Humor and workplace stress: a longitudinal ... - Wiley Online Library

Asia Pacific Journal of Human Resources (2017) ,

doi:10.1111/1744-7941.12157

Humor and workplace stress: a longitudinal comparison between Australian and Chinese employees Rong Wang Shenzhen University, China Darius Kwan Shing Chan The Chinese University of Hong Kong, China Yong Wah Goh The University of Southern Queensland, Australia Melissa Penfold The University of Southern Queensland, Australia Timothy Harper The University of Southern Queensland, Australia Tim Weltewitz The University of Southern Queensland, Australia

This study investigates how humor usage (including positive and negative humor styles) influences employees’ responses to the same stressful events, namely, the auto-correlation between stress experiences at two time points. Moreover, it examines differences between Australian and Chinese employees in such effects via bicultural comparisons. Results from a two-wave survey of 109 Australian and 141 Chinese employees indicated that humor usage moderated the StressTime1 – StressTime2 relationship for Australian employees but not for Chinese employees. Specifically, the positive relationship between the two stress measures became weaker for Australians who were higher in humor than those lower in humor. Similarly, Positive humor mitigated the relationship between StressTime1 and StressTime2 only for the Australians but not the Chinese. However, Negative humor exerted no influence on the focal relationship in either sample. Organizations should encourage employees to use humor in effective ways, thereby improving stress coping skills and reducing workplace stress. Keywords: Australia, China, humor, longitudinal study, workplace stress Key points 1 Chinese employees have lower levels of humor than Australian employees. 2 Positive humor usage helps Australian employees reduce workplace stress. 3 Both positive and negative humor styles are ineffective in reducing stress among Chinese employees.

Correspondence: Dr Darius Kwan Shing Chan, Department of Psychology, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, Hong Kong SAR, China; e-mail: [email protected] Accepted for publication 12 May 2017. © 2017 Australian HR Institute

Asia Pacific Journal of Human Resources

Humor refers to: anything that people say or do that is perceived as funny and tends to make others laugh, as well as the mental processes that go into both creating and perceiving such an amusing stimulus, and also the affective response involved in the enjoyment of it. (Martin 2007, 5)

The use, perception, and appreciation of humor are closely tied to positive definitions of self and are believed to provide a lot of benefits in our daily life. They have been associated with a reduction in mental health problems and have been found to moderate the perceived intensity of negative life events (Martin 2004). Moreover, humor can work as the ‘lubricant’ to improve individuals’ enjoyment and confidence in social interactions, and to facilitate social influence by producing greater compliance (Nezlek and Derks 2001). Humor appears to be inconsistent with the serious nature of work and even to disturb the rationality of systems emphasized in the workplace. Indeed, it also has significant implications for organizations (Mesmer-Magnus, Glew and Viswesvaran 2012). Humor has been found to be a useful way to create a fun environment that can be used to improve morale, performance and creativity, and to decrease stress-related problems (e.g. Lehmann-Willenbrock and Allen 2014). For leaders, humor is an important element of successful leadership as well as a toolkit that can contribute to effective management, such as motivating employees’ innovative behaviors and establishing high-quality relationships with followers (e.g. Pundt 2015; Pundt and Herrmann 2015). For employees, constructive uses of humor may significantly improve their physical and psychological health, and reduce intention to leave and burnout (e.g. Ho 2016). Therefore, many corporations are taking interest in integrating humor into training, employee relations, and other dayto-day activities. Humor has even been reported as an indispensable part of organizational culture in some companies, such as Ben & Jerry’s, Southwest Airlines, and Sun Microsystems (Romero and Cruthirds 2006). Given the potentially positive functions played by humor in organizations, but confronted with limited empirical research in the workplace, it is useful to explore employees’ use of humor from the perspective of organizational psychology. Moreover, due in part, to increased competition and globalization, the work environment has been becoming more and more stressful (Romero and Cruthirds 2006). For example, work-related stress has been a significant occupational health and safety issue in the workplace, which has been rated as the second largest cause of work-related injury and illness in Australia (Caulfield et al. 2004). The current study devotes attention to the roles played by humor in reducing work stress from a longitudinal perspective. Individuals with the same jobs or even experiencing the same job events will not perceive the same level of stress. However, as shown in a number of longitudinal studies, especially those with a cross-lagged design (e.g. Besser and Neria 2010), individuals’ responses to the same stressful event and/or situation at different time points are generally correlated, indicating the persistent nature of job stress. In addition to the negative effects 2

