Based on a series of studies a new facet model of adult playfulness has been derived; it is argued that playfulness consists of (a) an other-directed; (b) a lighthearted; (c) an intellectual; and (d) a whimsical component (OLIW). The proposed structure was supported in exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses using several samples between n= 238 and n= 814. Correlations with other playfulness instruments and measures of broader personality traits were in the expected direction. Self- and peer-ratings of homologous scales were in the expected range (all ≥ .35; n = 120, ongoing data collection). The four scales were also positively related with averaged ratings of daily playful activities (over 14 days) of 364 adults; coefficients were between .33 and .35. Overall, the data are encouraging and may break the ground for a stronger consideration of research in playfulness as a personality trait in adults.

Besides aiming to measure a general “sense of humor”, specific tests have been developed to measure eight comic styles (sensu Schmidt-Hidding) and four humor styles (representing everyday functions of humor). The former comprises the eight comic styles of fun, humor, nonsense, wit, irony, satire, sarcasm, and cynicism. The latter measures two presumably adaptive humor styles (affiliative and self-enhancing) and two presumably maladaptive ones (aggressive and self-defeating). The present study investigates the self-peer convergence of these 12 styles in multitrait-multimethod analyses (i.e., 12 traits × 2 methods), employing one to two peer raters per participant. The findings revealed a good convergent validity for all comic and humor styles, except for the self-defeating humor style (< .30). Discriminant validity was high with two exceptions: Self-reported satire and sarcasm were also strongly related to peer-rated cynicism. Thus, the self-defeating humor style did show a low self-peer convergence, and the peers could hardly distinguish between the three rather criticizing comic styles of satire, sarcasm, and cynicism. Implications of these findings will be discussed.

The BENCOR (Ruch, 2012) is a 12-item self-report instrument for measuring benevolent and corrective humor. Benevolent humor describes a humorous outlook on life that entails the realistic observations of human weaknesses (and the imperfection of the world), but also their benevolent and forgiving humorous treatment. In contrast, corrective humor involves moral based ridicule; i.e., the use of mockery to fight badness and mediocrity. The English version of the scale was translated to Slovak language according to standard procedures including an independent back translation. Altogether 194 Slovak university students filled out a paper-and-pencil version of the questionnaire. Principal component analysis with direct oblimin rotation identified two factors that explained 45.84 % of the variance. The benevolent humor items had loadings ranging between .46 and .73, the corrective humor items had loadings ranging between .52 and .78 on the defining factors. The two scale were internally consistent (Cronbach`s α = .70/.77). Two items has somewhat lower item total correlations and were reworded. The scale with the refined items was administered to another sample of university students together with some validation criteria. The results and further applications will be discussed.

The objectives of this study were three fold. First, evaluation of the psychometric properties of the Macedonian version of the As-If-Scale (Renner et. al., 2008), next, comparison of the self-assessed wittiness with the ratings of peers, and finally, prediction of peer-rated wittiness by histrionic self- presentation style and (active) katagelasticism (Renner & Heydasch 2010, Ruch & Proyer 2009). MAP test and the parallel analysis led to an estimate of 1 component to retain for the Macedonian version of the As-If-Scale (103 participants; M = 18.51 years, SD = 1.01; 67 female, 36 male). To address the remaining objectives, a sample of 83 subjects (M = 17.70 years, SD = .49; 30 male, 53 female) from a high school in Macedonia was used. Students in each class rated all other students from their class how witty they are on a 4-point scale. There was only low positive correlation between self-assessed wittiness and peer-ratings of wittiness (r = .25, p < .05). Two hierarchical regression analyses revealed that gender (male), low (active) katagelasticism, and high histrionic self-presentation were all predictors of peer-rated wittiness scores. The discussion is mainly focused on the strengths and weaknesses of different methodologies used to assess who is humorous in the classroom.