One study says that laughing doesn’t promise a good date.
Olivia Petter shows that this isn’t logical because women laugh at men not because they’re funny, but because it’s easier than having to deal with them when they’re upset.
When did you last laugh? It could have been when your dad said something crude about cancel society.
Or when your boyfriend got coffee on his brand-new white T-shirt before work.
Or when someone in the meeting told a joke that made you cringe, and you felt bad for them.
I want to make a point that women laugh at guys for reasons that have nothing to do with how funny they are. A new study says that funny guys have a harder time dating, at least if they’re straight.
That’s why I feel compelled to make this point very strongly today.
That’s what a study from the University of Queensland found after asking 554 straight volunteers to go on a run of three-minute speed dates.
The dates were then videotaped and analyzed.
The results showed that being funny doesn’t help you get dates.
“Whether they were gay or straight, people who laughed more at their partner or got more laughs from them did not rate their partner as more or less attractive,” said Henry Wainwright, the study’s lead author.
“It’s interesting that this result goes against the common belief that women like funny men more and men like funny women more.”
In the past, psychologists have said that women like funny guys because of how our species evolved.
“In the past, people thought that being attracted to funny people was helpful because it made your children more likely to inherit good traits, like intelligence,” Wainwright said.
“If this process is real, it would mean that being funny and being attracted to funny people have evolved to help us. This could be one reason why humor is found in almost all human cultures.” Our results, on the other hand, show that trying too hard to be funny on a date might not help. Instead, you should just be yourself.
That’s not what I do. I’m also not a doctor. Also, I’m not really good at dating.
But I can tell you that this reasoning doesn’t make sense—at least not to me. The only thing that keeps the dating scene fun is humor. It’s the most important thing that my friends and I look for on Hinge dates. And most of the time, the only thing that makes it fun.
Still, I understand what the study found.
Contrary to what most people think, laughing does not always mean someone is funny. It can even mean the opposite sometimes, especially in a loving setting. I bet that almost every guy I’ve gone on a first date with has thought they were the next Steve Martin when we were done.
How many of them did I actually find funny? That number would be way too low, I’m afraid.To show what I mean, here are some things that have made me laugh on dates: I’m trying to calm him down because I can tell he’s scared.
I don’t want him to feel bad about how bad he is at flirting. He said something that made me feel bad, and I’m trying to hide the fact that it does.
The study didn’t make a distinction between men and women, but I think women are laughing out of pity more than men.
From a very young age, we are taught to be people-pleasers.
Who knew a long time ago that being angry or upset makes no one like us. They are the ones who have learned how to smile even when things aren’t going well.
With all of this in mind, I can see why the experts came to the conclusion that laughter did not always mean more attraction. That doesn’t change how much we value humor, though.
If anything, this study shows that too many of us laugh at things we don’t find funny on dates to keep the peace or to boost someone else’s confidence when we think it’s about to drop.
It’s true that funny guys still have the upper hand when it comes to straight dating.
Of course, trying too hard isn’t funny. And I’m not telling you to do that at all. But don’t let studies like this make you think that humor isn’t cool when it comes to dating.
I’d say it’s worth more than ever because my single straight female friends and I are tired of first dates that don’t go well, where the talk is painful and every laugh feels like a service.