© 2017 Australian HR Institute

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of organizational stressful events on employees’ health, well-being, and other organizational consequences, stress experience can also be conceived of as a first-level outcome of stressful events or situations. Therefore, unlike prior longitudinal research focusing on the role of individual differences in stress–strain relationships (Spector, Chen and O’Connell 2000), this study examined directly how the stability of two stress measures due to the same stressor (sometimes termed ‘autocorrelation’) taken 4 weeks apart would be buffered by individuals’ levels of humor. Cultural difference is another issue that we investigate in this research. Admittedly, humor and laughter have important socio-emotional functions that contribute to our survival, so they should be a universal aspect of human experience and occur in all cultures. However, different cultures have their own attitudes and norms about humor, such as appropriate subject matter, suitable types of situations and ways to express it (Martin 2007; Yang, Kitchen and Bacouel-Jentjens 2017). Organizations are also deeply embedded in cultures, and employees’ own cultural values, beliefs and assumptions influence their emotional expressions and humor appreciations (Robert and Yan 2007), which lay the foundation for exploring the interaction of humor and culture. Considering that individualistic values (e.g. independence and self-assertion) encourage emotional expressions whereas collectivistic values (e.g. interdependence and relationship harmony) might encourage emotional suppressions (Butler, Lee and Gross 2007), we compared Australian and Chinese employees in the relationship between humor and work-related stress over time. Apart from the cultural issue, it should be noted that use of humor in reducing stress has not received consistently supportive evidence (Anderson and Arnoult 1989; Overholser 1992), since humor does not always work in psychologically beneficial ways, and its implications seem to depend on how it is used by individuals (Martin 2007). Martin and colleagues distinguished beneficial (i.e. affiliative humor and self-enhancing humor) and detrimental (i.e. aggressive humor and self-defeating humor) uses of humor (Martin et al. 2003). Affiliative humor and self-enhancing humor refer to the tendency to use humor as a means of facilitating interpersonal relationships or coping with stress, whereas aggressive and self-defeating humor are used to enhance self at the expense of others or to gain approval and attention from others at the expense of one’s own psychological needs (Martin 2007; Martin et al. 2003). Negative forms of humor impair the initiation and maintenance of interpersonal relationships and have generally been found to be unrelated or even negatively related to individuals’ well-being (Samson and Gross 2012). Thus, this study will also explore the different roles of both positive and negative humor styles from a cross-cultural perspective. The current study makes several major contributions to existing literature on workplace stress and humor. First, most of the previous studies have demonstrated the use of humor in reducing stress via laboratory experiments; generalizability of such findings to everyday experiences, particularly in the work setting, remain largely unexplored. Due to the variations of individuals and organizational environments, the current study examines employees’ responses to specific and realistic stressful events that they have experienced. © 2017 Australian HR Institute

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Second, beyond the extant research related to humor, we adopt a longitudinal design to explore the persistence of work-related stress measured twice and see how the association of these two stress measures will vary with employees’ levels of humor, in order to demonstrate that humor should be taken seriously not only in social contexts but also in organizations. Third, the bicultural comparisons are conducted to delineate differences in humor usage between Australian and Chinese employees. Fourth, to advance our understanding of the mitigating effects of humor on workplace stress, the different roles played by different types of humor are also examined. Theoretical background and hypotheses development Humor and workplace stress Humor serves important cognitive, emotional, and social functions to reduce or cope with stress. According to the transactional stress theory, the impact of a potentially stressful event on individuals depends on their own interpretation (Lazarus and Folkman 1984). One of the most influential theories to explain the cognitive basis of humor is the incongruity theory (Forabosco 1992). Stressors are often incongruous since they are inconsistent with our logic and ordinary expectations. However, the incongruity theory suggests that humor can be employed to adjust individuals’ perceptions and even increase the enjoyment of incongruity in order to reduce the perceived threat and detrimental effect of stressors (Galloway and Cropley 1999). Compared to those who are less humorous, humorous individuals tend to appraise a stressor as more of a positive challenge and demonstrate more mental flexibility to adjust expectation about their performance, endorsing more realistic standards in evaluating self-worth (Kuiper, Martin and Olinger 1993). Humor also enables individuals to perceive more control over their own lives and choose event-enhancing and self-protective strategies to cope with stress, such as viewing the positive and challenging side of a stressor (Martin et al. 2003). Moreover, as a way to release pent-up nervous energy, humor can help individuals avoid becoming too emotional when confronting stressful events, and even lead to positive affect in individuals, and transmit it to other group members (Robert and Wilbanks 2012). It has been found that the positive affect of high humor individuals will increase with positive life events more easily and less likely to decrease with negative ones (Kuiper, McKenzie and Belanger 1995). Furthermore, according to the broaden and build theory (Fredrickson 2001), positive emotions induced by humor will broaden the scope of attention focus, inspire more creative problem-solving strategies, and provide an increased range of behavioral response options, and then build physical, intellectual and social resources to help individuals deal with challenges. Stressful events elicit individuals’ needs of social support. Humor also has social functions which work as social lubrication, helping team members construct and maintain good relationships with fellow workers, know each other better, defuse conflict, and reduce hostility (Holmes 2000). Then, the functional social-network engendered by 4


Rong Wang et al.

