When Is It Good to Be Able to Laugh at Yourself?

Picture this: Becky entered a restaurant, waving at the friends already seated. Much to her chagrin, she tripped over a chair on her way to join them, only just catching herself before hitting the floor.

Tripping over your feet, spilling your food, and calling someone by the wrong name are classic ways to embarrass yourself. So if you were Becky, what would you do? Pretend it didn’t happen, blush, or make a joke about your clumsiness?

The Benefits of Laughing at Yourself

As it turns out, according to Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam’s Selin Goksel and colleagues (2026), rather than just express your embarrassment or ignore the obvious, being able to laugh at yourself after committing a faux pas should be your method of choice.

There are two reasons for this. The first is that you recognize that your behavior violated social norms, in this case, maintaining your poise. The second is that you accept that the violation is benign, meaning that no one was hurt.

All of this is fine if no one actually does get hurt (other than yourself). What if Becky, in the process of nearly falling to the ground, managed somehow to tip over a wine glass perched on the table top? Wine went spilling everywhere, ruining the pristine white dress of the woman seated at the table. Not so funny anymore, is it?

Translating this problem into more academic terms, Goksel et al. note that “Theories of affective deviance argue that reputation is diminished when the valence of one’s emotional expression mismatches the valence of their actions” (p. 2). This mouthful simply means that people will resent you if your outward expression (humor) conflicts with the harm caused by your actions. Laughing implies you don’t care about outcome of your mishap.

There’s a hidden upside to a faux pas that you might not realize (again, assuming no one is harmed). People hate embarrassing themselves for obvious reasons. But if you do something embarrassing and admit it, you are actually strengthening your relationship with the people who see it happen.

Rather than fear that people will think less of you if you share your foibles, consider that they might actually like you even more. The one proviso is that in a truly benign situation, where no one is hurt, amusement is a “better emotionally calibrated” reaction, because it shows you don’t take yourself too seriously.

Testing Laughter’s Value as an Antidote to the Faux Pas

To test out the many factors that influence the best response to a bad situation, the author team conducted a series of six experiments involving just over 3200 people.

The first study in the set supported the theory that expressing amusement when no one is hurt is best for maintaining a person’s reputation. The experimenters asked participants to imagine attending a dinner party at a friend’s house and chatting with a cousin of the friend.

Each participant imagined one of 12 possible scenarios in which they would admit a blunder to this stranger. They included falling on a public street, giving a talk with one’s zipper unzipped, noticing a strong scent of body odor on oneself after a gym workout, snoring in a public theater, missing one’s mother’s birthday, and asking a woman who was not pregnant when her due date was.

To manipulate the actor’s reaction, the authors contrasted amusement with embarrassment in describing how the individual handled the situation. In the embarrassment condition, the scenario read that the actor “tends to look away and avoid eye contact with you. He/she also starts touching his/her face and you realize it is turning red.” In the amusement condition, the description read as follows: “As he/she is telling the story, he/she smiles and laughs at him/herself… you realize that he/she finds the situation funny.”

The findings of this study set the stage for the remaining studies which, altogether, showed that amusement won out over embarrassment in such judgments of the actor as warm, competent, and authentic, as long as the outcome caused little (e.g. zipper) vs. more (e.g. pregnant woman) harm.

Taking all the findings together, the authors constructed a model with character judgments of the offender as the final outcome. In this model, the display of amusement or embarrassment plus amount of harm predicted perceived emotional miscalibration and perceived embarrassment which, in turn, predicted how the actor was regarded by observers.

Embarrassment Essential Reads

Dealing with the Fear of Looking Dumb

How to Better Handle Embarrassing Moments

Why and When Laughing at Yourself Works

Clearly, if it’s a no harm-no foul situation, you are better off making yourself the butt of the joke. Indeed, by doing so, note the authors, you also give others permission to laugh as well, turning a cringe moment into one of shared positive emotions. All bets are off if someone does get hurt (even, potentially yourself, as in one of the studies).

One other reason laughter works in the case of a small blunder is that you also project a more authentic version of yourself to others than if you show embarrassment. Using humor about your failings means that you accept yourself, flaws and all. When you show embarrassment, it suggests you have something to hide. Becky’s ability to laugh at the restaurant incident would not only cut the tension, but also show that she doesn’t fear looking clumsy.

To sum up, as long as your blunders are of the innocent and minor variety, showing you don’t take yourself too seriously will not only neutralize the harm to your reputation, but allow your true self to show.