Foreword and overview Sense of humor: A new look at an old concept

Both laypersons and scholars assign the sense of humor a prominent role in our lives. In everyday life individuals use expressions like having or lacking a sense of humor to explain why people behave the way they do. This need to distinguish among facets of humorous and humorless personalities can be deduced from the fact that cultures typically have developed a rich vocabulary of humor-related nouns, verbs, and adjectives allowing for differentiated descriptions. Scholars in different disciplines have postulated links between the phenomena they study (coping with stress, mating success, health, etc.) and a sense of humor; but, for convincing empirical examination of these hypotheses, clearly spelled out concepts and psychometrically sound assessment instruments are needed. The necessity for a personality approach to humor is also evident in research establishing general theories of humor: Individuals behave differently in humor experiments and this can not be ascribed only to failure to keep the conditions equal for everybody.