was
subsequently distributed (although attrition from the study did not affect receipt of the tickets).
The voluntary and anonymous nature of the study was emphasized to encourage candid responses
and reduce social desirability bias (King & Bruner, 2000). Questionnaires were administered in
Portuguese, and items were translated using the standard method of back-translation (Brislin,
1980). First, the survey was translated into Portuguese by a bilingual speaker, and second,
another bilingual speaker was asked to back-translate the same items into English without having
access to the original survey. Both translators were asked to comment on any items that they saw
as ambiguous with respect to semantic equivalence. That process did not give rise to major
changes to any of the items.
A total of 184 interns completed the questionnaire. On average, the students were 22 years
old, 55% were female and 67% were in their final year before graduation. Most of the
participants were business majors (44%), while the remaining participants came from a variety of
academic backgrounds, including engineering (9%), law (9%), economics (4%) and psychology
(3%). Approximately 52% of the participants had male supervisors.
Measures
Use of humor
Eight items regarding the supervisor’s use of humor were measured in terms of frequency
of occurrence on a five-point scale ranging from 1 (not at all) to 5 (frequently, if not always). The
four items that measured positive humor were taken from Avolio et al. (1999) and included items
such as “My supervisor uses humor to take the edge off during stressful periods” and “My
supervisor uses amusing stories to defuse conflicts”. The other four items that measured negative
humor were developed from the literature on humor and leadership (e.g., Decker & Rotondo,
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1999; 2001) and included items such as “My supervisor mocks people at work, embarrassing
them” and “My supervisor tells dirty jokes that often make people uncomfortable”. The reliability
of the humor scales in the present study was 0.83 and 0.93 for positive and negative humor,
respectively.
Intern satisfaction
Intern satisfaction was measured with a 4-item scale derived from Brayfield and Rothe’s
(1951) Job Satisfaction Index, using a 5-point Likert-type scale ranging from 1 (strongly
disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). Some examples of the items included “I feel fairly satisfied with
my internship” and “I feel that I am happier with my internship than most people”. The reliability
of this scale in this study was 0.87.
Intention to stay and negligent behavior
Intention to stay and negligent behavior were each measured with 3-item scales adapted
from Leck and Saunders (1992). Participants were asked to indicate on a 5-point scale, ranging
from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree), how strongly they agreed with various behaviors
at work. Negligent behavior items included “I put in less effort in my work than I know I can”, “I
show up late for work even when I could make it in on time” and “I take more and longer breaks
than I should”. Intention to stay was measured by the following items: “I wish to continue
working at the company until I complete my bachelor degree”, “I wish to develop a career at this
organization”, and “I wish to be formally employed by this organization”. The reliability of these
two scales was 0.88 and 0.72 for intention to stay and negligent behavior, respectively.
Control Variables
As prior research has demonstrated, trait affect (positive/negative) can influence
individuals’ evaluations of attitude objects (such as their supervisors) and job satisfaction (cf., Ng
and Sorenson, 2009). Thus, to rule out the possibility that outcomes were influenced by the
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intern’s trait affect and not the supervisor's humor, we controlled both intern affect using ten
items from the Positive Affect and Negative Affect Scale (PANAS) (Watson, Clark, & Tellegen,
1988). Gender (both intern and supervisor) and intern age were also included as controls because
they can influence the way that people interpret and react to humor (e.g., Thorsen & Powell,
1996). Moreover, because gender similarity can create an identification between subordinates and
supervisors (Shore, Randel, Chung, Dean, Holcombe-Ehrhart & Singh, 2010), it was also added
as a control. Supervisor position was also controlled, reasoning that supervisory hierarchical and
status differentials could relate to closeness of relationship (Antonakis & Atwater, 2002) and thus
potentially affect our results. Finally, we coded the industry type of the host organization
(traditional versus knowledge-based) and included it as a covariable in our analyses, with the idea
that the more dynamic organizational culture of knowledge-based industries might affect
interpersonal interactions (cf., Consoli & Rentocchini, 2013) and thus confound our expected
relationships.