humor will provide employees with social support when confronting stressful events (Moran and Hughes 2006). Cultural differences in usage of humor According to Hofstede (1984), power distance and individualism–collectivism are two major dimensions that differentiate cultures. Humor seems to be more acceptable and effective in low power distance and individualistic cultures (e.g. Australia) than in high power distance and collectivistic cultures (e.g. China). First, it is the relative power in the workplace that determines who tells the jokes or who the target of jokes is (Dwyer 1991). Humor can be employed to stress one’s own superiority. Compared with individuals with low status in the hierarchy, those in senior positions are permitted to express emotions, attitudes, and feelings in humorous ways more freely. Using the database of the Wellington Language in the Workplace Project, Holmes and Marra (2006) found that humor, as a sophisticated strategy, was often used by influential people (e.g. leaders) to construct their leadership, maintain a dignified profile, and manage face threat. Authority, rank, and status are sacrosanct in organizations with high power distance, and subordinates’ ability to use humor might be constrained due to the potential punishment from their superiors and violation of organizational norms (Robert and Yan 2007). Second, the core distinction of individualism–collectivism is the notion of group (Hofstede 1984). Individualists behave primarily based on their own attitudes whereas collectivists are concerned with harmonious interpersonal relationships and behave in ways accepted by others (Triandis 2001); norm violation will lead to more face loss among collectivists (Yuan and Bond 2010). In terms of emotional expressions and emotional contagion processes, one important factor is the display rules, which specify which emotions are appropriate in specific situations and how to express emotions to others (Diefendorff and Richard 2003). It has been shown that compared to individualists, collectivists express emotions less frequently, less intensely, and for shorter durations, and those incongruent with the group mood (e.g. humor in the workplace) are more likely to be suppressed (Butler, Lee and Gross 2007). Tightness–looseness is another cultural distinction between Australia and China. Unlike loose cultures (i.e. Australia), tight cultures (i.e. China) tend to have higher degrees of situational constraint to restrict individuals’ behaviors, leading to higher levels of selfregulation (Gelfand et al. 2011). Given the fact that humor often disturbs the status quo and broaches taboo subjects, and is likely to deviate from social norms (Robert and Yan 2007), Chinese employees thus should be more cautious than their Australian counterparts in using humor in the workplace. We thus proposed the first hypothesis: Hypothesis 1: Humor usage will buffer the positive relationship between StressTime1 and StressTime2, and this moderating effect will be stronger among participants from Australia than for those from China.


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That is, the positive relationship between the two stress measures across time will become weaker for Australians who are higher in humor usage than those lower in humor. And such a pattern will not be observed in the Chinese sample. Different roles of positive and negative humor styles Humor is a ‘double-edged sword’. Negative or unwanted humor conveys a negative message that may result in problems in organizations, such as repression, humiliation, degradation, and intentional or unintentional distress (Romero and Cruthirds 2006). Among the four forms of humor suggested by Martin et al. (2003), affiliative and self-enhancing humor styles are the most commonly recommended styles while aggressive and self-defeating humor styles are discouraged. It is conceivable that different components of humor have different adaptive consequences and play different roles in reducing workplace stress. Correlations between humor styles and different dimensions of the Big Five personality dimensions may offer partial explanation. According to Vernon et al. (2008), affiliative and self-enhancing humor styles are positively correlated with extraversion and opennessto-experience, which contribute to individuals’ emotional well-being, social support, relationship satisfaction and better coping and problem-solving. In contrast, aggressive and self-defeating humor styles are positively related to neuroticism and negatively related to conscientiousness, indicating that individuals with such humor styles are likely to experience negative moods (high in neuroticism) and have lower levels of thoughtfulness and impulse control (low in conscientiousness). In addition to associations with self-reported personality dimensions, humor styles also influence personality impressions formed by others. Positive humor styles generate more positive personality impressions than negative ones, resulting in positive impact on social relationships or social support (Kuiper and Leite 2010). Different humor types have been found to have different adaptive consequences. Based on the emotion regulation perspective, it is shown that positive humor down-regulates negative emotions and up-regulates positive emotions more effectively than negative humor, regardless of difficulties in creating these two forms of humor, participants’ expectation or social desirability (Samson and Gross 2012). Samson and Gross further elaborated that positive humor encourages individuals to re-appraise the stressful situation, whereas negative humor just helps more to distance the threatening situation emotionally. It has also been found that positive styles are positively correlated with social abilities and components of emotional intelligence, but negative styles have negative associations with them, suggesting that the presence of positive humor as well as absence of negative humor are both adaptive when facing challenges (Yip and Martin 2006) (Figure 1). Based on above discussions, we developed the second hypotheses: Hypothesis 2: Positive humor styles (i.e. affiliative and self-enhancing humor) will play a more important role of buffering the positive association between StressTime1 on StressTime2 than negative humor styles (i.e. aggressive and self-defeating humor).

