Thank you Joachim.Also, I read in a psychology magazine that "funny women" might have difficulties in being appreciated/accepted by male audiences. It might be quite possible that men feel "intimidated" or maybe even 'ridiculed' by female humor. Let's see what our academic community comes up with, I appreciate your inputs like always :).

You've mentioned cultural or even neuroscientific reasons that may lead to gender differences in the dissemination and appreciation of humour, and I'd think linguistic reasons may be another factor. Stand-up comedians rely on the use of swears and taboo language for some, if not most, of their punchlines. "Dirty" jokes or even sexist humour may just "sound funnier" when narrated by a male, probably because their use of language in that way is more acceptable. There have been numerous studies based on swearing that conclude that although women and men may swear with nearly the same frequency, women swearing is less accepted, and less appropriate than men swearing - largely in mixed sex company. Hope this gives you another angle to see the problem through :)

Veyr interesting Hansika. I have been using humor on stage actually as one of the first stand up comedians in my country. Although I never used dirty words and mainly dealing with political satire, both on TV and on stage, I was feeling that male audience was both entertained and offended. There must be something related to hormones or other factors that 'witty' women may be considered as 'threat', at least in some cultures,despite thte fact that I survived :)

Haha, yes definitely. I meant to say that the topics handled by comedians seem to be male-dominated arenas to begin with - arenas wherein women do not traditionally play a role. Hence, when a woman jokes about business, politics or even sports, men may feel threatened - you're right. Although not a stand-up comedienne, whenever I make dead-baby jokes i get a couple of raised eyebrows (given that I'm a woman, and should be family- and child-oriented, etc.), but that's just my experience :)

I came across this interesting -popular scientific- article which elaborates on how humour is important and might affect (the start of) romantic relationships.

http://www.in-mind.org/article/a-funny-thing-happened-on-the-way-to-romance-how-humor-influences-romantic-relationship

Also, this paper by Bressler et al. goes into humour and the 'reasons why'. Good stuff: Bressler, E.R., Martin, R., & Balshine, S. (2006). Production and appreciation of humor as sexually selected traits. Evolution & Human Behavior, 27, 121-130.

Thank you Hansika and Karlijn. Let's see how "men" answer to that issue :)

When I last looked, which admittedly was a while ago, there wasn't much academic-type research on humor at all. Articles were still referring to Freud and Aristophanes for hypotheses to examine.

However, let's take a more general approach. For almost all of history, or all of history, regardless of what form of public performance, men have dominated the performance space. Not just the arts, but politics, sports, science, and whatever else you can think of. This includes indirect performance such as in the visual arts, authorship, and having the right to vote as well.

The only likely exception is dancing for the amusement and gratification of men. And in many cultures, this kind of expression is not permitted. And in the others, there is usually a man controlling financial and other non-performance aspects of the activity.

I am not saying that this is right in any way, but this is how things have been throughout the history of most cultures. There may be some exceptions, but for cultures that have advanced beyond the hunter-gatherer or subsistence agriculture socioeconomic systems, this seems to be true.

So humor, especially when expressed in groups or in performance spaces, should be considered within this general context. If humor wasn't under the dominance of men, that would be exceptional, but not the other way around.

The same can be said with regard to the perception of threat. Women acting within spheres of behavior considered to belong to men are generally threatening to a greater or lesser degree culturally or individually. There is the concern that women are usurping the power of men, but the more basic concern is that it diminishes the control men have over women. It also puts women on display for other men, increasing the potential for a woman to interact with them. Traditionally, men are not fond of this whether it is their wives, daughters, or sisters.

To push things back to the most basic level, there has been no way for men to verify paternity for all of human history until very recently in some places. Controlling (i.e., limiting) the interaction of women with other men has been the main way of trying to ensure paternity.

And yes, since men are very concerned about their ability to mate with women, and a major element of humor is indeed derogatory in some sense, men are not happy being on the receiving end of derogatory humor expressed by women, especially in public. Men are not so fond of being the butt of the joke from other men, but there is a recognition that they are in competition with each other. Access to women is the goal of that competition, and being the object of humor from women is a rather strong sign of lack of desirability as a potential mate.

Again, I am not saying that this is right. I am saying that, evolutionarily and historically, men want to maximize their access to women and minimize the ability of women they are associated with as sexual partners or by familial links to have access to other men. Public performance is something that exposes women to many men. Humorous public performance by women can make men feel that their ability to attract and maintain relationships with women is lessened.

James, I wish, I could add your comments (which are very similar to an article I read in Psychology Today years ago), to my biography. Having been one of the first female stand-upper and Talk show figures in my home country, I had been both praised abut also `put down’ a lot. On top of it I had been dealing with political satire which is (still) under the governance of male media and or comedy artists. Some male figures (all very educated) in my own family (other than my liberal and proud father :) had always commented sarcastically on my success etc. etc. (the rest for my psychiatrists :) What you say is so true that men even feel `threatened` by woman`s wit which might intellectually challenge them. In my performances, men sitting with their wives must have been feeling awful in interactive parts of the show.

You might as well say this is right, although exceptions will always happen. We should not be too politically correct and afraid of the fury of the other gender when we talk about general, biological, historic, social or hormonal! facts.

It is what it is! (Although being victimized in the way you were describing made me leave my country and brought me to Canada :))), I still understand the `manly’ perspective in that.)

humor is an exaggeration of reality... Depending on the personality of the patient

You are right Rasha, It is sometimes mixing reality with unreal or seeing reality from a different perspective. You are also right by saying it depends on personality. Surely there are humorous women and humorless men too.But the question is whose humor is more accepted or considered more appropriate in human societies here. And what is the difference between 'what to find or accept as 'fun/funny" and how/whether it is related to female and male brain functions.