Where’s your sense of humor? Political identity moderates evaluations of disparagement humor

Abstract

Two experiments ( N = 449; 246 men, 198 women) examined how political identity moderates appreciation of disparagement humor that violates different moral foundations described in moral foundations theory. In Experiment 1, liberals evaluated memes violating the individualizing moral foundations as more offensive and less funny than conservatives, whereas conservatives rated memes violating the binding moral foundations as more offensive and less funny than liberals. Moreover, conservatives judged the memes across all experimental conditions more favorably than liberals because they more strongly endorse cavalier humor beliefs. Experiment 2 examined the mediating role of perceived personal moral violations. Specifically, liberals evaluate humor violating the individualizing foundations as more offensive than conservatives because they see it as a greater personal moral violation. Similarly, conservatives judged humor violating the binding foundations as more offensive compared to liberals because they see it as a greater personal moral violation.