Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums GT Research Humor - A Faculty of the Gifted

After having undergone several evaluations to determine intellectual capacity, I noticed something that remained consistent in all prerequisite checklists for further evaluation, 'a keen sense of humor.�

How important is this quality in regards to intelligence, and what makes it so complex? Not to brag, I'll often say something that I don't mean to be taken as funny, and people swear it's the funniest thing...and when I actually try to be funny people either boo me, don't get it, or call me weird. What makes this aspect of human faculty unique to the gifted experience?

DS6 has understood sarcasm since diapers. He has an extremely dry sense of humor and things just pop out. He's extremely sarcastic and I must admit understands humor better than many adults I know.

DS7 taught DS4(then just 3yo) how to use air quotes for laughs.

It was hilarious to see a 3yo not only being sarcastic, but punctuating it with the dreaded air quotes! Just ridiculous!

Humor is one of the reasons I suspected DS4 might be GT. He's just very aware of social cues and is skilled at using humor to fit in, especially with a group of older kids.

I think a keen sense of humour is on a lot of giftedness checklists because a lot of humour relies on the ability to see connections between seemingly disparate things; witty wordplay relies on a capacious vocabulary, while allusive humour relies on a broad enough general knowledge to have something to which to allude!

It's a joke a minute around here, but I just have to share one or two with you:

There's a breakfast cereal in Canada called Shreddies (don't think it's available in the States? but you have something similar--Chex, is it? little woven squares of whole wheat, anyway). Frenchie has been eating this stuff twice daily for over 50 years (shudder), so any news on the Shreddies front is of interest in our household. This last autumn, they had an advertising shtick saying that Shreddies were a new improved diamond shape (rotated the photo on the box)--Diamond Shreddies Good New Exciting, Square Shreddies Bad Old Boring.

All this by way of preamble to 7yo Harpo's joke, that the theme music for Diamond Shreddies should be the Jewel Song from Faust.

Groucho (5) was looking at a Georgia O'Keeffe painting the other day (one of the cattle skull ones), and said, "I know what that cow's name was." "What," say I, "Yorick," says he.

(I think they're really funny, but you can see why the other kids don't get them; I'm afraid that their humour is not really helping them fit in at this point.)

One more funny--this past summer, Harpo kept wandering around saying "these are prime times, yes, sir, these are prime times." I finally asked him what he was on about, and he told me that until Daddy's birthday in the fall, all five of us were prime-number years old, and that he didn't see that this was likely ever to happen again, unless we lived to be really, really old.

peace
minnie

PS, landsgenesis2, I see you haven't been around here too long, so welcome from me! Hope you'll enjoy it here--I certainly have. We're glad you're here!

Yes, welcome landgen2! I liked minnimarx's description as to why humor is on the checklists. What I have found IRL is that all my best friends are people who "get my jokes."

Very funny minnimarx! I can see you and your children are on a different plane of gifted from me - i was thinking Jewel the pop singer sang something from Faust and i finally got the joke after googling.

We call 'em shredded wheat down here. Very original.

Dear Pauli,

It's not a "different plane of gifted" at all! It's just a different CD collection! (And the lads only got interested in my Gounod CDs after reading Tintin--Bianca Castafiore's "signature" aria is the Jewel Song, so they get some of their cultural awareness from comic books!!!)

peace
minnie

Ha ha! I forgot about bianca, silly me. It's been awhile since i read tin tin. My DS5 has a different comic (cartoon) collection for his knowledge (not so much cultural awareness) - scooby doo! He was looking at my scrabble letters last night, and I had T-O-X-blank-N. He said "I think that spells toxin." I asked how he knew that, and he said, "From one of my scooby doo movies!"

My 10 year old son says funny things that sometimes take me a few minutes to get. Sometimes I can't stop laughing and I am somewhere where you are supposed to be quiet and he will say something like "Mom, are you okay? It really wasn't that funny." and he will look at me with a serious look on his face and tell me that it might help to bite my tongue and if that doesn't work, and then he gets an even more serious look on his face and puts his hands on my shoulders, he says very seriously "think about the stimulus package."

His humor is not limited to wordplay. He uses accents and sometimes different voices and physical humor and acts out funny improv things that he makes up and he does not break character, even though he is looking them straight in the eye and they are laughing.

He uses a lot of sarcasm in his humor, especially with his adult sister and she has the same problem that I do with some of his jokes. Sometimes it takes a few minutes to realize what he said and she'll call him back and tell him he needs to be sent to brat camp.

He uses a lot of self-deprecating humor like describing himself as a freak and a geek and a big mix of disorders and syndromes and he will make up some that he doesn't have--like alien hand syndrome which of course he acts out or Tourettes which he says he has a form of (he doesn't) that leaves him with no control over some of the funny things he says--the words just pop out of his mouth.

