National Tsing Hua University

Institute of Learning Sciences

Neural Correlates of Positive and Negative Verbal Jokes: An fMRI study

Yen-Lin Lee Yu-Chen Chan
Institute of Learning Sciences, National Tsing Hua University, Taiwan

Introduction Result
3.1 The interaction between the types of stimulus and humor
Humor is a complex phenomenon. It invoves cognitive, behavioral, emotional, and social aspects
(Martin, 2000). Humor might benefit the recovery from negative events. The ability to regulate Table 1 Interaction between the types of stimulus and humor
emotional response to horror events is important for mental and physical health. Humor affects neg- MNI
ative feelings in a way similar to nonhumorous positive emotion such as joy and happiness. Never- Region BA Side coordinates Z score
theless, Strick et al. (2009)’s study revealed that humorous stimuli attenuate negative emotions to a x y z
greater extent than do equally positive nonhumorous stimuli.The present study builds on the au- (Regular joke + Horror sentence) versus
(Regular sentence + Horror joke)
thor’s previous research (Chan, 2014) exploring the emotional structure of jokes as well as is based Superior Temporal Gyrus 39 L -51 -61 31 4.28
on two previous studies (Chan et al., 2012, 2013) investigating the neural processing of humor. The Cingulate Gyrus 31 L -9 -58 28 4.00
Middle Temporal Gyrus
present study used functional magnetic resonance imaging to examine the neural bases of regular Superior Temporal Gyrus
21 L -54 2 -26 3.90
21 R 66 -22 -5 3.76
jokes and horror jokes. The purpose of the present study was to investigate the interaction between Superior Temporal Gyrus 38 L -48 11 -11 3.55
‘funny or not’ and humor across various joke types (regular and horror types), using both behavioral Middle Temporal Gyrus 21 L -60 -13 -8 3.54
experiments and fMRI studies. Note 1: MNI = Montreal Neurological Institute; L = left; R = right; BA = Brodmann’s area;
Voxels = number of voxels in cluster p < 0.05 FDR (false discovery rate) corrected, only
clusters greater than 12 are presented. Fig. 1. The peak activation in Regular joke + Horror sen-

Method
3.2 The simple main effects of ‘funny or not’ and ‘stimulus
Table 2 Simple main effects of ‘funny or not’ and ‘stimulus type’
tence condition( RJ+HS) compared with Regular sentence +
Horror joke (RS+HJ) condition in the Left superior tem-
poral gyrus

MNI
Participants Region BA Side coordinates Z score
Twenty-three neurologically healthy volunteers aged from 20 to 29 years old (11 males and 12 fe- x y z
males) participated in this study. They were native Mandarin speakers and all right-handed as deter- Regular joke versus Horror joke