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Figure 1 Conceptual framework of the current study

That is, the usage of positive humor rather than negative humor will moderate the positive association of the two stress measures in the Australian sample. Again, such a pattern will not be observed in the Chinese sample. Methods Participants A total of 250 participants from Australia and People’s Republic of China completed our surveys (109 were from Australia and 141 were from China). They were all employees who worked in a variety of work settings, ranging from commercial organizations, government departments, to educational institutions. In the Australian sample, 79.82% of them (n = 87) were female, with an average age of 38.83 years (SD = 13.80), and an average job tenure of 14.02 years (SD = 11.75). In the Chinese sample, 78.00% of them (n = 110) were female, with an average age of 26.04 years (SD = 3.87), and an average tenure of 2.89 years (SD = 3.04). Procedure Based on their employment status, the Australian participants were recruited via convenience sampling from the community and university staffs in Australia, while our Chinese participants were full-time employees enrolling in some part-time programs in the universities of Beijing. We first notified participants about our study. Those who agreed to participate were asked to complete the survey in two sessions. The time 1 and time 2 surveys were completed electronically online or through paper copies that were personally mailed directly to the Australian participants. Similarly, the Chinese participants received surveys distributed by our research collaborators in China. During the time 1 data collection, participants identified a recent stressor at work that had generated a considerable amount of personal stress and would continue for an extended period of time. The survey then assessed participant’s Perceived stressful rating © 2017 Australian HR Institute

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(PSR) and stress level (Job-related affective well-being scale, JAWS) in relation to the identified stressful event. The Humor styles questionnaire (HSQ) was also administered. About 4 weeks after the time 1 survey, the time 2 survey was administered. Participants were asked to answer the survey in relation to the specific stressful event identified at time 1 to assess their stress level again by using JAWS. Their participation was completely voluntary and those who completed each survey were given a souvenir (around $1) as a token of appreciation. The survey procedures were identical in the two countries. For data screening, only those cases with both surveys duly completed were kept for the analysis. We also examined whether the stressful events reported at the two time points were the same or not; our statistical analyses reported below include only those cases reporting the same event at both times. Measures The survey materials were first developed in English. To ensure conceptual equivalence, each of the scales was then translated into Chinese before data collection in China using the back-translation procedure (Brislin 1970). Stress Fifteen items of the Job-related affective well-being scale measuring negative emotions were used to capture participants’ stress levels (Van Katwyk et al. 2000). JAWS items were rated on 5-point scales (1 = ‘never’ and 5 = ‘extremely often’ or ‘always’). A sample item is ‘The stressful event made me feel anxious’. JAWS showed satisfactory reliability in our samples, with Cronbach alpha of 0.92 (time 1) and 0.92 (time 2) in the Australian sample, and Cronbach alpha of 0.90 (time 1) and 0.88 (time 2) in the Chinese sample. Humor Humor was assessed by the Humor styles questionnaire (Martin et al. 2003). It consists of 32 items, with 8 items in each of the 4 dimensions (affiliative humor, self-enhancing humor, aggressive humor and self-defeating humor). Using 7-point ‘agree’ – ‘disagree’ scales, participants were asked to indicate the degree to which they agreed or disagreed with each item, such as ‘If I am feeling depressed, I can usually cheer myself up with humor’. To test our hypotheses, following the logic of Zeigler-Hill and Besser (2011), affiliative humor and self-enhancing humor were combined to create the score of positive humor, while aggressive humor and self-defeating humor were combined to create the score of negative humor. The reliability coefficients of the 4 subscales were 0.67 to 0.80 in the Australian sample and 0.52 to 0.87 in the Chinese sample; reliability coefficients of positive humor, negative humor and the total humor score were 0.81, 0.79 and 0.78 in the Australian sample, and 0.86, 0.62 and 0.83 in the Chinese sample. Control variables Perceived stress rating (PSR) captures the overall amount of stress that our participants perceived due to the self-identified events, in comparison to other stressful situations. 8


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Using 5-point scales (1 = ‘least stressful’ to 5 = ‘most stressful’), participants were asked to rate the item: ‘How stressful this situation was compared to other work-related situations that you have experienced during your working life’. Regression results showed that PSR was indeed significantly associated with participants’ stress level at both times (time 1: b = 0.37, p < 0.01; time 2: b = 0.27, p < 0.01). Moreover, since significant differences were found in gender ratio (v2 = 4.10, df = 1, p < 0.05), age (t = 9.36, df = 246, p < 0.01), and job tenure (t = 9.59, df = 244, p < 0.01) between the Australian and Chinese samples, these three demographic variables were also controlled. Analytical strategy We started with descriptive analyses and independent sample t tests to gather basic information about the means and SDs, inter-correlations, reliability coefficients of the studied variables, and differences in humor usage between Australian and Chinese samples. Then, hierarchical linear regression analysis was used to test the three-way interaction posited in hypothesis 1. We also conducted analysis of repeated measures to explore the change in direction of stress among both high- and low-humor Australian employees. Next, two separate hierarchical linear regression analyses were conducted to test the roles of positive humor and negative humor styles posited in hypothesis 2. Following the practice of Dawson and Richter (2006) on probing three-way interactions in moderated multiple regression, we also examined the strength of StressTime1 – StressTime2 relationship among high- and low-humor employees, respectively, to see whether their differences in such slopes were significantly different from zero for each of the two cultural groups. Results Table 1 shows descriptive statistics of the studied variables. PSR was positively related to the StressTime1 (r = 0.37, p < 0.01) and StressTime2 (r = 0.27, p < 0.01). A high correlation was also found between StressTime1 and StressTime2 (r = 0.70, p < 0.01), but there was a significant difference between them (t = 3.80, df = 247, p < 0.01, MTime1 = 2.88, MTime2 = 2.74). In line with previous findings (Zeigler-Hill and Besser 2011), a weak but

