Is the Joke on You? The Effect of Sexist and Non-Sexist Joking on Work-Related Outcomes

The proposed study aims to shed light on the effect of sexist and non-sexist jokes and how the perception of both types of jokes affects work-related outcomes via positive or negative affect. Previous studies have found that the gender of the teller of the joke plays an important role for joke perception, such that jokes that are told by males are perceived as less disruptive and are associated with higher status compared to female joke tellers (Evans et al., 2019). By looking at both the source of jokes and the receiver of jokes, the present study investigates gender as an important boundary condition to the effect of jokes via affective perceptions. Thus, paying attention to both teller-related and receiver-related aspects, the study simultaneously inspects teller-related (collaboration, perceived competence) and receiver-related outcomes (creativity, task performance).