Laughing Through Attachment: How Our Bonds Shape Humor

Using both dimensional and categorical approaches to assess attachment, we examined how attachment patterns relate to four humor styles (affiliative, self-enhancing, self-defeating, and aggressive). The results revealed significant associations between the two variables.

Specifically, attachment anxiety was positively correlated with self-defeating humor and negatively with self-enhancing humor, while attachment avoidance was linked to aggressive humor. From a categorical perspective, fearful attachment was found to be associated with both aggressive and self-defeating humor, while preoccupied attachment was notably related to self-defeating humor. The study also validated the Relationship Scale Questionnaire among a sample of Tunisians (N = 162), thereby supporting the robustness of the two-dimensional attachment model through confirmatory factor analysis.