Table 1 Descriptive statistics and inter-correlations among studied variables Variable

M

1 StressTime1 2 StressTime2 3 Positive humor 4 Negative humor 5 Humor_total 6 Culture

2.88 2.75 4.87 3.39 4.13 NA

SD

1 .74 .72 .83 .70 .59

NA

2

.70** .01 .02 .02 .03

3

.07 .04 .07 .01

4

.19** .82** .20**

.73** .03

5

6

.12†

N = 250. *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, †p = 0.05. Culture: 0 = Australia, 1 = China. © 2017 Australian HR Institute

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significant relationship was found between Positive and Negative humor (r = 0.19, p < 0.01). Therefore, we also combined them to obtain the score of Humor_total. The independent sample t test results indicated that the levels of Humor_total and Positive humor among Australian employees were significantly higher than those of their Chinese counterparts (Humor_total: t = 1.97, df = 248, p < 0.05, MAUS = 4.21, MCHN = 4.07; Positive humor: t = 3.23, df = 248, p < 0.05, MAUS = 5.06, MCHN = 4.72), but they did not differ in the levels of Negative humor (t = 0.46, df = 248, ns, MAUS = 3.37, MCHN = 3.41). Analyses examining hypothesis 1 Hierarchical linear regression was used to test the predicted three-way interaction in our hypothesis 1. The control variables, main effect of each variable, all the two-way interaction terms, and the hypothesized three-way interaction were entered into the regression in four steps. As shown in Table 2, for Humor_total, the three-way interaction item accounted for an additional 1% of the variance in StressTime2, which was significant (b = 0.16, p < 0.05). Then, the moderating effect of humor was tested for the two cultural groups, respectively. Consistent with our prediction, Humor_total buffered the StressTime1 – StressTime2

Table 2 Regression results showing the three-way interaction among StressTime1, Humor_total, and Culture Variable Control variables (Step 1) Gender Age Tenure PSR Main effects (Step 2) StressTime1 Humor Culture Two-way interaction (Step 3) StressTime1 9 Humor StressTime1 9 Culture Culture 9 Humor Three-way interaction (Step 4) StressTime1 9 Humor 9 Culture F DF R2 DR2

M1

.11* .01 .05 .27**

5.33** 5.33** .09 .09

M2

M3

M4

.09* .06 .04 .00

.08 .06 .04 .01

.07 .05 .03 .02

.72** .12* .02

.75** .18* .02

.76** .19* .01

.05 .04 .08

.16* .05 .10

24.74** .99 .54 .01

.16* 23.57** 5.98* .55 .01

34.93** 67.86** .53 .44

*p < 0.05, **p < 0.01. Standardized beta coefficients are reported. 10


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relationship in Australian sample (b = 0.14, p < 0.05) but not in Chinese sample (b = 0.06, ns; see Table 3), supporting hypothesis 1. Supplementary analyses The above findings confirmed that the buffering effect of humor was found only for the Australian sample, not for the Chinese. Whereas it would be intuitively interesting to explore whether the actual reduction in stress over time would be different for high- and low-humor employees, such an analysis might be difficult for our study design because our participants were asked to freely recall a specific stressful event happened to them in the workplace. Such a manipulation is high in realism. However, it also challenges the analysis on actual reduction in stress over time because individual differences were evident in both the types of stressors and their associated levels of stress experience. Nevertheless, we still conducted some supplementary analyses to explore the pattern of change in the two stress measures for the Australian employees with different levels of humor. We first used the median split to divide the Australian sample into high- and low-humor groups, and then conducted repeated measures analysis, with time as within-subject variable, humor as between-subject variable and PSR as covariate. Results showed that high-humor Australians did report lower stress levels at both times than low humor ones (high: StressTime1 = 2.87, StressTime2 = 2.65; low: StressTime1 = 2.94, StressTime2 = 2.83), and their stress levels also decreased (D Stress = 0.22) more than that of low-humor Australians (D Stress = 0.11). Table 3 Regression results showing the two-way interaction between StressTime1 and Humor_total in the two cultures Variable