Common Method Variance
Because data were collected using survey measures from a single source, several steps
were taken to address potential concerns about common method bias (Podsakoff, MacKenzie,
Lee, & Podsakoff, 2003). Procedural remedies to avoid these biases included protecting
respondent confidentiality, reducing item ambiguity and randomizing items. Moreover, we
performed statistical remedies. Specifically, we performed Harman’s 1-factor test and conducted
an exploratory factor analysis using principal component analysis and varimax rotation for all
independent and dependent variables. No single major factor emerged to account for a majority
of the variance explained by the model (the EFA yielded a 7-factor solution, with the first factor
accounting for only 22% of the variance explained), suggesting that the data contain no
substantial common method bias.
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Analytical Strategy
To test the hypotheses, we developed a structural equation model using AMOS v. 16 that
can assess the direct and indirect relationships within a model. The recommendations of
Anderson and Gerbing (1988) were followed for implementing the model. First, a confirmatory
factorial analysis was performed to test whether the variables used to measure each construct
presented convergent validity (i.e., whether the items of each construct were correlated, defining
an internally consistent construct) and discriminant validity (i.e., whether the variables of
different constructs clearly measured different constructs). Subsequently, the causal relations
proposed in the theoretical model were estimated in several structural path models, analyzing
which model best fit the data.
RESULTS
Descriptive Statistics
Table 1 presents the means, standard deviations, and correlations among the key
constructs.
Insert Table 1
Measurement Model
To evaluate unidimensionality and the convergent validity of the model’s constructs (i.e.,
positive humor, negative humor, internship satisfaction, turnover intention and negligent
behavior), a confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was conducted. The factor structure of the
measurement model revealed a good fit (χ2 = 227.0; χ2/df (125) = 1.82; GFI = 0.89; CFI = 0.95;
RSMEA = 0.07), and no standardized residual for each pair of items within each construct was
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higher than 2.58, thus suggesting unidimensionality (Garver and Mentzer, 1999). Furthermore, all
of the indicators in the model presented statistically significant (p < .01) loadings on their
intended constructs.
To further assess the discriminant validity of our measures, we followed the procedures
outlined by Fornell and Larcker (1981), which require the average variance extracted for two
constructs to exceed the squared correlation between the constructs to demonstrate discriminant
validity. The results confirmed that all of our study constructs have sufficient discriminant
validity.
Hypothesized Models
Having confirmed that the adequate fit of the measurement model, we tested our study
hypotheses in two interlinked steps. First, we examined a non-mediated model to evaluate the
extent to which the interns’ attitudes and behaviors were influenced by their supervisors’ use of
humor (Hypotheses 1 and 2). Second, we empirically tested if satisfaction acted as a mediator of
the proposed relationships between humor and work outcomes (Hypothesis 3). Analyses were
conducted with all control variables on the model.
The results of the non-mediated model (χ2 = 769,2; χ
2/df (458) = 1.68; GFI = 0.82; CFI =
0.88; RSMEA = 0.06) supported Hypotheses 1a and 2a, showing that the use of positive humor
by the supervisor was positively and significantly related to interns’ satisfaction (b = 0.29, p<
.01), whereas negative humor exerted the opposite effect (b = -0.39, p< .01). Additionally, the
direct (non-mediated) effect of positive humor on either negligent behavior at work or intention
to stay was non-significant (b = -0.12, p > .10 and b = 0.01, p > .10, respectively), whereas
negative humor was found to be positively related to interns’ negligence (b = 0.30, p< 0.01) and
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negatively related to intention to stay at the end of the internship (b = -0.21, p<0.01), thus
supporting Hypotheses 2b and 2c.
The non-significant direct relationship between positive humor and both work outcomes,
hypothesized by H1b and H1c, may be explained by the mediated nature of such relationships.
