One of my more irreverent posts. If you haven’t already seen it, check out Part 1.
A few years ago I asked my students some peculiar questions as part of a voluntary anonymous survey. Besides getting their yes/no agreement, I also asked if the questions were funny (yes/no) and offensive (yes/no):
Last week, I posted the questions that more than half of the students said yes to. Here is the other half of the questions:
| Yes (%) | Offensive (%) | Funny (%) | |
| -Do you believe in reincarnation? | 44 | 3 | 3 |
| -Do you whiten your teeth? | 44 | 4 | 6 |
| -Do you drink milk out of the carton? | 43 | 6 | 10 |
| -Do you believe in ESP (extra sensory perception)? | 39 | 4 | 15 |
| -Do you believe in ghosts? | 35 | 2 | 16 |
| -Do you know who Peter North is? | 33 | 3 | 30 |
| -Do you put your socks on before your pants? | 29 | 1 | 39 |
| -Have you ever wet your bed as a college student? | 28 | 7 | 54 |
| -Do you dream in black and white? | 14 | 3 | 15 |
| -Do you know who Oliver North is? | 14 | 3 | 9 |
| -Do you believe in unicorns? | 12 | 2 | 47 |
| -Do you eat your boogers? | 7 | 13 | 49 |
…
……“I swear that I am not Peter North.”
Some observations:
-Across all the questions, there was a positive correlation (r = .47) between mean funniness and offensiveness ratings. That is, the more offensive the question was judged the funnier it was also judged.
-There are some really peculiar questions here.
-The responses to the bed wetting questions is the most disturbing to me.
– I don’t know what to make of the response to the unicorn question.
– My students are more likely to know a porn actor than a
…..
What do you notice?
……….One kind of Dutch Oven, but not the funny kind.