Australia (N = 109) M1

Control variables (Step 1) Gender .18 Age .04 Tenure .02 PSR .34** Main effects (Step 2) StressTime1 Humor Two-way interaction (Step 3) StressTime1 9 Humor F 4.44** DF 4.44** R2 .15 DR2 .15

M2

China (N = 141) M3

.10 .10 .01 .00

.12 .11 .03 .00

.74** .02

.73** .02

20.33** 44.39** .56 .40

.14* 18.57** 4.11* .57 .02

M1

.08 .01 .09 .18

1.36 1.36 .05 .05

M2

M3

.08 .01 .13 .00

.09 .02 .13 .00

.68** .00

.69** .01

16.91** 45.85** .48 .43

.06 14.59** .81 .48 .00

*p < 0.05,**p < 0.01. Standardized beta coefficients are reported. © 2017 Australian HR Institute

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Analysis examining hypothesis 2 To explore the different roles of positive and negative humor styles (as posited in hypothesis 2), the effect of three-way interaction was examined via two separate hierarchical linear regression analyses. As can be seen in tables 4 and 5, the three-way interaction term of StressTime1 9 Positive humor 9 Culture accounted for an additional 1% of the variance in StressTime2 which was significant (b = 0.15, p < 0.05). However, the coefficient of StressTime1 9 Negative humor 9 Culture was non-significant (b = 0.09, ns), indicating there was no three-way interaction effect for Negative humor. Next, the moderating effects of both Positive and Negative humor were tested for each cultural group. For Positive humor, its moderating effect on StressTime1 – StressTime2 relationship was marginally significant in the Australian sample (b = 0.13, p = 0.06), but non-significant in the Chinese sample (b = 0.02, ns). Negative humor exerted no influence on the focal relationship in either sample (Australia: b = 0.09, ns; China: b = 0.10, ns) (see tables 6 and 7). These findings supported our hypothesis 2. Finally, following the statistical procedure of Dawson and Richter (2006), by examining the strength of StressTime1 – StressTime2 relationship among high- and low-humor employees, we checked whether the differences in such slopes were significantly different from zero for each of the two cultural groups. In terms of Humor_total, the difference Table 4 Regression results showing the three-way interaction among StressTime1, Positive humor, and Culture Variable Control variables (Step 1) Gender Age Tenure PSR Main effects (Step 2) StressTime1 Positive humor Culture Two-way interaction (Step 3) StressTime1 9 Positive humor StressTime1 9 Culture Culture 9 Positive humor Three-way interaction (Step 4) StressTime1 9 Positive humor 9 Culture F DF R2 DR2

M1

.14* .01 .05 .27**

5.33** 5.33** .09 .09

M2

M3

M4

.09 .07 .02 .00

.08 .07 .02 .01

.07 .06 .02 .01

.72** .12* .01

.75** .21** .01

.76** .24** .01

.05 .04 .11

.15* .05 .14

24.70** 1.03 .54 .01

.15* 23.58** 6.27* .55 .01

34.83** 67.65** .53 .44

*p < 0.05, **p < 0.01. Standardized beta coefficients are reported. 12


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Table 5 Regression results showing the three-way interaction among StressTime1, Negative humor, and Culture Variable Control variables (Step 1) Gender Age Tenure PSR Main effects (Step 2) StressTime1 Negative humor Culture Two-way interaction (Step 3) StressTime1 9 Negative humor StressTime1 9 Culture Culture 9 Negative humor Three-way interaction (Step 4) StressTime1 9 Negative humor 9 Culture F DF R2 DR2

M1

M2

.14* .01 .05 .27**

5.33** 5.33** .09 .09

M3

M4

.10 .07 .05 .01

.09 .08 .04 .00

.08 .08 .03 .00

.72** .06 .05

.74** .06 .05

.74** .07 .04

.06 .04 .02

.11 .05 .00

23.59** .68 .53 .01

.09 21.76** 2.17 .53 .00

33.55** 64.93** .52 .43

*p < 0.05, **p < 0.01. Standardized beta coefficients are reported.

between high-humor and low-humor groups was significant in the Australian sample (Db = 0.22, t = 2.44, df = 238, p < 0.01), but was non-significant in the Chinese sample (Db = 0.10, t = 1.07, df = 238, ns). Similarly, the difference between high Positive humor and low Positive humor was found to be significant in the Australian sample (Db = 0.22, t = 2.42, df = 238, p < 0.01), but was non-significant in the Chinese sample (Db = 0.13, t = 1.15, df = 238, ns). We plotted these interaction effects using values that were one standard deviation above and below the scale means. Figures 2A and 3A show the interaction patterns of the Australian sample, and Figures 2B and 3B display different patterns derived from the Chinese sample. Discussion This study explored the constructive roles of humor usage in reducing workplace stress, and also the cultural differences between Australian and Chinese employees experiencing such effects. Consistent with our hypotheses, humor usage was found to moderate the StressTime1 – StressTime2 relationship among Australian employees but not Chinese employees. The same pattern was also found for Positive humor. However, Negative humor exerted no influence on the focal relationship in either sample. © 2017 Australian HR Institute