Despite Baron and Kenny’s (1986) suggestion that mediation requires the independent variable X
to exert a significant direct effect on the outcome Y (Step 1), methodologists have recently
identified potential shortcomings to this approach (MacKinnon et al., 2002). As the mediational
process becomes more distal or complex, the size of the X to Y association typically weakens and
may even lose statistical significance (as in the present instance) because it is more likely to be
“(a) transmitted through additional links in a causal chain, (b) affected by competing causes, and
(c) affected by random factors” (Shrout & Bolger, 2002: 429). Consequently, to test Hypotheses
1b and 1c, the significance of indirect effects of positive humor on work outcomes through the
proposed mediational paths was analyzed.
To test for mediation, we thus compared the non-mediated model with the partially
mediated model, in which both the direct and indirect effects of humor on outcomes (through
satisfaction) were estimated (χ2 = 718,2; χ
2/df (456) = 1.58; GFI = 0.83; CFI = 0.90; RSMEA =
0.06), and the fully mediated model, in which humor was hypothesized to only have an indirect
effect on interns’ behavioral outcomes through satisfaction (χ2 = 725.9; χ
2/df (460) = 1.58; GFI =
0.83; CFI = 0.90; RSMEA = 0.06). Both models provided an improvement in fit over the non-
mediated model, thus suggesting that the relationship between humor and interns’ work outcomes
is mediated by internship satisfaction.
The estimates of the standardized parameters of the partially mediated model are
presented in Table 2; Figure 1 highlights the significant model paths.
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Insert Table 2
Insert Figure 1
Our results indicated significant links between internship satisfaction and intention to stay
(b = 0.73, p < .01) and negligent behavior (b = -0.53, p < .01), thus supporting a direct effect of
the mediator on the outcome variables. Additionally, the direct effects of supervisor humor
(positive and negative) on behavioral outcomes were non-significant (with one exception),
suggesting the largely indirect influence of humor (via internship satisfaction) on negligent
behavior and intention to stay. However, we found a direct significant negative relationship
between positive humor and intention to stay (b = -0.22, p < .05), a finding not formally
hypothesized. In other words, positive humor exerted a positive indirect effect (through
satisfaction) and a negative direct effect on the intention to stay, a finding that we explore further
in the discussion section, thus explaining the non-significant total effect reported above.
Finally, we tested the statistical significance of the indirect effects of humor on the
outcome variables, with the standard errors estimated by bootstrapping. The results are presented
in Table 3. All indirect effects were significant for both the relationship between the use of
positive and negative humor and negligent behavior (b = -0.16, p < .05 and b = 0.20, p < .05) and
intention to stay (b = 0.22, p < .01 and b = -0.28, p < .01), thus supporting, in accordance with
Hypotheses 3a and 3b, the mediating role of internship satisfaction between humor use and intern
outcomes. Therefore, despite a non-significant direct effect of positive humor on both work
outcomes (when controlling for satisfaction in the non-mediated model), our findings suggested a
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significant indirect effect of positive humor (through satisfaction) on negligence and intention to
stay, partially supporting Hypotheses 1b and 1c.
Insert Table 3
Robustness test
Despite the procedural and statistical remedies described before, common method bias
might still have influenced some of our model’s postulated relationships because our data were
from the same source. To rule out the existence of such a bias, we used the method recommended
by Podsakoff, MacKenzie, Lee, and Podsakoff (2003). Specifically, we used structural equation
modeling to estimate a variation of the model that included a latent common method variance
factor on which every item in the model was allowed to load (in addition to its loading on its
respective construct). We compared the significance of path coefficients between the models with
and without the additional factor and found no differences, which suggested that the results were
robust to common method bias (Podsakoff et al., 2003).
