Humor in romantic relationships: A meta‐analysis

Abstract

Abstract This manuscript reports a meta‐analysis of the correlation between humor and relationship satisfaction in romantic relationships, combining 43 distinct samples from 39 manuscripts and including 15,177 participants (54.7% female) with a mean age of 34.0 years. Drawing from 3 theoretical dimensions of humor (i.e., within‐person/relational, positive/negative, instrumental/content free), weighted mean effect sizes were estimated for 12 distinct subdimensions of humor. All 6 positive types of humor were positively associated with relationship satisfaction, and 4 of 5 negative types of humor were negatively associated with relationship satisfaction. Instrumental humor was unassociated with satisfaction. In support of the proposed relational dimension, self‐reported humor showed small associations with satisfaction, while partner‐perceived and relational humor showed medium and large effect sizes, respectively.

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