The relationship between the dominant humor style, emotional intelligence, and problem-solving skills in trainee teachers in Turkey

Abstract

We investigated the relation between humor styles used by 1456 volunteer trainee teachers and their emotional intelligence and problem-solving skills. The participants completed the Humor Styles Questionnaire (HQS), Revised Schutte Emotional Intelligence Test (R-SSEIT) and Problem-Solving Inventory (PSI). The highest-scoring HQS subscale for each participant was taken as the index HQS subscale and the two adaptive HQS subscale (affiliative and self-enhancing) scores and two maladaptive HQS subscale (aggressive and self-defeating) scores were added together in order to calculate each participant's preferred total adaptive and maladaptive reflective humor style scores. Based on this score, every participant was identified as a maladaptive or adaptive reflective humor user. Women had better PSI and R-SSEIT scores compared to men (p < 0.001). The highest index HQS subscales were aggressive humor (234, 36.6%) for men and affiliative humor (334, 40.9%) for women participants. Five hundred fifty women (67.4%) and 264 men (32.4%) were identified as adaptive humor dominant (x(2) = 49.757, p < 0.001). Adaptive humor styles (affiliative r = 0.293, and self-enhancing r = 0.263) were positively correlated with EI, while there was a negative relation between maladaptive humor styles (aggressive r = -0.294, and self-defeating r = -0.273) and EI. Affiliative humor and self-enhancing humor were positively correlated with problem-solving skills whereas aggressive humor and self-defeating humor were negatively correlated with problem-solving skills. The adaptive humor styles (affiliative r = -0.429, and self-enhancing r = -0.365) were negatively correlated with PSI, and positively correlated with maladaptive humor styles (aggressive r = 0.426, and self-defeating r = 0.323). At linear regression analysis, it was confirmed that humor styles were in correlation with EI and PSI. At binary logistic regression analysis, female gender (OR = 1.9), and possessing higher levels of problem-solving skills (OR = 1.058) and EI (OR = 1.011) were identified as independent factors for using adaptive dominant humor styles.