What’s so funny? Exploring international students’ humor understanding and appreciation in Singapore

The nuanced ways that people use humor across cultures poses communication and psychological challenges for individuals transitioning to new cultural environments. This investigation explores the relationship between international students’ interpersonal and mediated communication activities and their humor understanding/appreciation in Singapore. Participants (N = 223) described their friendship networks, viewed and assessed short video clips of Singaporean stand-up comedians, and completed the Humor Styles Questionnaire. Consistent with previous comprehensive friendship network research, international students tended to have a higher ratio of and form stronger bonds with co-national friends. However, the correlation coefficient and regression analysis indicated a significant relationship between host national friendship and Singaporean humor understanding/appreciation. Additionally, results suggest positive relationships between affiliative, self-enhancing, and self-defeating humor styles and Singaporean humor understanding/appreciation. These findings not only have implications for humor styles in an intercultural context but also demonstrate the potential impact that host social communication activities have on humor understanding/appreciation in a new culture.