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The benefits of humor as an individual coping mechanism and a social lubricant
are well established. Humor helps people cope with pain and tragedy, reduces
social conflict and promotes group cohesion. But Lehmann-Willenbrock and Allen
explored whether humor in the workplace might also help a corporation boost its
bottom line .In a longitudinal investigation of team efficiency and productivity,
they evaluated humor patterns in the regular team meetings of two industrial
organizations in Germany, and then examined short-term and long-term
outcomes.
To assess humor patterns, Lehmann-Willenbrock and Allen first videotaped 54
different team meetings, each roughly forty-five minutes long, that collectively
involved over 350 employees. If you find work meetings to be arduous and dull,
you would not want to be on this research team, for the investigators then
watched all of those meeting tapes and coded the team interactions. They were
particularly interested in positive humor patterns, that is, upbeat, funny remarks
followed by laughter. They intentionally did not include negative humor (sarcasm,
put-downs) or failed humor (e.g., a joke followed by silence). After coding the
humor patterns, they then evaluated what happened after the laughter.
Lehmann-Willenbrock and Allen found that within the meetings, humor patterns
triggered problem-solving behaviors (e.g., what do you think about this
approach?), procedural suggestions (e.g., let's talk about our next step), and goal
orientation (e.g., we should target this issue). Humor patterns also promoted
supportive behaviors like praise and encouragement, and led to new ideas and
solutions.
It can reasonably be inferred that Lehmann-Willenbrock and Allen's study differed
from previous studies of humor in that it _________
A.considered international differences in workplace humor.
B.explored negative humor patterns as well as positive ones.
C.focused on humor's effect on the achievements of groups of people.
D.investigated the way humor affects people's responses to challenging situations.
重点单词：
assess [ə'ses] v. 估定，评定
mechanism ['mekənizəm] n. 机制，原理
social ['səuʃəl] adj. 社会的，社交的
conflict ['kɔnflikt] n. 冲突，矛盾，斗争，战斗
critical ['kritikəl] adj. 批评的，决定性的，危险的，挑剔的
lubricant ['lu:brikənt] n. 润滑剂
issue ['iʃju:] n. 发行物，期刊号，争论点
corporation [.kɔ:pə'reiʃən] n. 公司，法人，集团
orientation [.ɔ:rien'teiʃən] n. 信仰，趋向，定位，适应，情况介绍
established [is'tæbliʃt] adj. 已被确认的，确定的，建立的，制定的