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Aug

30

Something Else to Look Forward To

Filed Under Ruminations

This morning I read about a recent study that declares the ability to recognize humor diminishes with age. And though I have no credible science background other than the fact that I took over our fifth grade science class (without pay) when the teacher proved unsatisfactory, I find myself wondering about the validity of this study that was conducted by a psychology graduate student and an associate professor of psychology at Washington University in St. Louis. The study included 41 adults ages 65 to 93 and 40 college students who were “around 20 years old”.

Stop right there: we’ve got 41 older adults with definite ages and 41 college students who aren’t sure about their ages? Is math on a downward swing again?

According to an article about the study (www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/08/03/health/webmd/main3132978.shtml) the older adults took a basic mental skills test, and it was found that none had any “obvious mental defects”.

Wait a minute: why didn’t the college students have to take a basic mental skills test? Was it assumed that because they are in college they possess “basic mental skills”? That’s faulty logic if ever there was such a thing. I recently went to graduate school, I KNOW you can’t just make an assumption like that.

Anyway, participants were given the setup to 16 jokes then asked to choose the correct punch line.

Bear with me because I have to stop again and speak from personal experience: Jokes are an individual preference thing. Jokes that would crack me up might send you to the real life crime section of the bookstore. And then there’s the delivery, something that’s pretty key to successfully telling jokes. (If you’ve ever heard my Aunt Ruth tell a joke, you know precisely what I’m talking about.) (Name changed to protect family relations.)

Let’s continue . . .

One of the 16 jokes goes like this: “A businessman is riding the subway after a hard day at the office. A young man sits down next to him and says, ‘Call me a doctor . . . call me a doctor.’ The businessman asks, ‘What’s the matter, are you sick?’” Participants were then to select the punch line from the following buffet of choices:

A. The young man says, “I just graduated from medical school.”

B. The young man says, “My sister is a nurse.”

C. The young man pulls out a water gun and squirts the businessman.

If you chose the punch line behind door number A, you’ve just shaved or added years off/to your age, depending on where you fall in relation to being “around 20 years old”. Okay, admittedly I can see the humor in punch line A, especially for those around20yearolds who are in undergraduate school and looking forward to being called “doctor” when they’re finally out of school 10-12 years from now.

But I’ve always liked what I call “cerebral humor” and I have to tell you that being a former psychology major who happens to be part of a large closely-knit all-American-including-our-fair-share-of-dysfunction family makes punch line B nothing short of hilarious.

Take a few minute to think about it. We’ll wait.

If physical humor is your favorite flavor, take a minute to run punch line C out on the inside of your eyelids. That is funny stuff. Especially if you dress the young man in a suit and tie and the businessman in a tshirt (picture http://www.upscalehomeless.com/shirt/officesupplies/mens) over suit pants. You know, like he’s coming home from a company picnic or maybe it was Spirit Day at The Office. Or maybe he works for a company that encourages casual dress complete with black socks and tivas. Or what about this: we go with stereotypes and the young man is dressed in jeans and a tshirt (picture http://www.upscalehomeless.com/shirt/argylepm/mens) while the businessman is wearing a suit, and let’s fill the squirt gun with rainbow-colored silly string. Or maybe they’re riding an extremely crowded bus and the young man takes the last available seat (which is the one next to the businessman) and can’t breathe because the businessman is sweating and hasn’t had his only suit cleaned in 57 days. Or maybe as the young man aims and shoots, we find out from the print on his tshirt that he’s just been named Most Creative Employee of the Year by his employer (the advertising department of a local hospital), a title he desperately wants to keep. Or maybe he’s first runner-up and aiming (sorry, couldn’t help myself) to be top dog in the Most Creative Employee department next go-round. At the risk of sounding like Aunt Ruth, I have one more scenario: maybe the gun was filled with poison ivy juice. I know (and love) some people in both age categories who would fall down laughing at that. Poison ivy juice. Just the thought of it would keep them chuckling for weeks.

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