Masters Theses

Date of Award

5-1989

Degree Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts

Major

Psychology

Major Professor

Howard R. Pollio

Committee Members

Michael K. Smith, J. Albert Wiberly

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to determine how audience members react behaviorally and phenomenologically to comic performances. To evaluate the individual audience members listening to comic audiotape recordings, data were collected by means of direct observations of Ss' attending behavior and a thought-sampling procedure. There were a total of 57 individuals, divided into 12 different groups based upon the factors of Company (Friends/Strangers), Gender (male, female, mixed), Order (first, second), and Comedian (Cosby, Pryor).

For the behavioral data, correlations were computed between all possible pairs of categories, to evaluate natural clusters of audience reactions. These differences were evaluated statistically for both the behavioral and thought-sampling data using a four-factor analysis of variance. Results of the behavioral data indicate that the frequency with which an individual audience member laughs at a particular comic performance depends upon a number of factors, both singly and in combination. Results of the self-report data, indicate that Company and Comedian factors strongly influence how audience members react to the comic performances. The degree to which self-report and IV behavioral codings yield a similar picture of audience reactions indicate that total agreement values yielded an average of 63% and that Comedian and Company factors influence this dissociation between behavior and self-report. Finally, the overall pattern of results suggests that both comedian and audience effects strongly affect what audience members do and experience in regard to the comedians under both friends and strangers context.

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