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Table 6 Regression results showing the two-way interaction between StressTime1 and Positive humor in the two cultures Variable


Control variables (Step 1) Gender Age Tenure PSR Main effects (Step 2) StressTime1 Positive humor Two-way interaction (Step 3) StressTime1 9 Positive humor F DF R2 DR2

.18 .04 .02 .34**

4.44** 4.44** .15 .15

M2

China (N = 141) M3

.08 .09 .01 .02

.09 .11 .01 .01

.74** .04

.74** .02

20.33** 44.39** .56 .40

.13† 18.57** 4.11* .57 .02

M1

.08 .01 .09 .18

1.36 1.36 .05 .05

M2

M3

.08 .01 .13 .00

.08 .01 .13 .00

.68** .03

.69** .03

16.96** 46.00** .48 .43

.02 14.43** .07 .48 .00

*p < 0.05,**p < 0.01, †p = 0.06. Standardized beta coefficients are reported.

Humor provides individuals with not only ways to express negative emotions but also opportunities to explore the cognitive alternatives in response to stressful situations. In making such cognitive appraisals people differ in their sensitivity and vulnerability to stressful events, as well as in interpretations and reactions. To prevent the occurrence of stress, humorous individuals tend to perceive a potential stressor in positive ways, reconstruct and create new meanings for it, and even transform it into a positive one via various protective coping strategies (Doosje et al. 2010). More importantly, humor may increase individuals’ positive psychological resources to cope with stress. For example, previous research on psychological capital (Psycap) has yielded evidence of its effect on various outcomes, including stress reduction (Avey, Luthans and Jensen 2009), and humor has been found to be positively related to four components of Psycap: confidence, hope, optimism and resiliency (Hughes 2008). However, some previous research failed to support the stress-buffering hypothesis of humor. It has been found that individuals who laugh frequently do not show the higher levels of positive affect (Kuiper and Martin 1998), and from the social support perspective, humor does not necessarily increase levels of intimacy in interpersonal relationship (Nezlek and Derks 2001). These findings indicate that humor is not always the best ‘medicine’, with some being facilitative or detrimental. Of two maladaptive components of humor, self-defeating humor has been linked to poor self-esteem and judgments of selfcompetence, and depression and anxiety; and aggressive humor has been found to be 14


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Table 7 Regression results showing the two-way interaction of StressTime1 and Negative humor in the two cultures Variable


Control variables (Step 1) Gender Age Tenure PSR Main effects (Step 2) StressTime1 Negative humor Two-way interaction (Step 3) StressTime1 9 Negative humor F DF R2 DR2

M2

.18 .04 .02 .34**

4.44** 4.44** .15 .15

China (N = 141) M3

.10 .10 .01 .00

.11 .09 .01 .01

.74** .00

.74** .00

20.29** 44.29** .55 .40

0.09 17.74** 1.65 .56 .01

M1

.08 .01 .09 .18

1.36 1.36 .05 .05

M2

M3

.08 .01 .13 .01

.11 .02 .13 .01

.69** .03

.70** .00

16.99** 46.07** .48 .43

.10 14.93** 1.84 .49 .01

*p < 0.05,**p < 0.01. Standardized beta coefficients are reported.

Figure 2 (a) Interaction of StressTime1 and Humor_total on StressTime2 in the Australian sample

Figure 2 (b) Interaction of StressTime1 and Humor_total on StressTime2 in the Chinese sample

unrelated to personal well-being (Kuiper et al. 2004). It has also been found that only positive humor enhances leadership behavior and effectiveness (Decker and Rotondo 2001). Consistent with these standpoints, we also found that negative humor usage was not effective in buffering workplace stress in either the Australian or the Chinese samples. Due in part to cultural values and characteristics, such as collectivism, high power distance orientation, and cultural tightness, humor usage was found to be ineffective in reducing stress among Chinese employees. In line with previous research (e.g. Chen and © 2017 Australian HR Institute

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Figure 3 (a) Interaction of StressTime1 and Positive humor on StressTime2 in the Australian sample

Figure 3 (b) Interaction of StressTime1 and Positive humor on StressTime2 in the Chinese sample

