Humor not only adds a pleasant touch to romantic relationships but also serves as a powerful tool for building interest and enhancing quality, according to a recent study. While previous research has emphasized the significance of humor in romantic relationships, this new study specifically investigates how it influences relationships over time.
The study, led by Kenneth Tan, an assistant professor of psychology at Singapore Management University, shifts the focus to humor’s association with relationship quality in established relationships. Tan notes that while humor is traditionally seen as preceding attraction, the study aims to explore whether attraction may also lead to finding someone humorous.
To conduct the research, 108 couples with an average relationship duration of 18.27 months were enlisted. The participants were assessed daily for seven consecutive evenings. They reported their perceptions of humor in their relationships, along with levels of relationship satisfaction, commitment, and perceived partner commitment.
The findings reveal that couples who reported higher satisfaction and commitment on a particular day also found their partners more humorous on the same day and the following day. Conversely, on days of lower satisfaction and commitment, partners were perceived as less humorous both on the same day and the next. However, there was limited evidence of the reverse pattern, where more humor initiated on a given day did not consistently lead to greater commitment the next day, only satisfaction.
The study also identified that men tended to produce more humor in relationships. It is important to note that the research involved couples in college, and the results may vary with older adults.
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