mined by the Edinburgh Handedness Inventory (Oldfield, 1971). Inferior Parietal Lobule
Cingulate Gyrus
40
9
L
R
-57
9
-61
-28
40
28
4.59
4.29
Experimental stimuli
Horror joke versus Regular joke
Forty-eight stories in Mandarin Chinese were selected, including twelve stories for each of four n.s.
conditions: regular jokes (RJ) and matched regular sentences (RS), horror jokes (HJ) and matched
horror sentences (HS). Each story contained two components: the setup and the punch line. The sto- Regular joke versus General sentence
Supramarginal Gyrus 40 L -54 -61 31 6.08
ries were standardized for length and presented in the same pseudorandom order to all participants. Amygdala L -24 -7 -23 5.73
Experimental paradigm Parahippocampal Gyrus
Inferior Parietal Lobule
35
40
R
R
24
66
-10
-43
-29
28
4.80
4.66
The present study used The present study used The present study used an event-related fMRI par-
Horror joke versus Horror sentence
adigm. According to Chan (2014)’s joke classification, there are two kinds of emotion type. RJ and Medial Frontal Gyrus 40 L -6 41 28 5.10
Fig. 2. The peak activation in regular joke condition com-
pared with horror joke condition (RJ - HJ) in the left inferi-
RS are positive emotion type. On the contrary, HJ and HS are negative emotion type. The study in- Parahippocampal Gyrus 23 R -24 -34 -14 4.83 or parietal lobule
vestigated the relationship between emotion category and humor using four conditions of verbal Same above Note 1
jokes that crossed two factors: regular/horror of type (regular type and horror type) and funny/
unfunny (joke and non-joke) .
The current study used fMRI to investigate the relationship between semantic ambiguity and hu-
mor using four types of verbal jokes that crossed two factors: the presence/absence of humor (jokes 3.3 The main effect of ‘funny or not’ and ‘stimulus type’
versus non-jokes) and the presence/absence ambiguous sentences. It is clear that a dissociation exists Table 3 Main effect of ‘funny or not’ and ‘stimulus type’
between the mechanisms that underlie different forms of ambiguity and humor. MNI
The experiment consisted of event-related paradigm. All the stimuli were presented in black and Region BA Side coordinates Z score
white. While in the scanner, each participant was presented with 30 verbal jokes (AJ, and UAJ) and x y z
30 non-funny trials (AS and UAS) in pseudorandom order. A custom-build pseudorandom order list (RJ+HJ) versus (RS+HS)
Middle temporal gyrus 39 L -54 -67 25 5.88
across conditions using MATLAB was generated. Within a trial, a jittered inter-stimulus interval Middle temporal gyrus 21 R 48 5 -44 5.25
(ISI) of 2.1, 3.2, 5.6, and 7.9 s was varied randomly and counterbalanced across events. The setup Anterior cingulate 32 R 3 41 -5 5.25
Fig. 3. The peak activation in regular joke condition com-
was shown once for 12 s, after which the punch line was delivered, lasting 9 s. Thereafter, partici- Parahippocampal gyrus 36 L -24 -34 -14 5.24
pared with regular sentence condition (RJ - RS) in the left
Inferior parietal lobule 40 R 66 -40 28 4.85
pants were asked to provide a subjective funniness judgment by pressing one of four buttons on a Posterior cingulate 23 L -6 -58 16 4.83 supramarginal gyrus
keypad (1 = not funny at all and 4 = very funny). The use of hand for the button-press responses was (RJ+RS) versus (HJ+HS)
counterbalanced in the scanner. Superior frontal gyrus 9 L -18 44 37 4.10
Stimuli in the four experimental conditions were randomly distributed in the functional runs. There Inferior parietal lobule 40 L -48 -52 55 3.96
Precentral gyrus 44 R 60 5 7 3.95
was a 2-min break between each functional run. After the scanning session, all participants were in- Superior temporal gyrus 38 L -33 2 -17 3.95
terviewed and asked to rate the comprehensibility and funniness of all trials on a 1 to 9 scale that had Lentiform nucleus - R 33 -10 7 3.84
been presented during the scanning session. (HJ+HS) versus (RJ+RS)
RJ, RS, HJ, and HS. Once in the MRI scanner, participants were first presented with the word Middle temporal gyrus 21 L -54 5 -23 3.80
“ready.” Subsequently, each participant was presented with 60 verbal stimuli. The duration of each Same above Note 1; HJ = horror jokes; HS = horror sentences; RJ = regular jokes;
stimulus was 37.1, 39.3, or 41.6 s in random order with a jittered interstimulus interval (ISI) for 5.1, RS = regular sentences
7.3, or 9.6 s, respectively. Within a stimulus, the setup was shown once for 20 s, after which the
punch line was delivered, lasting 9 s. Thereafter, participants were asked to provide a subjective fun-
niness judgment by pressing one of two buttons on a keypad in the participants' hand. After the scan- Fig. 4. The peak activation in regular joke condition com-
ning session, all participants were interviewed and asked to rate the comprehensibility and funniness pared with regular sentence condition (RJ - RS) condition
in the left amygdala
of all stimuli on a 1 to 9 scale (1 = incomprehensibility/not funny at all, 9 = very comprehensibility/
very funny) that had been presented during the scanning session.
Future Studies
Acknowledgments
This research was supported by the “Investigating the Neural Mechanisms and Networks Underly- The current study used fMRI to investigate the relationship between different joke type and hu-
mor factors. The present study revealed activation the cortical region in left IPL in regular jokes
ing Humor Motivation among Individuals and Groups: fMRI and dMRI studies” of the National compared with horror jokes, whereas the reverse contrast showed no significant regions in horror
Tsing Hua University (NTHU), sponsored by the Ministry of Science and Technology under Grant jokes compared with regular jokes. Future studies may investigate the neural mechanisms of humor-
No. MOST 103-2410-H-007-033. ous stimuli, positive non-humorous stimuli, and negative emotion stimuli.

Institute of Learning Sciences