Martin 2007), our data also showed that Chinese employees reported lower levels of humor than Australian employees. Chinese employees’ lower levels of humor may be due to three possible reasons. The first factor is the traditional Chinese culture, such as doctrine of ‘moderation’ (zhong yong) and advocacy for ‘gentlemen’ (jun zi). Chinese tend to treat humor as a display of extreme emotion, and as gentlemen, they should mind their behaviors by behaving seriously and restraining their laughter (Wu and Chan 2013; Yue 2010). The second reason may be shyness. ‘Face preservation’ is often accentuated by Chinese; as a result, compared with westerners, they will demonstrate more shyness in social interactions, and lack of social self-confidence and social skills makes shy people more likely to identify emotional expression as negative or be reluctant to express emotions in humorous ways (Zhao, Kong and Wang 2012). Furthermore, people in the workplace are inclined to use humor mainly for two purposes: social integration and cohesiveness improvement, but such motivations work only when both the initiator and receiver perceive each other as in-group members. Guided by short-term, symmetrical or contractual reciprocity norms, employees in individualistic societies would be more accepting of others as in-group members, and thus are more likely to use humor. In contrast, those in collectivist societies typically require more time to establish relationships and accept others as in-group members, based on their long-term and asymmetrical reciprocity norms (Yum 1988). Humor is thus less likely to be involved in such interactions. Managerial implications Several improvement programs based on humor have already been introduced in the United States, Europe, and Israel, typically in hospital and education settings. However, while organizations and practitioners have begun to realize the value of humor, its full potential has not been appreciated (Romero and Pescosolido 2008). The current study highlights the potential benefits of humor in handling workplace stress, suggesting that organizations should develop and improve employees’ humor in different ways. 16


Rong Wang et al.

First, humor-training seminars can be integrated into stress coping and stress management programs. For example, training modules could be designed to teach employees how to express humor at work and how to use humor to reduce daily stress. However, considering the different types (and potential side effects) of humor, employees should learn to select the appropriate humor styles suitable for desired outcomes. Moreover, the effectiveness of intervention attempts has to be evaluated. Second, organizations, especially those in collectivistic cultures, should try to build a humorous climate to encourage the broad presence of humor in the workplace. For example, physical, visual and mobile humorous smart technologies can be used to provide recreation and enjoyment for the employees. Third, humor is considered to be one of important elements of successful leadership, and managerial humor has been an emerging topic in humor and leadership research. Since power is an important determinant of humor effectiveness, organizational leaders should play an active role in planning, organizing, influencing, and controlling the development of organizational humor. For instance, they can set the example of effective humor utilization and create open and creative organizational cultures to support the development of employees’ positive humor. Our results of cultural differences of humor in reducing workplace stress also have implications for organizational training programs. For example, as our study revealed that humor had limited impact on Chinese employees, introducing humor in stress management training to the Chinese context may have questionable merit and effectiveness. However, it will be wise to train and encourage Chinese managers about the use of humor if they are posted to individualistic cultures, such as Australia. With the prevalent trend of globalization, humor will also be an important component in cross-cultural training programs for employees working in culturally diverse workplace. Limitations and future research Besides humor, other variables are also likely to moderate relationships with reducing workplace stress. Future research could take other factors, such as individual differences (e.g. affective traits) and contextual characteristics (e.g. organizational support), into account. It would also be interesting to delineate how humor buffers the detrimental effects of workplace stress and the underlying mechanisms of such a moderating effect from a longitudinal perspective. For example, do individuals’ levels of humor determine whether they interpret stressful events as hindrance stressors or challenge stressors? The former type has been found to be negatively associated with job attitudes and organizational commitment and positively associated with turnover and withdrawal behaviors, whereas challenge stressors have the reverse relationships with these job attitudes and outcomes (Podsakoff, LePine and LePine 2007). Moreover, we chose Australia and China as representatives of two opposing cultures, based mainly on the cultural dimension of individualism–collectivism. Future studies should examine if our findings can be generalized to other societies with such cultural characteristics. © 2017 Australian HR Institute

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Acknowledgement This research was supported by the General Project of Philosophy and Social Science Research in Colleges and Universities of Jiangsu Province, China (Grant number: 2016SJB190001) and the General Project of Social Science for Young Scholars of Shenzhen University (Grant number: 00000420). Rong Wang (PhD, Chinese Univ of Hong Kong) is an assistant professor at Shenzhen University. Dr Wang’s research concerns leader behaviors, workplace stress and well-being. Darius Kwan Shing Chan (PhD, Illinois at Urbana-Champaign) is an associate professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Dr Chan’s research concerns culture and interpersonal relationships, health and social behavior, and job-related attitudes and behavior. Yong Wah Goh (PhD, Univ of Queensland) is a senior lecturer of psychology at the University of Southern Queensland, Australia. Dr Goh trained as an organizational psychologist and his areas of specialty include stress and coping, training and development, and cross-cultural psychology. He is also heavily involved in consulting projects with J&G Global Consulting in Singapore. Melissa Penfold (MA, Univ of Queensland) is a registered organizational psychologist specializing in recruitment, talent management, and recruitment process outsourcing solutions. Her interests lie in the field of stress and coping, and its applications in the organizational context. Timothy Harper (MSW, Univ of Queensland) is currently working in the field of mental health in Australia. Tim Weltewitz (BA(Hons), Univ of Southern Queensland) is currently a management executive in an Australian manufacturing and wholesale company

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