A psychologist ran an experiment to determine the funniest joke in the world. Dr. Richard Wiseman requested individuals to rate jokes on a website and even welcomed them to submit their own. The 2001 experiment received over 40,000 jokes and over two million ratings. Gurpal Gosall, a psychiatrist from Manchester, provided the joke with the highest global ratings. So, according to research, what is the world’s funniest joke? No, it is not ‘Knock knock! Who’s there?’
The world’s funniest joke!
One of the two hunters is out in the woods when he falls. He doesn’t appear to be breathing, and his eyes appear to be glazed. The other individual pulls out his phone and dials 911. He exhales: ‘My friend has died! What should I do?’ The operator declares: ‘Relax, I’m here to help. Let’s first make sure he’s dead.’ There is silence, followed by a shot. ‘OK, now what?’ replies the person back on the phone.
According to Wiseman, this joke won because of its global appeal. ‘ Many of the jokes submitted had greater scores from different categories of people, but this one had true global appeal,’ he told The Guardian. ‘ Also, we find jokes hilarious for a variety of reasons. They can make us feel superior to others, lessen the emotional effect of stressful events, or startle us due to some form of incongruity. ‘All three aspects were included in the hunters’ joke’, the psychologist added.
A computer analysis of the data revealed that jokes with 103 words were deemed most amusing. The winning joke about ‘hunters’ is 102 words long. Surprisingly, the researchers also discovered the year’s funniest moment, when individuals found jokes funnier at 6:03 p.m. on October 7.
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