Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: This paper presents an experimental test of the assumptions of the author’s proposed psychological model of political humor effects. The model, referred to as the Counterargument Disruption Model of Political Humor (CADIMO), is a theoretical framework in which to examine the effects of political humor which integrates assumptions of humor’s incongruity mechanism (Suls, 1972), the Elaboration Likelihood Model ( Petty and Cacioppo, 1986), and argument-disruption theory (Festinger and Maccoby, 1964). The primary aspect of the CADIMO addressed in this paper concerns the counterargument disruption mechanism posited to occur in the context of humor, specifically in late-night political humor. The experiment uses a 2 condition within-subjects design on a sample of 59 college undergraduates to test the hypothesis that humorous constructs inhibit cognitive elaboration on message arguments.