New Research Says Being Funny Is Associated With High IQ

This shouldn’t come as a shock to any of you comedians out there, but a 2011 study conducted at the University of New Mexico found that funny people have above average intelligence.

The UNM study asked 400 psychology students to complete measures of abstract reasoning ability and verbal intelligence, then asked them to caption New Yorker cartoons. The ones rated as being funnier were authored by students who scored higher on tests of cognitive ability.

Another study, conducted the same way, came up with identical results. Going even further back, research published in the 1970s found that comedians scored higher on IQ tests than the average person. Males scored at around 138 and females scored around 126. To compare, the averages are 90 and 110 respectively.

It makes sense that this would be the case. People with a good sense of humor tend to be able to creatively think about the world around them and easily come up with new ideas and memes. To assume their intellect is higher isn’t that much of a stretch.

I like to think I’m pretty funny myself, and I also think I’m pretty damn smart, so this makes perfect sense.