Additional Analysis
Although not in our original hypotheses, to understand whether the proposed relationships
in our model were influenced by contextual variables, we conducted additional exploratory
analyses to test the interactions of gender similarity, supervisor hierarchical level and industry
type with supervisor humor to predict intern outcomes. These post hoc analyses investigated
these variables’ roles as boundary conditions, attenuating or enhancing the effects of
hypothesized relationships. The results indicated that, among same-gender supervisor-intern
pairs, the positive effect of positive humor on intern satisfaction was enhanced (b = 0.21, p <
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0.01), whereas the negative impact of negative humor did not change it (b = -0.08, p > 0.10). In
other words, the relationship between the use of positive humor and satisfaction was stronger
when the supervisor and the intern were of the same gender. Furthermore, the results did not
show moderating effects of industry type and supervisor hierarchical level on the humor-intern
satisfaction relationship.
DISCUSSION
Today’s organizations increasingly rely on internship programs to recruit, train, and retain
human resources (Liu et al., 2011). Internship programs provide a unique learning experience
that bridges classroom learning and work life. As part of a small but growing body of
organizational research that directly studies interns’ work experiences (D’Abate et al., 2009; Liu
et al., 2011; Narayanan et al., 2010), the present study contributes to the theoretical and
evidentiary base of the emerging literature.
As hypothesized, we found an effect of positive supervisory humor on intern outcomes,
with this effect mediated through intern satisfaction, supporting the claim of D’Abate et al.
(2009) about the centrality of supervisor relationships to interns. Our results suggest that healthy
fun and jokes in the workplace improve interns’ work perceptions, reducing both proclivity to
leave and work negligence, consistent with Duncan and Feisal’s (1989) finding that humor
relieves workplace tensions.
Somewhat surprisingly, however, when controlling for the mediated effect of intern
satisfaction, positive humor had a significant negative direct effect on intention to stay. Testing
this mediational path exposed a negative effect that had been obscured by the total effect of
positive humor on intention to stay. Although unexpected, this result is consistent with the dual-
pathway theory of supervisory relationships described in the theoretical section. In this view,
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relationships send both cognitive signals regarding work aspects and affective messages
regarding the affirmation or disaffirmation of relational bonds. In the case of negative humor,
both informational and emotional signals should be negative, leading to lowered cognitive and
affective evaluations of the internship. In the case of positive humor, however, mixed signals
could result, with the positive affective signals leading to higher satisfaction but also, perhaps, to
doubts about the “seriousness” of the workplace as a place to begin a career. Because of the
precariousness of internships and early-stage career choices (e.g., Perlin, 2011), candidates may
evaluate humor as indicative of instability or levity, despite its positive affective signal and
subsequent satisfactory evaluations. Such an interpretation, furthermore, seems consistent with
past research noting the possibility for “fun” managerial approaches to backfire and produce
negative effects (Meyer, 1999; Romero & Pescosolido, 2008). Because interpretations for
turnover motives were not directly collected, however, this interpretation remains provisional.
Future research should more directly study the possible negative effects of humor independent of
intern satisfaction.
The negative relationship between negative humor perceptions and intern satisfaction was
corroborated as hypothesized. When supervisors use negative or abusive humor, they may send
negative messages about the workplace and undermine the vertical relationships that are key to
intern satisfaction (Liu et al., 2011). Additionally, because negative humor often targets
newcomers (Duncan & Feisal, 1989), interns may be particularly exposed to negative effects,
differentially affecting their satisfaction and outcomes. Although we did not compare interns to
more established workers, such comparisons are warranted.
Thus, our results suggested that humor may be an important tool for intern performance
and retention to the extent that it can affect satisfaction. We found strong evidence that humor
can either increase or decrease satisfaction, depending on its valence, which suggests that it is not
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the use of humor per se but instead its relational implications that produce these effects. For
instance, some research suggests that younger employees (here, the average age of the
respondents was 22) may be driven by career-oriented goals (Wrzesniewski, et al, 1997),
implying that messages about an organization’s ability to enhance career development may be
particularly important. Notably, past humor studies have largely involved older, regularly
employed populations, whereas younger newcomer populations (i.e., interns) may be more in
need of reaffirming messages about belonging to an organizational community.
