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In today's personality stakes, nothing is more highly valued than a sense of humor.
如今，人的性格因素中沒有其他因素能比幽默感更受推崇。
We seek it out in others and are proud to claim it in ourselves, perhaps even more than good looks or intelligence.
我們在他人身上尋求幽默感，同時也因自己具有幽默感而感到驕傲，或許擁有幽默感更勝于擁有姣好的外貌或智慧。
If someone has a great sense of humor, we reason,
如果一個人極富幽默感，
it means that they are happy, socially confident and have a healthy perspective on life.
我們推測這意味著這類人的生活是幸福的、在社會交際中是自信的、對生活的態度是健康積極的。
This attitude would have surprised the ancient Greeks, who believed humor to be essentially aggressive.
這種看法可能會使那些認為幽默是具有攻擊性質的古希臘人感到驚訝。
And in fact, our admiration for the comically gifted is relatively new and not very well-founded,
事實上，我們對于幽默這種喜劇天賦的推崇贊美才剛剛開始，并沒有多少根據。
says Rod Martin, a psychologist at the University of Western Ontario.
西安大略大學的一位名叫羅德·馬丁的心理學家表示
Being funny isn't necessarily an indicator of good social skills and well-being, his research has shown.
他的研究顯示：風趣幽默未必說明一個人具有良好的社交技巧并且生活幸福。
It may just as likely be a sign of personality flaws.
它有可能正是人格缺陷的一種跡象。
He has found that humor is a double-edged sword.
他發現幽默是一把雙刃劍。
It can forge better relationships and help you cope with life,
幽默感可以使人與人之間的關系更加融洽同時讓你輕松應對生活；
or it can be corrosive, eating away at self-esteem and irritating others.
或者它可以具有“腐蝕性”，蠶食掉你的自尊并且激怒他人。
It's a form of communication, like speech, and we all use it differently, says Martin.
馬丁說，幽默感是交流的一種形式，就像演講一樣，我們使用幽默感的方式都各不相同。
We use bonding humor to enhance our social connections,
我們用迎合式幽默來提升我們的社交關系，
but we also may employ it as a way of excluding or rejecting an outsider.
但我們也可以借此來排斥或拒絕一個異己。
Though humor is essentially social, how you use it says a lot about your sense of self.
雖然幽默具有社交性的本質特點，但是如何運用幽默很大程度上反映了一個人的自我感知。
Those who use self-defeating humor, making fun of themselves for the enjoyment of others,
那些運用自嘲式幽默取笑自己娛樂他人的人，往往對自身持有那種敵意，
tend to maintain that hostility toward themselves even when alone.
即使當他們孤身一人時也是如此。
Similarly, those who are able to view the world with amused tolerance are often equally forgiving of their own shortcomings.
同樣地，那些能夠以自娛式的寬容眼光看待世界的人也往往很容易寬恕自己的缺點。
