Humor Styles, Sociability, and Self-Esteem in University Students

Sense of humor and humor styles are different concepts that can be studied independently. Humor styles are related to cognitive tools, information processing strategies, and coping strategies that help to reduce cognitive or emotional vulnerability to stress. They are associated with situation assessment, cognitive flexibility, emotional intelligence, self-esteem, psychological distress, loneliness, vulnerability to depression, and perfectionism. This research focused on the correlation between the humor styles, sociability, and self-esteem in university students. The sample consisted of 48 medical students aged 18–24 years. They were subjected to the methods of R. Martin’s Humor Styles Questionnaire, diagnosing personality sociability, the Self-Attitude Test Questionnaire, and Raven’s Progressive Matrices. The obtained data underwent correlation, cluster, and mean comparison analyses. Adaptive humor styles proved to be associated with high stress resilience, average or high emotional intelligence, cognitive flexibility, belief in personal success, a good social orientation and interaction, and positive self-esteem. In contrast, maladaptive humor styles were associated with psychological distress, cognitive inflexibility, low sociability, and contradictory self-attitude. Humor style, situational context, personality traits, motivation, and selfcontrol demonstrated complex and contradictory correlations. Based on this study, adaptive humor styles seem to be a resource that contributes to better self-esteem, interpersonal relationships, and adaptation to the new academic environment.

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