EFFECTS OF HUMOR ON SENTENCE MEMORY

Memory for humorous and nonhumorous versions of sentences was compared . Humorous sentences were better remembered than the nonhumorous sente nces on both free- and cued-recall tests and on measures of sentence r ecall and word recall. These effects persisted when subjects were warn ed that they were about to read a humorous sentence but were attenuate d in incidental learning and limited to within-subjects manipulations. In incidental learning, recall was also scored as a function of subje ctive ratings of humor. Subjective humor affected memory in both withi n- and between-subjects designs. Attention, arousal, rehearsal, retrie val, and surprise explanations were explored. Results suggest that hum orous material receives both increased attention and rehearsal relativ e to nonhumorous material.