He uses humor to mediate fights between his sister and her boyfriend. Recently she called to complain to her brother that her boyfriend would not get her something to drink when she asked him to and she always did things for him and he just didn't get that it would be nice if he would do things for her once in a while. She was on speaker phone so her boyfriend could hear her and she told her brother that she was going to break up with her boyfriend over this because she was tired of him not doing anything for her and she thought her 10 year old brother would offer some support. He told her to calm down, and no she wasn't going to break up with him and he would try to help her if he could. Then he gave her step by step instructions on how to fix the drink and said he was reading the instructions from "How to Fix a Drink by Yourself for Dummies" and he would send her a copy of the book if she needed it. There was more to it that I can't remember but he got his sister laughing and she forgot about being mad.

And I think he looks at life like it is one big humorous soap opera. He calls it "Unhappy Days" and sometimes he makes up the script for the day's show in the backseat of the car as we are driving. When he has a choice between laughing or crying he will always choose to laugh and in doing so he makes other people laugh, taking their minds off of problems.

Yes! One of the stand out clues for us that DD 26 mos. was different was that she had an adult-ish sense of humor from as soon as she could laugh, and especially around 10 months. Somehow, our DD, as a baby, would laugh at things that were genuinely out of place, uncommon, or ironic. She wasn't telling jokes yet, but she saw humorous situations at a very early age.

Other babies would laugh at new things, like seeing the pillow on the couch, but our DD somehow seemed to be able to zero in on the incongruities in the environment at a time where everything *should* seem all new. We could not figure that out.

She is now cracking jokes, changing the words to songs, and showing off her physical comedy.

I am glad to find this thread. I have also wondered if my kids sense of humor is a family attribute or a GT attribute. DD10 has a great timing when it comes to one liners and sarcasm.

My favorite memory is from her toddler years. She was eating a snack of fruit and cubed cheese. She was making a tower from the cheese and purposely not lining up the cubes well. I observed for a while as she was looking if the tower would fall over and asked what she was doing. Her response was: "Look Mom, it's the Leaning Tower of Cheesa". She must have heard about the leaning tower of Pisa somewhere, but I didn't recall talking about it.

Jen

We were told at the beginning of this school year by DD6's kindergarten teacher that many of her classmates didn't get her humor. I asked DD about it and her reply was "yeah, I know they don't get it but Mrs. H. (teacher) does."

My 13 month old already has a great sense of humor and can get us laughing everytime. Of course this is all with body language, as her verbal skills are not to the understandable stage yet.

I love that DS5 has the SAME sense of humor as I do... at least someone gets my jokes!

I agree with the connection. DS's favorite first books were Amelia Bedelia.

Sense of humor or wittyness does seem a common trait among the gifted. We often say 2 negatives make a positive w/regard to our jokester DS6 since my husband and I are serious.

Yes, I have two little comedians over here, so they keep me on my toes and make me laugh too. Life is a blessing!

DS7 made up some joke today with a punchline about Crystal Pepsi.

I mostly laughed because it was so COMPLETELY RANDOM! I have no idea where this one came from!

He wanted to go to DS4's pre-K and tell all the adults there. Happily, I think he forgot by the time we got there.

Lucky adults!

LOL!

Weird!

Tracey LOL!

Kriston, very funny! Where does he get this stuff?

I want to hear the joke!!
Ds' latest round of jokes has come in the form of doing 'exactly' what he is asked...exactly.

LOL, Chris! I don't even remember it because it was so completely random.

Of course he thought he was hilarious. His little brother wanted to hear the joke, but he refused to tell it "because only adults will get the reference," he said.

(I didn't have the heart to tell him that I got the reference, but not the joke!)

I talked to my daughter today about her little brother. I am rarely able to talk to anyone without him hearing me and he is at a birthday party playing paintball for the first time with friends.

My daughter often calls her little brother and puts him on speaker phone when she is with her friends, ages 27-30. I always thought she was just kind of showing him off, but today she told me that her friends ask her to call him so they can listen to him because they think he's funny.

She thinks if he were in school that kids would like him because of his sense of humor. She says she is sure that girls would like him. She said she remembers when she was in middle school that the smart, funny guys sometimes had better looking girlfriends than some of the jocks. But she went to a city school and not a small town sports obsessed school.

A few weeks or so ago, her 27 year old boyfriend asked her to call her brother and ask him why there were so many people standing in line at Game Stop at midnight. My son said "tell E that it was probably because ? was just released and then tell him you want to know what he was doing out in that part of town at midnight without you." He puts on this act like he is the protective older brother instead of the 10 year old kid he is. They find it hilarious, especially since my daughter's boyfriend is about 6'3" and a bodybuilder.

Exactly. It works in small towns, too. Girls turn 17 and some start thinking about the real world. Going out every weekend, getting drunk, picking fights, telling the same jokes over and over again, and their jock BF who has no future because he never studies and is actually pretty dull - it gets pretty old. Along comes a kid, destined for college, actually looks beyond her looks and clothes and makes funny stories and makes the world an interesting place. She sees that goofy nerd will be a good looking guy in another year or two. Besides, his comments give her something to laugh about when she is all by herself.

ok.... here it is DS7's lastest joke


Why do they call him "Bernie Madoff"? 'cause he "made off" with his investors money.

PA-dum dum...... He'll be here all week folks... try the veal!

ROFLPIMP!!! good one!

ok I got the rofl.... but what is the pimp?

