Exploring the relationship between coping humor and subjective happiness: belongingness and forgiveness as serial mediators

Begum Satici

doi:10.5114/hpr.2020.97329

Autor

Begum Satici Artvin Coruh University

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5114/hpr.2020.97329

Słowa kluczowe:

subjective happiness, coping humor, belongingness, forgiveness, serial mediation

Abstrakt

Background
Positive psychology plays an important role in strengthening mental health. Nevertheless, the relationships between variables have not been clarified yet. The present study used an undergraduate sample to test a mediation-based model of the cross-sectional association of coping humor with subjective happiness, as serially mediated by belongingness and forgiveness.

Participants and procedure
A total of 306 valid participants (51.6% female and 48.4% male), ranging in age from 18 to 26, completed paper and pencil questionnaires assessing subjective happiness, coping humor, belongingness, and forgiveness. The bootstrapping procedure was used for serial mediation.

Results
The results indicated a significant and positive link among subjective happiness, coping humor, belongingness, and forgiveness. In addition, serial mediation analysis revealed that coping humor was associated with higher belongingness, which was associated with increased forgiveness, which were then associated with more subjective happiness. Therefore, coping humor was indirectly associated with more subjective happiness via belongingness and forgiveness, in a serial fashion.

Conclusions
These findings indicated that coping humor could help university students’ belongingness, and improve forgiveness, thereby enhancing their subjective happiness. We suggest possible prevention and intervention programs for increasing subjective happiness among individuals with low coping humor and suggest courses for future inquiry. We also discuss the theoretical and practical implications of these findings.

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