You are not a bad person if you laugh at these jokes. On the contrary, you are very intelligent.
A man enters a rooftop bar and takes a seat next to another man. ”What are you drinking?” – he asked the man.
‘Magic beer’ – the man replied.
”Oh, yeah? What is so magical about it?”
Then, he shows him. He swigs some beer, dives off the roof, flies around the building, and then finally returns to his seat with a triumphant smile.
”Amazing!” – the man says. ”Lemme try some of that!” The man grabs the beer. He downs it, leaps of the roof and plummets 15 stories to the ground.
The bartender shakes his head. ”You know, you are a real jerk when you are drunk, Superman.”
Let’s put off the fact whether the man survived or not. The main question is: Did you understand the joke? Did you find it funny or sick? Maybe both?
A recent study published in the Journal of Cognitive Processing found out that the reaction to this joke can indicate your level of intelligence. In the study, a group of psychologists found out that people who like dark humor can have higher level of intelligence, express lower aggression and eliminate negative feelings more successfully than other people.
In order to find the relation between intelligence and dark humor, 156 female and male participants took part in a study. They had to read 12 bleak cartoons from the ‘Black Book’ by Uli Stein. All the participants in the study showed whether they understood the joke and whether they found it funny or not. Then, they did certain IQ tests and answered questions about their aggressiveness, mood and educational background.
The findings of the study were coherent. Namely, participants, who understood the joke and enjoyed in the dark humor, had higher levels of intelligence and reduced aggressive tendency than those who did not. Moreover, the participants who least understood and liked the joke showed lower level of intelligence and higher level of aggression.
Researchers believe that understanding dark humor joke represents a mental gymnastics. On the other hand, comprehending a knock-knock joke represents a complex processing of information, which requires determining various meanings, while creating an emotional distance from the real content.
This emotional distance puts dark humor aside of puns, which actually pits the right and the left hemispheres of the brain, as you process several meanings of a word, but they do not often distract your comfort zone.
Whereas jokes that are based on wordplay will make your brain work, dark humor jokes need a bit of emotional control to make you laugh. If you want to test your level of intelligence, read the dark humor jokes from the Reader’s Digest Comedy:
- ”I am sorry and I apologize mean the same thing. Except at a funeral.” – Martin Demetri
- A: ”What has four legs and an arm?” B: ”A happy bit pull.”
- ”Cats have nine lives. Makes them ideal for experimentation.” – Jimmy Carr
- A: ”Why do not cannibals eat clowns?” B: ”Because they taste funny.”
- ”I have a vest. If I had my arms cut off, it would be a jacket.” – Mitch Hedberg
- A: ”What did Kermit the frog say at Jim Henson’s funeral?” B: ”Nothing.”
- ”If at first you do not succeed, the skydiving is not definitely for you.” – Steven Wright
