Thesis Ideas: Psychology
I was watching the Daily Show the other day. The interview part. And this description is going to be really vague so bear with me. But at the beginning of the interview the guest mentions something that Jon finds noteworthy or funny. Let's say its Llamas. Let's say the guest rears llamas. And Jon reacts: "llamas?" Laughter from the audience.
And then at the end of the interview Jon looks for a punchline (it was one of those more lighthearted interviews) and what Jon did for a punchline was just mention llamas in a new context. This is not at all how it went but you'll get the idea.
Jon: So what are you doing next?
Guest: I'm filming a movie in Chile.
Jon: Maybe you can uh...pick up some Llamas while you're there.
My version isn't very funny but you get the point. All he did, basically, was put this somewhat unusual detail from earlier in the discussion into this new context and boom! Kinda funny.
And that got me thinking, the first thing you gotta be able to do if you're going to be funny in that way is remember what was said earlier. Jon Stewart must just be in the habit of remembering details like this all the time so he has them at his disposal when he's casting around for a joke.
And then that got me thinking that a lot of my funniest friends are funny because they remember stuff well, and remember details well, that are then later funny almost on their own just because they're details.
So here's the thesis topic. Correlate funniness and memory (short-term especially, maybe long-term too). My prediction: funny people have better memories.
Think about the funny person in your group of friends. It's the raconteur, right? And stand-up comedy is just embellished storytelling.
It's kinda complicated though. I mean, the relationships between memory and general smarts, and humor and general smarts could make things pretty murky. But you could conceivably do really well on like a mensa-style pattern prediction IQ test and still have a crappy memory. So you'd want to try to control for "smarts" somehow. Like take funny and non-funny people with similar GPAs or similar IQ scores or something.
And then at the end of the interview Jon looks for a punchline (it was one of those more lighthearted interviews) and what Jon did for a punchline was just mention llamas in a new context. This is not at all how it went but you'll get the idea.
Jon: So what are you doing next?
Guest: I'm filming a movie in Chile.
Jon: Maybe you can uh...pick up some Llamas while you're there.
My version isn't very funny but you get the point. All he did, basically, was put this somewhat unusual detail from earlier in the discussion into this new context and boom! Kinda funny.
And that got me thinking, the first thing you gotta be able to do if you're going to be funny in that way is remember what was said earlier. Jon Stewart must just be in the habit of remembering details like this all the time so he has them at his disposal when he's casting around for a joke.
And then that got me thinking that a lot of my funniest friends are funny because they remember stuff well, and remember details well, that are then later funny almost on their own just because they're details.
So here's the thesis topic. Correlate funniness and memory (short-term especially, maybe long-term too). My prediction: funny people have better memories.
Think about the funny person in your group of friends. It's the raconteur, right? And stand-up comedy is just embellished storytelling.
It's kinda complicated though. I mean, the relationships between memory and general smarts, and humor and general smarts could make things pretty murky. But you could conceivably do really well on like a mensa-style pattern prediction IQ test and still have a crappy memory. So you'd want to try to control for "smarts" somehow. Like take funny and non-funny people with similar GPAs or similar IQ scores or something.
posted by Andrew at 10:08 PM
1 Comments:
i actually disagree. i mean, clearly that is one type of humor, a seemingly very calculated kind, but i wouldnt go so far as to say that one's memory could be correlated with their "funniness." first of all, how would you find these "funny" people in order to study them? who decides theyre funny? would you have to use people like jon stewart, who are already famously funny? because what if having a good memory was a better predictor of famousness than funniness (just a random example)? wouldnt you agree that out of all of jon stewarts truly funny antics, remembering some random detail from earlier in the interview ranks pretty low? i think its more of an easy way to get some laughs and tie up the conversation. and also, my funniest friends arent the ones who remember stories or past incidences the most accurately, but rather are able to come up with something full of wit and novelty without any pre-meditation. for the record. but interesting blog nonetheless! keep on shootin!
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