Sense of humor, self-concept, and psychological well-being in psychiatric inpatients

Recent work with nonclinical samples has found that higher levels of sense of humor are associated with a healthier, more positive self-concept, and g reater psychological well-being. As such, the purpose of the present study was two-fold. First, we wished to determine if the levels of humor displaye d by psychiatric inpatients would be similar to, or different from, those d isplayed by a nonclinical comparison group. Second, we assessed the degree to which the relationships between humor, self-concept, and well-being that have been documented for nonclinical samples would also be obtained for ps ychiatric inpatients. To this end, participants in this study completed fou r self-report measures of sense of humor, two measures of self-concept and two measures of psychological well-being. Initial analyses indicated that t he overall psychiatric sample scored significantly lower than a nonclinical comparison group on each of the four humor scales. When the psychiatric sa mple was divided into various diagnostic categories, however, it was found that clinical depressives displayed the lowest levels of sense of humor, ye t still evidenced the strongest relationships between sense of humor, a mor e positive self-concept, and greater psychological well-being. In contrast, schizophrenic inpatients showed only slightly lower levels of humor than t he nonclinical comparison group, but failed to exhibit any relations betwee n sense of human, self-concept, and psychological well-being. These finding s were discussed in terms of practical clinical implications and suggestion s for future research.