Cultural tightness reduces humor production: Evidence from multiple countries

We hypothesized and tested in six studies that cultural tightness-strong social norms and low tolerance for deviance in a culture-would influence people's sense of humor, particularly humor production. Studies 1 (N = 279) and 2 (N = 278) demonstrated that participants from a tight culture (China) scored lower on humor production compared with participants from a loose culture (the United States). Study 3 (N = 441) generalized the results to a broader sample involving three tight and two loose countries. Study 4 (N = 199) replicated the effect while examining a tight (but individualist) culture with a loose (but collectivist) culture. A mini meta-analysis showed that humor production is negatively related to cultural tightness but unrelated to collectivism. Studies 5a (N = 233) and 5b (N = 246) with priming found that cultural tightness hindered humor production. Drawing on cross-cultural evidence, the research unpacks culture and presents the first causal evidence of how cultural tightness influences humor. The findings have important implications for cultural understandings of humor and intercultural communication. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).