There is your first clue!!!!

LOL..good one!!!

i guess i should as the 7 year old.....lol

"Peeing in my pants"

ok... ok.... yeah. see he would get that...... but i need to be drawn a picture

We can't do that, it would be obscene!

unless you did it with good light... then it's art....lol

(See i can make that joke cause i'm an artist.....)

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

You're on quite a roll today, Soup! Nice!

Alright. Lots and lots of feedback, and very funny testimonials as well. Thank all of you guys for helping me clarify that humor represents a critical aspect of intelligence, especially in children.

Thank you for asking the question. I enjoyed reading these stories.

When you say that humor represents a critical aspect of intelligence I really believe that is true. I think humor is almost another learning style for my son. When he learns something, he often relates it to something else in a funny way.

For example, yesterday I was in the car with my daughter and 10 year old son when my son asked if we could stop by a fast food restaurant. My daughter didn't order a drink because she thought her brother would share, like he always used to when she would ask.

This time when she asked for a drink of his Dr. Pepper, he said "No, why didn't you order your own when you had the chance?" and "Is this the latest version of "Brother can you spare a dime" (a song that became the anthem of the Great Depression). I said "Just give her a drink." He said Oh, so I don't really have a choice here. Isn't this like some kind of socialism, which you say you don't agree with? I don't really own anything and no matter what I do or what they didn't do I have to share with them (I guess he felt that he had done all the work by being successful in talking me into stopping at the restaurant and his sister didn't "earn" her drink because she didn't bother to order anything).

His sister wanted to know what happened to the sweet little bubba she used to know. I told her he was starting to go through p-u-b-e-r-t-y and she wasn't exactly a sweet little kid when she went through it.

Lori-
That's "my" DS10 you're talking about!! We were just on vacation driving around(for a long time) looking for a restaurant when our DS broke into a spur of the moment improv(with accent) and he kept going & going while we were driving & driving!

A few years back my DS was at my Mom's and when I called to check on him he answered the phone with a french accent acting like I called a restaurant instead. He would not break character and "I'm embarrassed to admit" he had me going for awhile thinking I misdialed.

I asked him if he ever does his characters for his friends and he said no, that they wouldn't think it was funny. He said he works instead on seeing if he can make me and his dad laugh.

Austin & Lori-
Thanks for your bits of wisdom. My DS10 and I just had this conversation last night regarding his best buddy that "gets all the girls"! I'm going to share this with him so he can hear it from someone other than "just mom". How does that go, "An expert comes from 100 miles away and carries a briefcase." You may not have briefcases, but your my experts!!

Last time I spoke with DS8's principal - who to this day refuses to utter the word "gifted" - he commented on what a great sense of humor DS has, and that he has seen instances in which an adult will crack a joke to another adult and he can see DS react, whereas the rest of the kids have no clue what's going on.

So I printed off lists of gifted characteristics from 4 different sources, highlighted the "sophisticated humor" lines, and mailed it to him with a letter suggesting that he might recognize these traits in DS and some of his peers.

He has never acknowledged it.

I think my son's sense of humor might possibly get him into trouble if he isn't careful. I don't think I would want him to say what he said today at a friend's house or at church. We were doing an online vocabulary quiz and the word irascible came up. He saw that irritable was one of the choices and he said "ir-ass-ible? Well, the first part of word sounds like it could be a portmanteau of the words irritable and that word Dad calls me sometimes that comes after the word smart.

That is funny, LOL.

That reminds me of DD10. She got dressed in a hurry the other day and came into the living room with the pockets of her pants sticking inside out. I pointed this out to her and she said: "Oh, maybe I'm starting a new trend with Obama flags" and then fixed the pockets. It took me a minute to figure out she was making a comment about Hoover flags during the Great Depression. When I finally laughed out loud, I saw a smirk on her face because she knew I "got it".

Jen

Have to share this: I worked with a couple of very gifted sixth-grade girls, "H" and "N", back in 2007, and I was aware that H had quite a crush on me. So H and I are playing chess one day, N sitting by patiently waiting to play the winner, and H makes a move and calls "check". I look around the board for a minute and say "actually, I think that's mate" - and N, totally deadpan, quips "Well, looks to ME like that's what's going on here." H was completely mortified and turned the brightest shade of red I've ever seen. For my part, I literally fell off my chair laughing.

I love this thread!!! DD has also had a sarcastic streak since she could speak. One other thing I have always found unusual about her vs. her 16 cousins, is that she will ask me why things are funny. She dissects humor. It can make me crazy because I just want to say "because it is" but it's all part of the ride :-)

DD's always had a good sense of humor. I don't remember how old she was but it was definitely before she was 1 she started laughing socially. As in if all the adults were laughing she's start doing this fake little laugh, it's great! DD has always laughed a lot and she did that pretty short after birth. Her current favorite funny thing to do if to put sunglasses on inside the house while we sing and dance to "I wear my sunglasses at night..".

Both DH and I have pretty good senses of humor. Many people have actually told DH he could be a stand up comedian and for me I normally am more writing orientated with it (as in funny emails, stories, etc.).