As expected, satisfaction significantly predicted both intention to stay and negligent
behavior during the internship. Because internship programs increase participants’ employability
(Gault et al., 2000) and serve as gateways to the job market, young interns may contemplate a
permanent position at their internship site. To the extent that humor, via satisfaction, can
encourage or discourage interns from seeking full-time employment and becoming personally
engaged in work processes (Rusbult et al., 1988), it is important for both interns and their host
organizations. Our results support this link between satisfaction, turnover intention, and negligent
behavior.
The present study thus contributes to an emerging but understudied interest in intern
behavior (Narayanan et al., 2010), building on the fact that interns offer great benefits to
organizations (Sapp & Zhang 2009). The (strong) positive relationship between intern
satisfaction and intention to stay suggests that organizations should be proactive in promoting
conditions under which internship programs, which offer a good source of new talent (Gabris &
Mitchell, 1989; Gault et al., 2000; Hurst, 2008), enable students’ successful transition into the
workplace.
Although not theorized a priori, our exploratory findings of a gender similarity also
corroborate some extant literature showing the differential effectiveness of humor strategies
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across gender (Decker, Yao & Calo, 2011). Because our theoretical framework emphasizes
creating positive perceptions and messages via humor, it does not account for dyadic gender
differences, which we nevertheless observed. One possibility is that the perception of positive
relationships depends on prior expectations of supervisor behavior, which may differ by gender
(e.g., Eagly & Karau, 2002). Future research should more explicitly explore this mechanism.
Contributions to Theory and Practice
Given the incipient nature of the empirical literature on interns’ work experiences, the
present study offers several important contributions to organizational theory and practice. First,
we follow calls to develop models of intern behavior that predict successful internships (Liu et
al., 2011), a new and pioneering stream of literature that is relevant for both management
education and organizational outcomes. Given the rapid rise of intern programs globally (Perlin,
2011), research is needed to keep abreast of developments in this area.
Second, this paper contributes to the understanding of the role of specific leadership
behaviors in sending organizational messages, ultimately affecting intern attitudes and behaviors.
Although past research has pointed to supervisors as key to intern success (Liu et al., 2011), the
particular ways in which leader humor can generate positive or negative messages about the work
setting, influencing interns’ proclivities to remain present and engaged in the organization, have
not been theorized or empirically demonstrated. By adding complexity to our knowledge about
supervisory practices, we are in a better position to assess the interpersonal determinants of intern
success.
Third, although prior research has explored the determinants of intern attitudes, the
present study contributes by linking intern attitudes to specific intentions regarding important
work behaviors. As a substantial amount of research has shown, the attitude-behavior link cannot
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be taken for granted (e.g., Ajzen & Fishbein, 1980) and must be demonstrated empirically. In
this case, we find that supervisory humor affects both attitudes and behaviors and that these
effects are opposite in the cases of positive versus negative humor.
Fourth, we develop a more nuanced view of supervisor humor with respect to past humor
studies, showing how different uses of humor can lead to virtually opposite effects in terms of
intern satisfaction and outcomes. Although most research has focused on the effects of positive
forms of humor (e.g., Avolio et al., 1999), some notable exceptions have noted that humor can be
used ironically or abusively (e.g., Martin et al., 2003; Romero & Cruthirds, 2006). Our
contribution, therefore, is not to show that negative humor exists but to empirically demonstrate
its differential effects on intern satisfaction and behavioral outcomes.
Furthermore, the relatively low negative correlation between positive and negative forms
of humor strengthens the argument that distinct forms of humor can be used by managers and that
positive and negative forms are not simply the inverse of one another. To our knowledge, this is
the first study to directly test the differential effects of both types of humor, a contribution that
also adds to construct development within the managerial humor literature.
