Die verband tussen kognitiewe buigsaamheid en humorsin by adolessente

[摘要] English: The purpose of this investigation was to determine whether a relationship exists between cognitiveflexibility and a sense of humour. By means of a literature study it was shown that a theoretical linkdoes, indeed, exist between the abovementioned two constructs. Predictive variables such as sex andcultural group were discussed in terms of the extent to which they influence a sense of humour andcognitive flexibility. The research population consists of 392 adolescents, 205 African languagespeakers, and 187 Afrikaans speakers. Thorson and Powell's (1993a) Multidimensional Sense ofHumour Scale (MSHS), was used to measure humour, while cognitive flexibility was measured using theCognitive Flexibility Scale (CBS) of Martin and Rubin (1995).The results found that Afrikaans speaking adolescents demonstrating high levels of cognitive flexibilityalso present with high levels of humour. Conversely, African language speaking adolescents with highlevels of cognitive flexibility demonstrated a low level of humour. These differences can be explained asfollows. The validity of the questionnaires for African language speakers can be questioned, seeing asthese learners responded in a second language. The nature of certain questions was relatively abstract,and furthermore bound to a future perspective, that may be difficult to align within a collectivistic culture.The CBS questionnaire is standardised for Western cultures and this may have influenced the results.Assuming that the results are reliable, a possible explanation may be found in the propertiesdistinguishing individualistic and collectivistic cultures. If social cognitive flexibility in an Africa culturedisplays a low value dimension in terms of thought patterns, and enjoys low priority in terms of socialsystems, then this phenomena can be partly understood on this basis.

[发布机构] University of the Free State