The psychological role of “Auschwitz jokes”: humor as a coping strategy for the negative psychological consequences of traumatic historical exposure

Abstract Previous research has shown that exposure to traumatic history, such as visits to Holocaust memorials or death camps, can have detrimental effects on people’s psychological well-being. There is relatively little research showing how these negative consequences could be mitigated. Based on previous studies in which humor is an effective way to cope with stress and difficult situations, we tested how humor in memes can help cope with exposure to traumatizing historical content. An online experiment ( N = 197) was conducted in which we showed participants a video of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Museum and then tested their reactions depending on which memes they viewed (Holocaust-related vs. everyday life-related vs. no memes). The study found that individuals who effectively use humor as a coping mechanism and who view memes related to traumatic historical contents (such as Holocaust-related memes) experience a more positive mood after exposure to traumatic stimulus than those who watch everyday memes or no memes. Results suggest that humor may be an effective form of reducing the negative consequences of confrontations with traumatic historical contents.