Regarding implications for practice, this study demonstrates the importance for
organizations and university internship programs to consider dyadic relationships, to prepare
students for the world of work and to promote organizational talent retention. Although business
schools and organizations have devoted a great deal of attention to developing internship
programs, in terms of project selection, organizational partnerships, and other organization-level
actions, the success of these programs may depend on dyadic, interpersonal aspects of intern-
supervisor relationships. Thus, neglect of those relationships may be both costly to organizations
(in terms of lost talent) and detrimental to intern education (by promoting neglect of the learning-
related goals associated with internships). Therefore, both institutions of higher education and
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organizations have reason to focus their attention on the micro-level predictors of intern success
and to sensitize organizational members to the importance of intern relationships.
Understanding supervisor influences in internship experiences, beyond providing insight
into an understudied component of management education, can be used in educational settings in
several ways. For example, such insights could help students to reflect upon important, career-
relevant experiences during or after their internship experiences or potentially to help them
choose internships in advance by considering potential supervisor relationships. Such reflections
are not only important in classroom experiences but also allow business schools to seek feedback
regarding internship sites. Such feedback can influence school counselors and student services in
preparing students for the internship experience and even potentially influence university-host
organization agreements based on evidence of supervisor-intern relationships.
Limitations and Future Research
Despite these contributions, some important limitations of this study should be
acknowledged. For instance, on a measurement level, this study measured supervisory humor
through intern, rather than supervisor, perceptions. Because we are interested in the intern
experience and posit it as the proximal cause of intern outcomes, we believe this choice to be
justified. However, future research should examine the relationship between supervisor and
subordinate assessments of humor, both to determine whether humor is always used
“intentionally” by supervisors and to account for the possibility that matching supervisor-
subordinate perceptions themselves might have a relationship with outcomes independent of the
primary effects of humor.
With respect to methodology, although we engaged in the steps above to address possible
common-method bias, our design and measures make it impossible to rule out this possibility
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completely. The external measurement of the independent variables (for instance, using fellow
colleagues to measure supervisors’ humor) would be advisable in future studies to test for the
robustness of results across measurement methods.
Second, because our sample was drawn from a database linked to top-tier private business
schools, our sample involved interns of relatively high socio-economic status. Therefore, our
results might not generalize across socio-economic categories, in which the satisfaction-turnover
relationship might differ. For example, Perlin (2011) describes the increasing pressure to engage
in often-unsatisfying internships to secure a full-time position, a pressure that may be more acute
lower on the socio-economic ladder. Under difficult economic conditions, interns from lower
socio-economic backgrounds may select different options when addressing dissatisfaction than
students from higher socio-economic backgrounds. In general, because internships have been
linked with increasing workplace precariousness and managerial flexibility (Perlin, 2011), the
socio-economic context behind intern experiences is an important factor to take into account.
Future research should study how interns from diverse socio-economic backgrounds react to
intern experiences and how the use of supervisor humor might change depending on the socio-
economic group of the interns involved.
On a related note, our study took place within a Brazilian economic context marked by
relatively strong economic growth and low unemployment (cf., Islam, 2012). Thus, the interns
may have been in a relatively strong bargaining position and been more willing to consider
leaving the organization if unsatisfied. With the recent slowing of growth across emerging
economies, one might expect that interns would show higher average propensities to stay with the
organization independent of satisfaction, possibly opting for negligence behaviors rather than
exit. Additionally, because Brazilian internships are tightly regulated compared to the U.S., as
described above, and the percentage of college-educated recruits is lower, interns may be more
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likely to be used as potential recruits rather than as a temporary source of cheap labor. In general,
more research across national and economic contexts is needed to understand intern outcomes
more broadly.
