Parents Just Don’t Understand
A study by Washington University at St. Louis showed that old people find it difficult to “get” what’s funny. The study had undergrads and AARP-ers attempt to complete jokes and cartoon strips by picking the correct punchline from a group of options. From BBC News Online:
Huh. Judging from the jokes my parents email me nonstop, I always thought this kind of humor was only understood by old people.
One such joke in the test was: “A businessman is riding the subway after a hard day at the office. A young man sits down next to him and says, ‘Call me a doctor, call me a doctor’. The businessman asks, ‘What’s the matter, are you sick?’.
The participants were expected to correctly identify the punch line as: “The young man says, ‘I just graduated from medical school’.”
Huh. Judging from the jokes my parents email me nonstop, I always thought this kind of humor was only understood by old people.
comments
submit a comment07.13.07 at 12:07 pm
yeah, thats really not funny at all. calling it a joke is really a stretch.
07.13.07 at 12:07 pm
A whole new generation of old comedians (who can’t tell a joke to completion) now have Alheimzer’s to thank for their late-blooming comedy careers! Thank you degenerative brain diseases!
07.16.07 at 12:07 pm
They can’t find the punchline, because there isn’t one! This joke sucks. When my Grandfather (a retired doctor) told my non-Jewish boyfriend that he’ll circumsize him for free—I realized that even though he’s 86, his humor game is STILL ON.