Third, although our interest was specifically in intern outcomes, we acknowledge that
literature exists that shows the positive benefits of humor in the workplace more generally. Thus,
it would be useful to compare intern samples with permanent employee samples to determine
whether relationships and mechanisms differ across sample groups. This would enable the
isolation of the unique effects of our dependent variables on interns. In particular, because we
find that, when controlling for satisfaction in an intern sample, positive humor may actually have
negative effects on outcomes, it is particularly important to determine whether other humor
studies should be re-analyzed in the light of possible negative effects. Although comparative
research would involve diverse methodological challenges (for example, similarity of work type,
matching for age and experience across samples), such research would provide a substantial
contribution to understanding interns’ work experience. This study takes one step, however, to
create a discussion around the intern experience.
Although, from a managerial perspective, intern behaviors leading to organizational
outcomes such as performance are paramount, we focused on variables relating to the intern
experience, such as career-related variables (intent to remain) and withdrawal (negligent
behavior). Our choice was consistent with an intern-centered approach, which is of interest to
both educators and managers. However, we recognize that examining other related variables,
such as motivation and proactive behaviors, could be of interest both for understanding interns
more generally and for improving organizational performance. Future research should examine
additional types of internship-related behaviors and experiences.
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Additionally, because of the inherently short-term nature of the intern relationship, myriad
factors beyond intention to stay are likely to affect whether interns remain at the organization in a
formal capacity. Retention ratios for interns are likely much lower than for formal employees but
much higher than for external recruits; studying interns may seem to take a type of “intermediary
position” between recruitment and management perspectives, the former more concerned with
intent to accept an offer, the latter more focused on intent to turn over. New models of
management that integrate recruitment issues into the work role itself, together with
understanding recruitment as an ongoing process within organizational relationships, are
necessary for a more complete understanding of internships.
Expanding our knowledge about intern experiences at work could draw on several areas
of current organizational scholarship, based around interns’ unique job situation vis-à-vis
permanent employees. In this study, we focused on the importance of supervisor communication
through humor because past research has established supervision as a key element of internship
success (Liu et al., 2011). However, other aspects of the intern experience, such as the cognitive
and emotional effects of low power (e.g., Keltner et al., 2003), together with the temporary and
precarious nature of intern employment (e.g., Ellingson, Gruys & Sackett, 1998), might also
affect interns’ educational and career outcomes. Such topics could provide for rich areas of
inquiry around this growing area of organizational relationships.
The differential effects of humor strategies across gender (Decker et al., 2011) should also
be explored in future research. Dyadic gender differences may impact the perception of positive
relationships depending on prior expectations of supervisor behavior, which may differ by gender
(e.g., Eagly & Karau, 2002). Future research should explicitly explore this mechanism, which has
implications for cross-gender vertical relationships.
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Finally, although we expand the construct domain of humor by testing the differential
effects of positive and negative humor, it can be argued that further construct differentiation
could be fruitful. For example, negative humor may involve abusive or bullying jokes (Romero
& Cruthirds, 2006) but may also involve ironic, anti-organizational comments that both create
inter-employee solidarity and negatively impact the organization (e.g., Rodrigues & Collinson,
1995). Conversely, positive humor might build organizational identity, but forms of positive
humor might give the impression of a lack of importance of work, promoting shirking or
negligent behavior (Duncan et al., 1990). As we saw in the current sample, positive humor seems
to have multiple pathways to intern outcomes, both positive and negative, which may be sensitive
to variations in what types of humor are used in specific situations. More work on specific types
of humor would almost certainly move beyond the “positive-negative” taxonomy to build a more
nuanced view of humor strategies.
In sum, this research suggests that the use of humor is an important, although often
overlooked, aspect of managing and retaining interns. Accordingly, the supervisory use of humor
should be viewed seriously by researchers and practitioners. Although the current paper may not
cause supervisors to be more humorous, we hope to establish the importance of positive humor
and the detrimental effects of negative humor to interns’ experiences at work.
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FIGURE 1
Partially Mediated Structural Equation Modeling Results
Note: Standardized path coefficients provided; Nonsignificant lines are dashed; * p. < 05; ** p.
< 01; All control variables were included as controls of the model’s mediator and outcomes;
however, only the significant relationships were represented.
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TABLE 1
Means, Standard Deviations, Correlations and Reliabilities
Variables Mean s.d. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13
1. Intern Gender a .45 .50 -
2. Intern Age 22 1.6 .04 -
3. Supervisor Gender a .52 .50 -.02 -.07 -
4. Gender Similarity b .49 .50 .04 .04 -.11 -
5. Supervisor Position c 2.0 .83 -.04 -.04 -.02 .05 -
6. Industry Type d .52 .50 .09 .19** .11 .02 .07 -
7. Positive Affect 4.28 .58 .07 -.01 .08 .02 -.01 .01 (0.82)
8. Negative Affect 1.84 .63 .01 .03 -.03 -.01 .03 .08 -.34** (0.68)
9. Positive Humor 3.62 .93 .09 .05 .11 -.01 .02 .10 .39** -.10 (0.83)
10. Negative Humor 1.53 .92 .10 .00 .05 .02 -.01 .04 -.11 .21** -.16* (0.93)
11. Intern Satisfaction 3.62 .93 .09 .05 .08 .05 .08 .04 .48** -.18* .46** -.37** (0.87)
12. Negligent Behavior 2.01 .95 .12 -.02 .02 .02 .10 .01 -.17* .10 -.18* .29** -.39** (0.72)
13. Intention to Stay 3.74 1.23 .14 .07 .06 .00 -.14 .04 .31** -.12 .18* -.18* .56** -.33** (0.88)
N = 184; * p. < 05; ** p. < 01; Alpha coefficients in the diagonals; a Women were coded as 0 and men as 1;
b Gender similarity was
coded as 1; c Supervisor position was coded from 1 (analyst or assistant) to 4 (director or general manager);
d Traditional industries
(e.g., banking, manufacturing, oil & gas) were coded as 0 and Knowledge-based industries were coded as 1 (e.g., telecommunications,
consulting, education).
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TABLE 2
Path Coefficients from SEM Analyses
Path from To Path Coefficient (t)
Positive Affect Intern Satisfaction 0.39** (4.30)
Negative Affect Intern Satisfaction 0.15 (1.85)
Positive Affect Negligent Behavior 0.05 (0.39)
Negative Affect Negligent Behavior 0.03 (0.25)
Positive Affect Intention to Stay 0.03 (0.24)
Negative Affect Intention to Stay -0.07 (-0.75)
Positive Humor Intern Satisfaction 0.30** (3.75)
Negative Humor Intern Satisfaction -0.38** (-5.61)
Intern Satisfaction Negligent Behavior -0.53** (-3.74)
Intern Satisfaction Intention to Stay 0.73** (5.80)
Positive Humor Negligent Behavior 0.05 (0.47)
Negative Humor Negligent Behavior 0.10 (0.97)
Positive Humor Intention to Stay -0.22* (-2.37)
Negative Humor Intention to Stay 0.08 (0.98)
R2 Intern Satisfaction .53
R2 Negligent Behavior .33
R2 Intention to Stay .43
N = 184; Standardized path coefficients provided; * p. < 05; ** p. < 01. All control variables
were included in the model as controls for intern satisfaction, negligent behaviors and intention to
stay. No significant relationships were found between controls variables and outcomes, except for
the effect of positive affectivity on intern satisfaction (b = .39, p < 0.01) and intern gender on
negligent behaviors (b = .18, p < 0.05).
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TABLE 3
Significance Tests of Direct and Indirect Effects of Humor on Outcome Variables
Independent variable Dependent variable Direct effect Indirect effect
Positive Humor Negligent Behavior 0.05 -0.16**
Negative Humor Negligent Behavior 0.10 0.20**
Positive Humor Intention to Stay -0.22* 0.22**
Negative Humor Intention to Stay 0.08 -0.28**
N = 184; Standardized effects provided; Standard errors estimated by bootstrapping; * p. < 05; **
p. < 01.
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